The QMJHL semifinals promised to be crazy. It is the case. I was at the Videotron Center on Sunday afternoon and freaked out.
Apologies to the regular Remparts fans who don’t miss a game and who get chills every night. I, it’s not my case.
Since they came back 26 years ago (I was 9 at the time) I must have seen almost 200 games. It’s always nice evenings, it’s very rare that I feel what I felt on Sunday.
The same shivers that run through me when I walk into Fenway Park, when I’m at the Bell Center and the two young Canadian flag bearers jump onto the ice to the music of U2, when Alexander Radulov and Angelo Esposito juniors dominate hockey in 2006 in the old Colosseum in Quebec.
It feels good
There was something bigger than usual for hockey in Quebec on Sunday and it felt good. We deserve it. I’m too young to know the Nordiques, and I dare only imagine how lucky Quebecers have been to experience this often.
That’s why it was different on Sunday:
– It was not easy to go to the Videotron center. The car park at Fleur de Lys was occupied an hour and a half before the game, as was the lot in the ramp between Soumande street and the mall. Thousands of supporters didn’t want to walk in the mud and cross the highway.
– Half and half was $94,639, nine times more than some nights.
– The prelude, in the dark, with the light effects, the noise, a record setting in the history of the league in the playoffs that are displayed on the scoreboard, then the little message from Patrick Roy to cheer everyone up, it was amazing .
–And the expansion was amazing. Apparently 17,000 people rode each Remparts player once they left their zone. And it’s been a long time since I’ve heard so many mass onomatopoeia: Oh! Ah! Ha! It sounded like the sounds recorded while playing hockey video games. I’ve rarely heard that anywhere but in an NHL playoff game. Quebec’s supporters are strong.
young people under pressure
“I’ve never experienced such an atmosphere here,” said my colleague Kevin Dubé, who has been following the activities of the Remparts for nine years. And about the pressure that can mean: “When we played at a Midget tournament in Rimouski and there were 500 people, we were stressed. Imagine her! he told me.
That’s so true. We often forget, but these guys are 17 to 20 years old. You were pee not so long ago. It’s impressive to see them put on such a show with so much pressure on their shoulders.
The audience plays a role, that’s clear.