From Mason to McConnell: Jackets Make History

For seven seasons, this city has craved this evening. 654 contests had been played… 132 players had skated Nationwide Arena’s ice… 91 draft selections had been made… Nine were top ten selections… Five players had served as captain… Three logos had been utilized… And an owner and chairman had passed away…

With one point separating the Blue Jackets from their initial playoff experience, I anticipated an electric evening… As I walked the bricks, over the bridge, down the stairs, and toward the Frog Bear and Wild Boar, I was stunned… The bricks were silent… Granted, the temperature was imperfect and the Blue Jackets were in Chicago… Still, I expected activity… I expected recognition for the importance of this evening (I would locate that recognition later)…

When I arrived at the Frog Bear and Wild Boar, I recognized a cache of empty chairs… The Arena District’s premiere pre-game venue was vacant, only a scattered array of fans were enjoying dinner with friends, entertaining the bartenders, or watching the contest… And the contest, for the first period, was not worth watching… Fourteen minutes into the contest, the Blackhawks inked the initial salvo… Five minutes later, they registered a 2-0 lead (Apparently, the Blue Jackets didn’t recognize the importance of this evening either)…

Amidst this frustration, I was thankful for two conversations… The first with Frog Bear and Wild Boar Owner Tom Selvaggio… The second with Grace, who is a server… The round robin of our comments, mostly centering on the Blue Jackets and how, given the present circumstances, playing their way into another premature vacation was entirely possible, was completely enjoyable…

The second period’s commencement mirrored the conversation… After twenty-five minutes, the Blue Jackets closed within 2-1… They evened the contest three minutes later and as I walked the still silent bricks to R Bar, the obvious thought in my head, must have been obvious in everyone else’s as well… We are thirty minutes away… Don’t mess this up…

As I walked across the bridge and toward R Bar, the scene was what I had expected… The venue was crushed… The crowd was chanting, they were groaning, they were exalting and exhaling with every second… Yes, ABC6 and a Dispatch photographer were present, but the media wasn’t the patrons’ inspiration… Erasing their past was…

That past reappeared again, as five minutes after my arrival, the Blackhawks reassumed command 3-2. Was this scenery a titanic tease? Would this energy, which finally rivaled a football Saturday, be wasted? Would the Blue Jackets and their partisans have to count on the Detroit Red Wings to engrave their postseason invitation?

For almost fifteen minutes, those questions remained unanswered… Not for lack of inspiration from those watching… The chants, which included “Let’s Go Jackets” on numerous occasions, were exhilarating… This was the crowd I had anticipated… This was the crowd this franchise merited… An educated, exuberant mass crammed into a venue, which on this evening, was the ultimate hockey bar…

With ticks over five minutes remaining, the educated, exuberant mass finally received reason to explode… A trickling puck, which seemed unsalvageable, found the stick of Rick Nash… Who better to clinch the playoffs? Who better to score the goal? And he did… 3-3… The venue erupted…

That eruption would be trumped only minutes later when history was made… Within a glance, I couldn’t surmise if this was New Year’s Eve or simply a new hockey era… Fans cheered and hugged… I saw multiple couples kiss… The chant progressed from “Let’s Go Jackets” to “Lets Go Playoffs.” This crowd was delirious…

But, they were not satisfied… Amidst a chant of “Let’s Get Two,” the verdict was clear… They wanted a win… Overtime elapsed… The first shootout participants elapsed… Then, Fedor Tyutin scored… Steve Mason registered a final save… And the perfect conclusion was authored… As the crowd celebrated and cheered, the most poignant chant, one I had not considered, but savored hearing occurred… “J.H.M.”

In the post triumph pandemonium, it’s easy to forget that the person most responsible for hockey in Columbus wont witness the initial playoff contest… As many fans dedicate this penultimate accomplishment to Mason or Nash or Ken Hitchcock, they should remember John McConnell as well…