Game #5-San Jose Sharks

San Jose Sharks vs. LA Kings
HP Pavilion
April 1, 2008

Thanks to a close college buddy, Greg Kopotic, he was able to hook us up with amazing HP seats about 10 rows from the glass. These are the perfect seats to see a hockey game, above the glass but close enough to see the eye color of the players. I didn't expect much from my home team in the game…the Sharks were playoff bound with an amazing team headed by Joe Thorton and solid tending by Evenjai Nabokov, the Kings are almost last in the NHL. But I was solid, had my 70’s gold Kings jersey on and was one of maybe 4 Kings fans in the entire arena. The game was somewhat close until the 3rd when the Sharks started to really pull away, but that didn’t diminish the fun we were having. Several beers in, I noticed the TV announcer was sitting right next to me. Well what else could I do? I was a bit buzzed, the Kings were losing, how about getting the entire arena to boo me! I scooted over to the announcer and started jumping up and down (mind you he was on the jumbo tron at the time) and “pimping” my jersey…giving the number 1 sign and pointing to the Kings logo…the place went nuts! My friends from college were a bit embarrassed, but hey what are true fans supposed to do??? Sharks won 5-2, but it was still a blast.

Notes on the arena: HP is really nice, a lot of Sharks inspired art and fixtures. The best part of the pavilion is the giant shark head hanging from the ceiling.