First of all, you may have been reading some of my tweets and are perplexed as to why I'm cheering for the Jets so much (because I am indeed a Leafs fan). Let's just say that with all this flurry of excitement in our city (or should I say Fleury of excitement... more on that in a bit), you would have trouble not falling for it too. I wasn't around for the previous Jets era and had no clue about details of their move to Phoenix and how that affected the fans. Now that I'm in the thick of things, it just hits that much harder (especially after watching Jets documentaries featuring their hay days and their last days; Google White Noise and Fuelled By Passion).
I went to their first game since 1996, albeit exhibition, and was blown away by the atmosphere. I've only been to one NHL game before this, and that was back at the turn of the millennium at the ACC (the Leafs beat the Sabres 5-2, Jonas Hogland had two goals I believe. Loved it). I also just went to see their first regular season win against the Penguins. Kyle Wellwood scored 8 SECONDS into the game! After that, Marc-André Fleury (the Penguins' goaltender) had no chance at credibility with the fans. "FLEUR-REEE... FLEUR-REEE" in a mocking tone, rang up in the rafters and throughout the entire arena the whole game. Chill worthy. It was extremely satisfying for all of Winnipeg that the Jets finally got a win under their belt. Their poor start had us choked and for some... extremely upset (I won't name any names)!
With our half home season package, we didn't get the home opener against Montreal, which was disappointing... but I think we got the better end of the deal. We get a more variety of teams to see plus first dibs at playoff tickets (here's HOPING)! However, Brian Kennedy from L.A. (a best-selling author who is also my Mom's sister-in laws' brother...) received a last minute media pass and got to experience the epic occasion, reliving it with us after! He stayed at our place over the weekend and reported on the home opener weekend for insidehockey.com. He wrote about everything that concerns having them back in Winnipeg. Including a story that I was going to post regarding my Dad's account of acquiring our season's ticket package; but I'll let Brian tell it to you (it's in Part 2). His six-part article series is called Winnipeg Odyssey and can be found here: http://insidehockey.com/author/brian-kennedy.
Anyways, the Jets are BACK and Winnipeg is loving it!
Ciao for now!
p.s. Enjoy this little depiction of the previous Jets era:
