Fans would display this item before and during the game, and the view from the lower bowl was pretty amazing.

The game on Saturday night was something special.  Honoring Shane Doan, one of the most loyal and hardest working hockey players out there, was definitely a big deal.

Besides honoring Doan, there was a scene that I witnessed Saturday night that brought me back our first visit to the arena.  The packed house where the Coyotes fans outnumbered the visitors.

It was by far, one of the best game the Coyotes have played since the lockout.  Besides the penalty calls (and lack of them for obvious infractions), having the team kill off a 6-0n-3 with 45 seconds remaining was short of spectacular.  Seeing the crowd display their fleece blankets during those waning minutes brought us back to our first game.

So, Coyotes’ head coach Dave Tippett has this team playing extremely well.  Many people are seeing that Tippett’s coaching prowess and comparing this experience to Wayne Gretzky’s tenure here.   I saw a fan almost having his head ripped off for stating his thoughts about Gretzky’s coaching to a very drunk L.A. Kings fan wearing the jersey from circa 1992. Luckily, the drunk fan had a friend (who was also drunk) push him away from certain jail time.

Usually, about this time in the season, when the Coyotes are showing that they are a good hockey team, something from the press comes in to derail the party, hoping to distract this team.  What we’ve seen though, is this team cannot be distracted, or Tippett tries his best to keep the distractions outside the locker room.

One can say that tonight’s game is a huge game for the Coyotes.  What does Tippett say?

“Every game for me is the biggest game of the year; (today) is the next one”

quoted in Arizona Republic

He has done a masterful job keep the team focused on the job at hand.  Besides many of the criticisms leveled at Gretzky (some fair, some not), the problem with having such a high profile coach is that when something goes awry, (Rick Tocchet gambling, Jeremy Roenick leaving the team for a beer, the ownership issues) the media is all over it.  I can only think that some of those distractions found their way into the locker room.

I always wondered if the media stuff was exposed when the Coyotes were doing well.  Then, the team lost its focus because no longer were we talking hockey, but the distractions instead.  When John Tortorella was with the Tampa Bay Lightning, he had a skill to take the heat for his team.  Gretzky didn’t have this skill.  Tortorella thrived on the conflict whereas Gretzky sometimes avoided it.

I liked Gretzky while he was here, but it is clear now he didn’t have his coaching chops.  He couldn’t keep the distractions away and that’s the main difference.

So today, they face the number one team in the West the San Jose Sharks.  This will be a good test as they face adversity on the road.  I don’t buy the idea that this team will implode by the all-star/olympic break.  However, they do have to prove that they won’t.

It’s up to the team and Tippett’s staff to not allow that to happen.

In 2003, we saw the Lightning survive the first round of the playoffs and move on, only to get eliminated in the second.  In 2004, they won the Stanley Cup.  In 2004-2005, there was a work stoppage and we arrived in Arizona during the summer of 2005 to adopt the home team as our own.  We still kept tabs on the crew out East, and learned through painful experience that after that Cup run, they became a shell of its former self.

The connections between the two clubs were somewhat tangential.  Former Coyotes assistant coach John Tortorella was the head coach of the Lightning and turned that ship right around, and the goaltender of record for both playoff runs (inluding the Cup run of 2004) was Nikolai Khabibulin.

As expected, after winning the Stanley Cup, his contract was up and he wanted a pay raise.  Unfortunately, he had competition between three young players and a savvy defenseman (Vinny Lecavalier, Martin St. Louis, Brad Richards, and Danny Boyle respectively).

Now, the Bolts are not the same club.  It seems that Steven Stamkos is the goal scorer and Lecavalier and St. Louis are struggling to put the puck in the net.  Welcome to aging boys, it’s hell, eh?

Believe it or not, as fun as it is to wax nostaligic over times gone by, the purpose of today’s thought processes are truly not related to the Lightning.  Rather, it’s the goalter Khabibulin.

When Khabibulin went to the Lightning, his preparation routine was coffee and cigarrettes before the game.  Someone over there (Jeff Reese perhaps) drilled some sense into the often quizzical netminder to get healthy or get prepared to be shipped out.  He had a bad stretch of games during his Cup run, but got it together at the right time.

Now, after leaving the goaltending carousel in Chicago, he finds himself in Edmonton, playing with the Oilers franchise with an incredible history.  He might have been one answer for their aspirations for another visit in the Stanley Cup Finals.  Plus, it would have been pretty cool to see him play yet again against the club he shared the goaltending load with many seasons ago.

Unfortunately, it may not happen.  It looks like Khabibulin has back issues…and is day-to-day missing his start against the Blackhawks on Sunday.

The Desert Dogs are 13 – 9 -1 and the Oilers are 9 – 11 – 3; I bet most of the world would have thought those records would be reversed with the Coyotes taking more of the worst of it.  Hopefully, they will continue their hard work and good fortune continues for them with their own Battle of Alberta.

If you are looking for some pre-game material, this is what I’ve read today:

If the players do not rise to the occasion, of if those players choose to bail, he doesn’t waste his time expressing his opinion.

He can take on the coaches, the former ownership, and the media with his blunt assessment of the issues within his team and within the NHL.

Tortorella takes on the media.

What people don’t see is the other side of John Tortorella and he prefers it that way. In fact, it took reporters forever for Tortorella to grant them permission to highlight the charity work he does in the Tampa Bay area as he would rather highlight those who are struggling to fight life’s battles than call attention to himself.

As sports fans, we analyze stats, offer our assessments of players and games, and sometimes get wrapped up in the minutia of the finer points of our passions. However, life is larger than what sports offer and sometimes even I need the reminder.