Not the biggest 'hockey guy,' Eric Rueb got to witness the true magic of the sport

PROVIDENCE — Hockey is fun.

For a lot of you, that’s the dumbest sentence ever written. Hockey is a part of New England sports culture for so many, but for a kid born in San Francisco to two hippie parents who had zero interest in sports until their 6-year-old son started watching the Red Sox, it was never a part of mine.

For years I’ve tried to make hockey a part of my sports life, but it never took.

Work brings me to plenty of high school hockey, but nothing like what I saw on Friday at The AMP. I had the day off, but with the NCAA Tournament in town, I didn’t want to miss out on the action — and it was the best decision I could have made.

If you follow me on social media during the winter high school hockey season, I routinely post about being “Little Hockey” — a reference to a famous Tim Meadows/Saturday Night Live bit — and how I’m “ready to do that hockey” — a viral SNL skit involving Chance the Rapper.

It’s about as tongue in cheek as tongue in cheek gets. My game updates are filled with references to how teams need to “play the puck deep, cycle the puck, put pucks on net,” which is about as clichéd as clichés gets.

Bottom line: there aren’t many people who have stepped inside a rink who don’t know more about the sport than me.

Armed with this ignorance, I arrived at The AMP ready to enjoy the game as someone who was there to have a good time.

Spoiler alert — I did.

It started with top-seeded Boston College taking on Michigan Tech, a school I didn’t know was a real thing. In 34 seconds, I let my first of many surprised yells out as BC’s Cutter Gauthier scored the game’s first goal.

Normally such noises are frowned upon by the old dorks of legacy media who dominate press boxes. I didn’t get into sports journalism to be bored to tears — which is why covering the New England Patriots, in my experience, is not nearly as much fun as you’d think it would be — and covering high schools has helped me avoid such boring situations.

On Friday, this problem was resolved by an incredible media hospitality setup at The AMP. We were in an end zone, high above the ice and with plenty of tables, I saw with co-workers Bill Koch, Jake Rousseau and ABC6’s Nick Coit and actually watched and enjoyed hockey.

As the Boston College romp continued, it allowed me to both work and ask my colleagues dumb hockey questions, like — what exactly icing is and when I say pucks in deep, what does that mean?

The energy in the building was terrific. While Koch, a Boston University alum, may or may not have had good things to say about the BC faithful, the fans created quite an atmosphere. When Tech had enough of the beatdown and things got chippy in the third period, it really completed one of the best afternoons a non-hockey hockey fan could ask for.

What happened next was quite different.

Koch and Rousseau repeatedly told me the Providence Regional was one of the best in the tournament and a lot of it was because of the Quinnipiac-Wisconsin game that would follow. Wanting to take advantage of the state’s laws on sports wagering to make the game a little more fun, I needed to figure out who the favorite was. I asked former ProJo scribe Mark Divver — the best hockey expert I know — who to take and he told me the game was a toss-up.

I settled in on Quinnipiac, simply because former WPRI sports director Morey Hershgordon is an alum and rooting for my friends is a strategy I sometimes employ.

Less than four minutes into the game I felt like a genius after Quinnipiac scored early. But when Wisconsin scored two goals quick in the second, I didn’t feel that great. Quinnipiac tied things up with 1:32 left in the second period — and that’s when things got interesting.

The atmosphere for the BC-Tech game was loud and exciting; Quinnipiac and Wisconsin was crazy quiet. The nervy tension was incredible. There were moments of dead silence, someone would rip a shot and both sides filled the arena with groans and moans with the result.

Overtime was a fitting finish to the day.

Watching from the end zone, Coit predicted OT would end inside five minutes. Koch counted down the final seconds and when he finished, I looked over and said “you know what I want now?”

Koch smiled because he knew the answer.

Total chaos.

We didn’t get it, but the 6:04 that followed was incredible to watch. Sitting in the end zone, you could see chances developing before they actually happened. Seeing the game from that high up, I became equally impressed that players could score and goalies could make saves.

When Wisconsin was hit with a slashing penalty in OT, The AMP got as loud as it had been since the first game. Quinnipiac’s fans were hungry for a goal and now was the time for the Bobcats to strike.

Wisconsin killed the penalty, but before the Badgers could settle in Quinnipiac got a breakaway. As the players skated down the ice, you knew something was about to happen. Part of me wanted to see a goal to make my wager (which apparently you can’t put on an expense account) hit, but another part of me wanted to keep my dream of seeing a six OT game.

Victor Czerneckianair scored the goal that ended the game, and while I’ll certainly forget his impossible-to-pronounce name, I won’t forget the explosion that rocked The AMP when the lamp lit.

My colleagues packed their gear to go to the press conference and next thing I knew I was staring at an empty arena, listening to the hum of the Zamboni as I typed this column.

Most people are happy when the work day comes to an end. It was for me on Friday, but that’s not why I was smiling as I finished writing these final sentences.

Hockey is fun — and I got to witness exactly why.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: NCAA hockey filled AMP with an exciting, fun atmosphere