vip in the city

New York Islanders @ New York Rangers

Back at Madison Square Garden tonight for the Rangers-Islanders match-up, courtesy of SC and PJ. After a surf and turf dinner at Nick & Stef’s — rather: surf for the men, turf for the women — we headed next door and made our way into the best seats I’ve ever had inside the area.

So what does a $184 ticket get you? A club seat four rows from the glass (watch out for flying pucks!), with a prime view of every pass, check, hook, scuffle and skirmish. And personal waiter service, apparently. Rolled into each of our cup holders was a printed menu from which we could order a variety of food and drink. CG found the opportunity to order Peanut M&Ms just too extravagant to pass up; we put in our requests (no cotton candy this time, alas), and minutes later had the bright yellow bag delivered to us where we sat, along with a box of popcorn, a couple of Amstels and a Johnny Walker Black (hey, why not?)

Singer-actress Hilary Duff was in attendance that night – though we didn’t see her — cheering on her boyfriend Islanders forward Mike Comrie. In between periods, I tried — unsuccessfully — to get a text message posted up on the JumboTron scoreboard. Apparently my proposed missive deviated too far from the usual “Go Rangers!” “Islanders rule!” and “Dear Sharon, I Love You Forever!! Will You Marry Me? Streety Bird,” which aroused some suspicion among my companions. Were the MSG censors hard at work this night? Or was it just that the 18,200 fans inside the arena generated too many messages for all to be displayed? We’ll never know.

The Rangers’ only goal, which came in the second period. (They lost: 2-1 )

Check out the rest of the game photos on flickr, though unlike at the Knicks game a couple of weeks ago, there was a notable lack of cheerleading support on the ice. Sorry, boys, the Rangers City Skaters disbanded after former captain, Courtney Prince, brought a 2004 sexual harassment lawsuit against the club. Is it something in the air at the Garden?

And what would a hockey game be without a brawl? This pile-on ensued after Isles’ goalie Rick DiPietro punched Rangers bad boy Sean Avery in the head. Tsk, tsk.

Tags: hockey, Islanders, MSG, NHL, Rangers

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