Even The Great One couldn’t save hockey this season. The NHL and the NHLPA have now confirmed that hockey is done for the year.

For the life of me, I don’t understand why this has happened. It’s doubtful that hockey will ever make much more progress than Fourth-Best-Loved-Sport in America, but the hole that the league is in now is a hell of a lot deeper than the one it faced at the end of last season.

I got interested in hockey about the time that Tampa got a team, so I’ve been a Lightning fan since they started, and last year was a big fat thrill of lifetime. I’m sorry they’ve been robbed of their follow-up season and a chance to prove that the Cup win wasn’t a fluke. Ticket sales in Tampa were finally starting to turn around, and the community was really rallying around the team. It’s a crying shame that the Lightning and other teams in struggling markets are going to have such a mountain to climb back to profitability and respect from the fans.

Michael Bérubé speculates on the reasons for the disaster. Me, I’m just going to pop my Lightning 2003-2004 Championship Season commemorative DVD into the player and watch Game Seven one more time.

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Saturday, February 19th, 2005 @ 7:06 pm Sports Matters
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