Saturday night, playoff atmosphere in Jobing.com Arena. The third place team in the Western Conference, the San Jose Sharks, are in town to take on the local heroes, the Phoenix Coyotes. Win this game, and the playoffs are completely in the Yotes' hands.
↵Attendance: 16,394.
↵In an arena with a capacity of 17,125, that number isn't bad at all. But this isn't your regular situation out in the desert.
↵The Coyotes are fighting for their Phoenix lives, with a move to Canada in the works should the Goldwater Institute stop the sale of this franchise to Matthew Hulsizer.
At this point, you'd expect the city to sell out the arena, and prove its love for hockey. But that's not realistic -- Phoenix as a whole doesn't actually love hockey. This is a bandwagon city, my friends. We're always hitching onto the best team in the area, whether its the Phoenix Suns or the Arizona State Sun Devils football team (hey, I'm dreaming here).
Consistent fandom is not in this region's culture. More realistically, the citizens of the Phoenix metropolitan area have other allegiances, other ties to teams across the nation.
↵It's not a bad things, it's just reality. There's always exceptions to the rule, so don't bombard me with hate mail if you love Shane Doan and the Coyotes. Instead, go buy a ticket and cheer them on tonight against the Dallas Stars.