When asked if the day lived up to expectations or exceeded them, head coach Dean Evason had a quick answer.
“More,” Evason said. “I’ve been fortunate to be through a couple (outdoor games), but this experience was incredible. Not just the win – obviously, that’s fantastic – but all the stuff (honoring) Johnny (Gaudreau) made it even extra special. The stadium, the pep rally, the walk in, yeah. There’s a lot of emotion there.”
The star of the show was the venue itself, 103-year-old Ohio Stadium, long considered one of the most iconic venues in sports, a classic, Roman-inspired horseshoe design that has stood the test of time for both its architecture and its sightlines. Everything points to midfield, where the ice rink was placed with care over the past two weeks and supplemented by Ohio State football-inspired decor that covered the rest of the playing surface and made the setting uniquely Columbus.
It also helps the stadium holds more than 100,000 fans for football games and welcomed 94,571 fans for the Stadium Series game, the second-largest crowd in NHL history. If there were any doubts that Blue Jackets fans would be able to fill the venue – even as temperatures dipped below freezing and chilling winds swirled – those were answered emphatically by the time the puck dropped and the crowd roared.
The noise was taken to another level when the Blue Jackets scored, which they did five times, with the celebrations punctuated by a blast of the team’s famous goal cannon and the placement of a CBJ helmet sticker on the field.
“It’s tough to find a way to describe it,” Olivier said of the atmosphere and the noise. “Obviously it’s a little unknown to us because we’re used to playing with around 18 (or) 20,000 people. This is almost five times that. Everything sounds louder. Everything sounds like a deeper roar, and it’s definitely extremely special.”
The atmosphere inside the stadium was supplemented by a pregame scene that made the event feel like a fall Saturday. There was an Ohio State gameday vibe, with tailgating lots opening 10 hours before the game and crowds slowly gathering on campus throughout the day to enjoy the pregame fan festival, hang out with friends or simply enjoy the spectacle.
Perhaps the perfect touch was the Blue Jackets version of the pregame Skull Session and the Ohio State football team’s arrival to the stadium. The historic wooden seats of St. John Arena filled to the top with CBJ fans who were treated to a pregame concert featuring the Ohio State athletic band as well as Of A Revolution, the platinum-certified band whose members attended OSU.
As O.A.R. played its hit “This Town,” CBJ players entered the arena for their sendoff to the stadium. Fans lined the route from St. John Arena across Woody Hayes Drive and through Jesse Owens Plaza to the rotunda entrance of the stadium, chanting “C-B-J!” and encouraging the players, and the Gaudreau family led the team’s walk into the building.
“Coming here today with the pep rally, the fans outside the stadium already, the walk in, and then seeing the crowd in warmups, the warmup was pretty much sold out,” captain Boone Jenner said. “I knew Columbus was going to show up, and they did. What an atmosphere, what an experience for us.”
It was the biggest sign yet of how the Blue Jackets fan base has grown over two and a half decades of hockey in Columbus. An entire generation in Central Ohio now has grown up with NHL hockey in their backyards, and it shows in so many ways, from increased youth and adult participation to a fanbase that has filled Nationwide Arena in recent years no matter the team’s record.
As exciting as Saturday was, what’s truly fun to think about is what an event like this can do to continue to build a love of the sport.
“I think Columbus hockey is only going to grow from here,” CBJ forward Kent Johnson said after the game. “We have unbelievable fans already. We are very lucky, and we know that. We love playing in front of the fans, and obviously it showed even more. Hopefully this event can help grow the game in Ohio. I’m sure there were fans from other places than Columbus, too, that made the drive, so we definitely appreciate it.”
When it was all said and done and the cannon fired one last time to signify a CBJ victory, players and coaches understood they had just taken part in something they would never forget.
“This incredible city and incredible fan base and incredible environment – we just witnessed 90-something-thousand people (at a hockey game),” Evason said. “My God. It was just, you know, I’m glad we were able to talk to the group about taking it all in and enjoying the experience. They did.”
That they did.
“There were definitely times I was looking around and just enjoying it,” Zach Werenski said. “It’s one of those things where it doesn’t happen every day. It could never happen again in my career for all I know. I was doing the best I could, realizing how many people are actually in the building watching. It was special for sure.”