I will admit-I'm a newbie when it comes to hockey. I grew up in South Florida before they had the Panthers. When they got the Panthers, I watched a little-mainly the year that they made it to the Stanley Cup Finals against the Avalanche. I even went to a couple of games, but I never really considered myself a fan of the game. This all changed this past year. I moved to Dallas and decided to go to the Stars' home opener against the Boston Bruins. When they play the national anthem at the American Airlines Center, the fans shout "Stars" when that word comes up. That alone made me more interested in hockey than I ever was before. By the end of the night, I couldn't wait to come back. I went to about 10 regular season games, and watched every other game on TV-I was hooked. Then came playoff hockey. The first playoff game I went to was Game 6 against the Ducks-there was a nervous feeling in the building that if the Stars didn't win that night, they had no chance to win a Game 7 in Anaheim. Down 1-0 going into the 3rd period, the Stars played the best period that I've ever seen them play and the celebration began and lasted through the night. That brings us to Game 6 vs. San Jose. After going up 3-0, I boldly told people to get their brooms out because the Sharks were done. Boy, was I wrong!

Game 6 had that same nervous feeling in the air. After a scoreless first period, I told the gentleman in front of me that this game was going to be a 1-0 or 2-1 game because it looked like Marty Turco and Nabokov were seeing the game in slow motion. They seemed to have everything in control. Dallas scored in the second period and I was elated-I thought this might be the winning goal to push them to the Conference Finals. When the Sharks scored in the 3rd period, it got tense. I can't imagine how the players felt because I was so nervous that I couldn't sit still. We got on our feet with about 3 minutes left in regulation. That was the last action we would see sitting down. Everyone in the building was standing, holding our breath when the puck was in the Sharks' zone and ready to scream when the puck was at the Stars' end. At 1:28 Central time, the referee finally called the Sharks for tripping. The Stars' power play proved to be too much as Brenden Morrow scored the game winning goal and the place erupted! The crowd turned into one huge group hug-complete strangers with tears rolling down their exhausted faces embracing each other as they celebrated the Stars' clinching victory. I don't think anybody left the building until after the handshake was complete. Even after leaving, the party spilled out into the parking lots and streets. This was a glorious day in big D!

I finally got home-I recorded the game, but obviously didn't get the finish recorded since the game took 5 and a half hours to complete. Since I didn't have the goal recorded, I went online to watch the game winner again. That's when I saw the stats for this game and it floored me. The last time I looked up at the scoreboard to see the shot totals, they were in the 20's for both teams. Marty Turco made 61 saves! The even more impressive thing is that this was the 8th longest game in NHL history! I obviously didn't see the 7 longer games, but I am amazed at the high quality of play by both teams throughout all 4 extra periods. The goaltending was phenomenal-it's a shame that one of them had to lose. After this game, I don't know if the Conference Finals will be able to top this-but I'm ready to find out! Go Stars!