MLSE’s Toronto Maple Leafs tailgate parties have become an integral part of NHL playoff season in the city year after year, and I, a non-sports watcher, went down to find out what all the fuss is about for the first time.
Let’s set the stage. It’s the eve of Game 2 in the battle of Ontario, and I’m packed like a sardine in a southbound TTC train headed, alongside dozens if not hundreds of blue-clad compatriots, to watch the game from outside Scotiabank Arena at Maple Leaf Square.
Now, I’m a Leafs fan by virtue of birthright only — I can count on one hand the number of full games I’ve actually sat through — but, already seeing the sheer volume of fans planning to be physically present at the game (a tiny fraction, surely, of their total fan base), it’s beginning to dawn on me that I’ve been missing out on something major this whole time.
I just have to figure out what, exactly, that major something is, and Maple Leaf Square seems as good a place as any to find it.
Overture
Admittedly, despite living in Toronto for my entire life, I have not been blessed with the ability to navigate the ever-changing layout of Union Station and end up where I actually intend to be going. Usually, this results in me arriving no less than 30 minutes late after walking in circles around the entire station, sure that I really might be trapped forever in looping corridors.
Luckily for me, the concentration of game-goers is so dense that anyone with even a shred of herd mentality could find their way to the action simply by submitting to the tide. And if the scores of blue-and-white jerseys don’t point you in the right direction, the sound of a roaring crowd most surely will.
Upon passing the PATH entrance to Scotiabank Arena towards the Maple Leaf Square exit, we’re greeted by the iconic Angus Collis, an MLSE security guard who has garnered his own fan base over the years for his particularly colourful approach to crowd control, moving fans through the hall, before eventually stepping into the square.
I’ve attended my fair share of concerts, festivals, and street parties over the years. Hell, I even hit the streets of downtown Toronto after the Raptors won the NBA championship in 2019, but this level of fandom is like nothing I’ve ever seen before.
With 30 minutes until puck drop, the square is packed to the brim. On the main stage, there’s a competition underway where a few lucky fans have the opportunity to dance for tickets to watch the game from inside the arena. Winners are decided by the volume of applause, and when one fan begins an enthusiastic striptease, peeling off his jersey to expose a particularly impressive beer belly, the crowd erupts.
You’d think the Leafs had just won the Stanley Cup, and the game hadn’t even started yet.
I explore the grounds, where the usual corporate suspects have set up booths with games like money machines and slapshot contests to win merchandise. There are hot dog vendors and bars to keep fans fuelled up and, shockingly, none of them have lines. There isn’t even a line for the porta-potties. It seems like no one wants to miss even a single second of the real show.
However out of place I’m feeling at this moment, I spy someone who likely feels more so: Scott, a sole Ottawa Senators fan, sticking out like a red star in a vast blue night.
I ask him how he’s feeling, and he says “scared,” though I’m not sure whether it would be worse for him if the Senators win or lose. He’s there with his partner, adorned, more fittingly, in blue. I ask them how such a star-crossed relationship could possibly work, and she laughs. “It doesn’t.”
At least he’s not a Habs fan.
Puck drop
The frenetic energy in the square has been ramping up to this moment. Fans aren’t exactly antsy, but you can feel something bigger than all of us reined in and ready to break loose as soon as the game starts.
If a Senators fan walks by to enter the arena, everyone boos, even if they can’t see why, or to whom, they’re booing.
During the singing of the national anthem, a massive Canadian flag is carried across the crowd as fans sing along. It’s a nice moment, but not to be overshadowed by the absolute mayhem that breaks loose as the starting lineup is announced.
I don’t know who any of these people are, my knowledge caps out at Nylander, Tavares, Matthews and Marner, but I can immediately glean that Stolarz is kind of a huge deal.
I’m struck by the theatricality of this whole thing. There’s fake fog, spotlights, music. As a former high school theatre kid, I always thought my own interests were antithetical to sports, but I’m realizing now that the two aren’t so very different after all. I might actually like this.
As the puck drops, a wave of cheers crashes over me like a tsunami. It feels impossible not to get washed away in it, even if I had come here stubbornly committed to my own indifference.
Within two minutes, Rielly scores the first goal of the game. Within four minutes, the first punches have been thrown on the ice. It’s hard to gauge which the crowd was more excited about.
Tavares scores in the eighth minute.
With a two-nothing lead secured so early in the game, things still feel fairly relaxed. Everyone’s riding on the high of seeing our opponents score still at zero, it seems. I search the crowd for Scott, but can’t spot him.
Two fans, who’ve been among the most animated for the duration of the game thus far, tell me that they’re feeling “super heightened.”
“We’ve been like last season and then the other season before, and it’s so electric,” one of them tells me. This is one of the best and loudest crowds they’ve seen.
Intermezzo
While the 2-0 lead sticks around for much of the second period, hardship looms on the horizon. Tkachuk (who I’m told everyone hates by my more hockey-literate colleagues) scores.
The lead still belongs to the Leafs, but I notice a discernible change in the atmosphere. Heads tipped towards the enormous screen appear more set in their expressions, more focused. It’s like they’re willing their own precision to pass through the walls and get absorbed by the players, and, wait, am I doing that, too?
With five minutes left in the third period, after what seemed like a cake walk win for the Leafs, the Senators apply sustained pressure and manage to tie it up. We’re going into overtime, and I’m exhausted, but I’ll be damned if I leave now.
At some point during the game — it’s hard to tell when — everyone in the crowd ceased to be themselves and became something bigger. No one is really having conversations with one another, but rather exchanging glances, almost like we can read each other’s minds.
If getting out of Union Station was a herd-like experience, this is a hive, and it’s buzzing.
OT
I’m actively biting my nails. I feel like a total fraud.
For someone who just heard names like Stolarz, Knies and Domi for the first time today, I really do feel like a decent portion of tomorrow’s happiness is riding on their performance tonight. Is this what being a hockey fan feels like? I’m not sure I like it.
On the ice, things seem to be getting messier. What, in the beginning, appeared to me like an intricately choreographed routine is now something far more raw. More hungry.
Outside, it feels similar. While the crowd remains entirely civilized, which I, admittedly, find surprising, there’s a sort of desperation hanging in the air that makes my stomach feel hollow. If not for my own burgeoning love of the Leafs, I hope they win for everyone else in this crowd.
Luckily, they do. A goal from Max Domi sets the entire crowd alight. People who’ve never met before and may never see each other again are hugging as if family. One fan — a burly, 6 ft. man — wipes a tear from his cheek.
The Leafs have secured their first 2-0 series lead since 2002, and they’ve also secured a new, real fan in me.
Epilogue
Leaving the square, the energy is electric. If this is what it’s like after a mid-series win, I can’t even begin to wrap my head around what a series-clincher or, dare I say, a championship win would look like. Beyond pride that my city’s team won a game, I feel pride in the energy that’s being cultivated here.
I always, misguidedly, attributed the love of hockey as something that’s socially ingrained. It’s just something that Canadians do, and I, ever the contrarian as a youngster, decided that I didn’t like it, without ever really giving it a try.
After watching the game in the midst of the team’s most devoted fans, though, I see that it’s really about something bigger than just watching big, strong men throw punches and skate clutching taped-up sticks.
There’s a community aspect stronger than any I’ve seen, and, perhaps more than ever, that’s something the city really needs. If it comes alongside a Stanley Cup, that’s just a bonus, but Leafs fans have learned to love the team even without one.
The Toronto Maple Leafs take on the Ottawa Senators on the road for game three at 7 p.m. on April 24 at the Canadian Tire Centre.
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