The Chris Moeller Archives

A drinking town with a hockey problem

Des Moines, Iowa has two professional hockey teams-- two more than it needs. The Iowa Stars are the premier squad in town, the top minor league club of the NHL's Dallas Stars. They've been in town for two seasons at the luxurious new Wells Fargo Arena downtown, and tonight play Game 6 in the American Hockey League's division finals at Chicago's Allstate Arena, in the larger pursuit of something called "the Calder Cup." The Des Moines Buccaneers play in the United States Hockey League, which includes teams from other area cities such as Waterloo, Cedar Rapids, and Omaha. The Buccaneers have been in town much longer, play in the much older 95KGGO Arena located in the suburbs, charge about half as much for tickets as the Stars ($14 and $12 for adults, compared to $26 and $16), and hope to handle something called "the Clark Cup" if they can push through the USHL Final Four this month.

Meanwhile, it's 74 degrees today under mostly sunny skies in Des Moines, with an east-southeast breeze blowing at 9mph. Why some idiot would want to put on his or her fall jacket and go sit in a darkened ice box is beyond my realm of understanding. As it turns out, however, very few idiots do. On Thursday night, 1,822 fans packed the 15,000 seat Wells Fargo Arena for Game 5 of the Stars' series. Bucs fans, who fancy themselves the "rowdier," blue-collar variety, show up in numbers, on average, of about 2,500 per game.

The Iowa Cubs, our minor league baseball team, conversely, drew 12,101 fans last night for their game against Fresno downtown.

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Hear, hear. The phrases "baseball players" and "privacy" in the same news story.

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Baseball writers have grown so accustomed to passing moral judgment on the sport's premier personalities that a few now feel emboldened enough to assign culpability for one of the game's tragic deaths. CBS' Gregg Doyel is furious about this. As I see it, LaRussa is guilty of just two major crimes-- combining drinking and driving one night in Florida two months ago, and beating the Mets in last year's National League Championship Series.

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Finally, equal time for Ida Mae Dobbs.

posted by CM @ 1:40 PM