Not a classic final: Frolunda scored power play goals on their first three 5-on-4 chances to lead 3-0 after two periods, and that was pretty much that. Ryan Lasch, the "Wayne Gretzky of the CHL" as I called him (he was really embarrassed when I called him that to his face earlier today, but he does have 69 CHL points now in his career, 26 more than anyone else), scored the second of those goals and continued to make me wonder why he wasn't picked for Team USA at the Olympics last year. Red Bull Munich did pull a goal back in the third period when, with 9 minutes left, they pulled their goalie to go 6-on-4 and promptly scored their first PPG of the game on what I think was their seventh chance, but that was that, and it finished 3-1.
The most interesting part of the production involved setting up my broadcast position. I was basically in the last row of seats, in front of the press box, and with a small, angled surface in front of me on which my sound box, monitor and laptop had to sit. I had three seats to myself, but I had no leg room to speak of, and getting in and out of my position was basically impossible once press row filled up. I pretty much knew my place in the pecking order: Swedish and German TV and radio took all the good spots in the actual press box above me, and they had plenty of space, but whenever someone in the media to my left had to exit press row, they had to somehow get around me, which was not easy with all of the stuff I had around me. At the end of the second period, someone had to pass me just before I was to go back on air; and at the end of the game, during the trophy presentation I knew I was basically keeping four or five people from leaving the arena while I was talking (and eventually stood up and leaned forward to let them out even before I finished talking). Going to the bathroom was out of the question; I went once about 15 minutes before the start of pregame, and I managed to survive until the end of the game without too much bother.
Anyway, the monitor I was assigned - unlike all of the other monitors I could see on press row - was upright and on a stand, in such a way that I basically had to crouch and lean to my left to get any good view of it at all. (It was also fastened in place with some straps so as to not topple over on the angle of the desk!) That wasn't really acceptable, particularly given that all of the other monitors for the journalists around me laid pretty flat but with a nice angle for easy viewing. I called down to the truck and asked if someone could send an engineer up to me, which duly happened; I helped the engineer remove the stand of my monitor so it could also lie flat, but we couldn't safely strap it in place lying on its side (or reorientate its picture so I could use it upside-down with the stand in, which would have been safe), and in trying to MacGyver a solution together we managed to bend and break the HDMI cable sticking in its back. So eventually the engineer went away and commandeered a different monitor which still wasn't perfect - still quite a steep and upright angle - but just about did the job for me and could be safely strapped in place (and no longer needed an HDMI cable). That pretty much worked fine, although it wasn't optimal...and it really does go to show how commentary conditions in an arena can often be less than perfect.
As for my own commentary, the arena was really rocking and loud - it was a complete sellout (12,044 fans), and at times I could barely hear myself think. But overall I think I did well; my only real mistake was thinking that a penalty with six-and-a-half minutes left in the third period had been called against Frolunda when it had been called against Munich, and going into the equivalent of an ad break having set the scene that Munich could maybe pull another goal back and make it a great finish, when in fact the reverse was true and I couldn't clear up my mistake for at least a minute. Otherwise, I think my goal calls were all pretty good if not super-memorable; I was incredibly well prepared (and in fact had way, way more material than I could possibly use); and despite the cramped quarters I managed to keep my wits throughout. As always, I look forward to hearing the playback in due course...
...and so now, I'm basically unemployed for the next month, or quite possibly the next six months not counting the tennis broadcasts I have lined up. Which is sad for me, but hopefully I can pull a few irons out of the fire - I have a few ideas, but let's see where they lead me. (I might be going a bit dark in this thread for a while, though...we'll see.)