Commentary

The Englishmen at the hockey game

November 5, 2026   ·   0 Comments

By Keith Schell

It was Monday, Nov. 14, 1988. I had just worked the weekend shift and had the day off. And with that day off, I decided to do something I had always wanted to do ever since I moved to the big city:

I went to my very first Toronto Maple Leaf hockey game at Maple Leaf Gardens!

Even though the Leafs did not have a good team at that time, I was still excited to go. After spending all my life in central Ontario watching Leafs games on TV, I wanted to finally have the full Maple Leafs experience with the Minnesota North Stars in town that night. Getting off the subway close to the gardens, I bought my ticket from a scalper near the building for a decent price and went in and found my seat, about halfway up the building between centre ice and the blue line.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, I ended up seated directly behind a row of five Englishmen who had never seen a hockey game before. The crowd hushed as the game began.

That night, with the Leafs mired in the middle of a weak Norris Division and little hope for improvement on the horizon, the gardens was a tomb — no sound from the stands whatsoever, the crowd thoroughly cowed into a resigned silence by the myriad of losing traditions firmly established during the Ballard years in Toronto. You could hear a pin drop in the building.

Used to the enthusiastic rowdiness of British soccer crowds, the five Englishmen in front of me were flabbergasted by the silence. “Blimey, it’s quiet…” one said in stunned disbelief, lowering his voice as if he were talking in a library, “…so quiet!” Turning to the others with a grin, he piped up, “Right, lads, let’s get the place hopping!” They all started laughing and making a little noise, but it petered out quickly, making no difference to the general gloom in the building that night.

It was not a particularly exciting or energetic game, but occasionally something happened that would roust the crowd out of its discouraged slumber.

As the North Stars brought the puck over the Leaf blue line, tough‑as‑nails Leafs defenseman Brian Curran dropped the puck carrier with a thunderous body check to the general approval of the crowd. The Englishmen in front of me were wowed by the act of legal physicality. “Crikey!” one said to the others, “Did you see that? I wish they could do that in football!”

Later in the period, during a stoppage in play, Curran tried to inspire his team by chirping with North Star Brian Bellows at the Leafs blue line and getting into a wrestling match. Less than a fight but far more than a shoving match, it rousted the Gardens crowd from their slumber. As the combatants were led to the penalty box, the Englishmen were duly impressed.

But when the two‑minute roughing majors were announced, one astonished Englishman said to the other, “You mean he only got two minutes for that?” “Yes,” the other one mused, “The harshness of the sentence seems to be in direct proportion to the severity of the assault.” And he was absolutely right — an astute and accurate assessment from a neophyte fan trying to make sense of hockey justice.

As the intensity of the game started to pick up, we became more focused on the action, and the conversations in front of me began to drop off. But throughout the whole game, the Englishmen just couldn’t get their heads around the silence that permeated the building.

Towards the end of the game — the first hockey game they had ever seen in their lives — one of the Englishmen made a poignantly accurate observation to his mates as he looked around the crowd: “There seems to be a general despondency about the building…as if they expect their team to lose!” And again, he was absolutely right. In his own English way, in the very first Leafs game he had ever seen, he had hit the nail right on the head. I couldn’t have said it any better myself.

Overall, the Leafs lost again that night, 5–4, and I was not particularly impressed as I filed out of the building with the rest of the crowd. It was not a particularly good game. The players feed off the crowd, the crowd feeds off the players, and when both have little enthusiasm, it can make for a long and disappointing night.

But what saved the night for me was the five Englishmen who sat right in front of me. Their accurate observations throughout the game on a sport they had never seen before were both interesting and refreshing.

Towards the end of the game, when I politely volunteered to answer a couple of hockey questions they had posed amongst themselves, they realized I had been listening in on their conversations and stopped talking. Me and my big mouth. I hope they forgave me for my eavesdropping. But it was so long ago now that they probably wouldn’t remember me anyway.

I honestly didn’t mean to eavesdrop on them at the beginning of the game, but over the course of the evening, I just couldn’t help myself. I found it fascinating to listen to the observations of a handful of sports fans from another country who had never seen hockey before and to hear their perspective on the game. And their observations that night were generally right on the button.

Looking back now, I remember that night far more for those five Englishmen than for the actual hockey game itself. All these years later, I can still hear their voices and still see their wide‑eyed amazement at a sport they were experiencing for the first time.

And on evenings like that, sometimes the best part of the game isn’t the match itself, but the people you share the seats with.

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