Hockey Freaks I: 1990-1991 Team Canada World Junior Gold Medal Team 2X

This all began yesterday when I was reading a local online news article about the World Juniors. They said that the 1990-1991 Team would be at World Fest at 4:30 on New Years Eve. We planned on going in to watch the game there so this was just an excuse to get there early. Now, you have to understand, when I say the 1990-1991 Gold Medal Team, that's just the western Canada players, no one from eastern Canada showed, ie Lindros, Ricci, Potvin. As per Hockey Canada they were an hour and a half late from the program starting. We were there for the long haul so no matter to us but HC has been doing this all week. They introduced the players, NHL experience and any World Junior tidbits they could add. The players appeared to be excited to be with the guys again and most are from around here and they were shuttled off to the CAN/US game across the street after. They had an autograph session with posters for fans to get signed. I have cards of most of the guys but hey, you know me, I had jerseys and pucks galore. And yes, I did get that look from players. Most of the jerseys I had lying around so more so than anything, just putting them to good use. I played against Pat Falloon so I chatted with him for a bit about the old days. I had the Islander puck for Sillinger but did not want to come off greedy so when I went up again, I asked him if he could personalize it to my wife, avoiding the obvious assumption. They were scurried off and we watched the CAN/US game with 2000 of our best friends. Na, there were too many people for my liking. Friends who went to the game, came over to bring in the New Year with us. The 50/50 was $200,000 last night too, I have been to Flames games with 25,000 people and it was only $60,000. I am not a drinker so the alarm went off early today, bringing more tired eyes than anything else. We headed down to the brunch with the same players in -40 weather, rushed inside and had a nice meal with some new friends. Some players were a little late for the brunch, must have had a little too much fun I guess. There was a small program and then an autograph session again. I had only two logo pucks left, plus 4 blank pucks so I thought I'd get them filled. Hey at $75 a plate, I was walking out with some autographs. I chatted with Falloon again, got a picture with him. We laughed about something 'back in the day'. Most of the players were walking around so I managed to score some pics with Sillinger again, Needham and Chyzowski. I got my pucks signed and asked Sillinger about some of the games in Regina. He said he was not really worried about the Canada games, only 1 Oiler (Eberle) but Finland had 3 players drafted so he watched them pretty close. Dykhuis was bugging Sillinger about him being traded so many times. He said "She had a 1 in 9 chance to get one of your teams Mike!" The odds were not correct but funny anyway. I got to Kidd and kept a full puck for him, said I was a die hard Flames fan and got a picture with him. Cool guy...