Home Ice Advantage
A short story for your enjoyment
Tyler wanted to reverse the trend of his team failing during the last 20 games of the hockey season and subsequently missing the playoffs. This was a trend that had been going on for the past 3 seasons and he was determined that it wouldn’t happen this year.
His plan then was to spike his favorite team’s water with amphetamines or any other performance-enhancing drug and spike the opposing team’s water with a sedative. But first he had to gain access to the locker rooms. And to do that he would need to get a job as either a janitor or a security guard.
And so, he applied at the companies that had the cleaning and security contracts for the arena. As luck would have it, he got an interview with the cleaning company two days later. Two days after that he was hired.
On gameday he was mopping the floor of his favorite team’s dressing room, when the water bottles were placed on the table near the sink waiting to be filled when it got close to game time. Seizing his chance when he got close to the bottles, Tyler poured a little powder into each one, this he hoped would give his team an extra kick for the game.
He finished that task before anyone else came into the dressing room and it was now time to mop the floor of the visitor’s locker room. Unfortunately for Tyler the visiting team were on their way in when he started mopping so he couldn’t put the sedative in their water bottles. But he was confident about the amphetamines he put in is home team’s bottles would be sufficient to get his team to victory.
All the arena staff were able to watch the game for free when they are on shift. And Tyler watched with satisfaction outside the TV broadcaster’s booth when he heard the color commentator and play by play announcer mention that the team was skating faster than he had ever seen them skate. This helped them get to a 5 nothing lead in under 7 minutes and closing out the first period 8 nothing.
The second period they got four more goals to take a 12 nothing lead. In the third it was more of the same, five goals to close out the game 17 nothing, the most lopsided shutout in NHL history. Tyler was very happy with what he accomplished, and he vowed to do more of the same, at least for the home games as he wouldn’t be able to follow the team for the next five road games. But the 10 games that they play at home after the road trip he would be able to give his team that little extra boost.
A narrated version of this story can be found on YouTube. https://youtu.be/meum7vPZZfU