Oilers fan Brandon Kraus with Spittin' Chiclets host and former NHL player Ryan Whitney at The Canadian Icehouse before Game 3 in Edmonton, Alta., on June 13.Megan Albu/The Globe and Mail
Brandon Kraus cried at the Oilers game Thursday. And he suspects he will do it again Saturday night.
No, not because the Florida Panthers are suffocating the Edmonton Oilers, a team he holds dear, in the Stanley Cup final. And not because he expects to spend more than US$10,000, including travel from his hometown in Illinois, on an eight-day playoff extravaganza in Edmonton to watch it happen, either.
It was the city’s winning vibe, rather than the team’s actual L, that did him in.
“It was incredible,” Mr. Kraus, a 35-year-old American obsessed with Edmonton, the Oilers, and the energy rippling through Alberta’s capital, said after the Panthers beat his beloveds Thursday night. “Totally worth it despite the result. I cried during the anthem. So awesome.”
Mr. Kraus came to Edmonton not just to see his team play in the Stanley Cup final, but to experience the city’s unrelenting passion for its team during its playoff run. “It is nothing like anything I’ve experienced,” he said. “It is just another level.”
The city has been bursting with ecstatic fans – both homegrown and imports such as Mr. Kraus – who are spending oodles of money while riding the playoff high. Fans have injected $179-million into the local economy during the Cup campaign, tourism organization Explore Edmonton told local media this week.
The Oilers, however, have been struggling in the Stanley Cup final. The Panthers are up three-zip in the best-of-seven series, after winning the first two games in Florida and the third in Edmonton. Game 4 is slated for Saturday in Alberta’s capital, and Oilers fans will be crushed if the Panthers sweep Connor McDavid and his teammates at home.
Mr. Kraus is one of the many stoic Oilers fans trying to convince themselves it isn’t over until the crowd boos NHL commissioner Gary Bettman as he awards the Stanley Cup to the winning captain. Mr. Kraus will be back in Rogers Place, section 112, on Saturday night.
“If they lose, it’s still been a magical year,” Mr. Kraus said, referencing the team’s horrifying early season, followed by its dazzling 16-game winning streak starting in December.
Even if the Oilers win Saturday, it is unlikely the team will be able to repatriate the Stanley Cup. The Toronto Maple Leafs, in 1942, became the first and last team to rally from a 0-3 deficit to win the Cup; the Montreal Canadiens, in 1993, were the last team based in Canada to win it all; and the Oilers last made it to the final in 2006, when the team lost in seven to the Carolina Hurricanes.
Khal Moustarah holds season tickets to the Oilers, which meant he had first dibs on buying playoff tickets. He got so caught up in the rush of the playoffs that he went to Florida for Game 2, only to end up stranded because of storms. The delay forced him to give up his tickets to Game 3 – and his chance to see the Oilers play on home ice in the Stanley Cup final for the first time in 18 years.
“Devastated,” he said in an interview Thursday while waiting in an airport for the next leg of his return flight. “Absolutely devastated. It is surreal.”
Mr. Moustarah watched Game 3 on his flight back to Edmonton, huddled around an iPad with other fans and a stash of snacks. “I’m feeling a lot better about missing the game now,” he said Friday. Despite the unlikelihood of the Oilers becoming champions, Mr. Moustarah is still buzzing.
“I’m going to tomorrow’s game for sure!”
Mr. Moustarah is from Edmonton, making him a natural Oilers fan. Mr. Kraus, however, lacks geographical or familial ties to team. He is from a family of sports fans in the middle of Illinois, but they were hockey agnostic. Mr. Kraus was in the market for a team worthy of his worship in 2006, when the Oilers made their last Cup run. He favoured Canadian franchises and latched on to the Oilers, even though he couldn’t find Alberta on a map. Now he’s all in.
“The Oilers are my biggest obsession,” he said.
Then he fell in love with Edmonton, the city, when he and his wife attended a four-game home stand in February. He had tickets to playoff games in the third round, but he delayed the trip – and prayed the Oilers would beat the Dallas Stars – because a hailstorm tore up his roof.
Mr. Kraus returned to Edmonton Sunday, and found the city’s love of its team even more intense. He watched Game 2 in the Moss Pit outside Rogers Place, and through a season-ticket holder he previously befriended, snagged tickets in the lower bowl for Games 3 and 4, for $1,250 a pop.
He is playing tour guide for a cousin who tagged along from Los Angeles, even though his kin does not have tickets to the games. They’ve hiked river trails, explored Whitemud Park, fuelled up at restaurants, and poked around the Royal Alberta Museum.
“It is such a fun city. It is beautiful,” he said. “I don’t know why people give it such a bad rap.”