The farewell ceremony at Maple Leaf Gardens on Saturday
night was "panned" for various reasons, including the "lack
of attention" given to former Maple Leafs players, but Leafs
President Ken Dryden said he had "few, if any, regrets"
about the evening, according to David Shoalts of the Toronto
GLOBE & MAIL. Dryden: "There are always things you would
like to have changed. ... What I wanted to get across is
that the Leafs were all of the players, they were not just
the Hall of Famers" (Toronto GLOBE & MAIL, 2/16). Shoalts
called the ceremony "a curious evening" and "oddly low-key."
Shoalts: "The intensity of emotion that should have been
expected ... wasn't there." The ceremony "leaned heavily on
video clips" and featured 110 former players (GLOBE & MAIL,
2/15). More Dryden, on some former coaches and trainers not
invited to the event: "We should have stopped ourselves and
said, 'Well, let's invite all former trainers and all former
coaches and all former managers' and we never did" (NATIONAL
POST, 2/16). In Toronto, Lance Hornby called some elements
of the ceremony "puzzling to the crowd," as the Leafs alumni
included several "virtual footnotes in franchise history."
Leafs Manager of Hockey Ops Casey Vanden Heuvel: "It
reflected our goal of inviting the Leafs who played 50 or
more games to our celebration" (TORONTO SUN, 2/15).
IN WITH THE NEW: In Toronto, Frank Zicarelli wrote that
45,000 attended the Air Canada Centre open house on Sunday.
The arena offered free admission and 50% discounts on
concessions to tour the facility (TORONTO SUN, 2/15). In
DC, Steven Pearlstein wrote that "for all its success on the
inside," the Air Canada Centre is "rather disappointing on
the outside," as it resembles "a stolid Depression-era
edifice of granite and limestone" (WASHINGTON POST, 2/13).
