On Monday, December 23rd, the Legere Brothers, John and Brian, having been given tickets by their father as an early Christmas gift, attended the Rangers/Devils game at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Here is a minute by minute accounting of their trip from the diary they kept during the game…

7:00 PM Entering MSG and walking down to our seats… and still walking down to our seats… all the way to the 3rd row behind the glass! Section 91, Row E, Seats 3 and 4. Way to go dad! Thank you corporate expense account! These tix have a $150 face value on them? You mean to tell me that people actually pay $150 to watch the Rangers? Hey, Spike Lee isn't going to be here, is he?

7:07 Scanning the Blue Seats looking for some sign of season ticket holders and fellow league owners Rob "Five Minutes For" Hanratty and Don "Pardon My Misconduct" Cardoza. On one hand we're hoping to call out to them to show off our seats, while on the other hand we're living in constant fear of being "outted" as Devils fans sitting in the midst of enemy territory if one of them spots us!

7:09 Wondering whatever happened to former league franchise owner Johnny La, an avid Ranger fan himself (yeah, I love the "Range-jers"! Sorry, Brian does the accent so well, it just doesn't translate phonetically to paper.) They're announcing the line-ups and I just realize that the Rangers stars are all injured. Richter, Leetch, Bure, Poti, all scratched, none of the "healthy" variety. Scratches for the Devils include Mel Bridgeman, Don Lever, Patty Verbeek and Alain Chevrier.

7:10 With all these injuries I wonder who's actually playing for the Blue Shirts these days? I'll soon find out as the announcer does a poor impression of Michael Buffer and "HERE COME YOUR NEW YORK RANGERS!!!!", well the ones that still have working MCL's at least…

7:13 Watching the Rangers go around during the pre-skate. Who's the GM of the Rangers, Neil Eskow? I don't think I've ever seen so many goons dotting a roster! Matthew Barnaby, Sandy McCarthy, Billie Tibbetts (fresh out of jail and perhaps still on parole as a matter of fact!), Dave Karpa, Dale Purinton, Gordie Dwyer… "Very nice" indeed! Can't wait until the 4th line takes the ice!

7:15 Opening face-off, Devils win the coin toss, elect to receive, Rangers will kick off into the wind and defend the north end of the stadium.

7:17 Actually these seats aren't really that great. Sure there's waiter service available, but when the puck gets lost in the far corner you really can't see anything. You're forced to look down the ice through all the other panes of glass and you get this really weird "carnival fun house mirror" effect. Hey, when did Eric Lindros start looking like the Wilson sisters from Heart? Oh, never mind…

7:22 Martin Brodeur, in an attempt to clear the zone, accidentally flips the puck into the stands, resulting in a delay of game penalty and all 13 year old girls not sitting behind the protective netting scrambling away in fear!

7:26 A bunch of shouting going on, some brave Devils fans taunting Holik, a couple of people shouting encouragement to Messier and there's this 279 pound guy behind me and I'm not sure what he's yelling, or even in what language he's yelling, but all I do know is that according to him, somebody definitely sucks!

7:32 Third line out for the Devils. It's Sergei Brylin and his Merry Men! Hey, this Brian Gionta guy's a freakin' midget! Why he can't be any taller than Kevin Kelly, can he?

7:37 All right, some penalties, it's about time! Barnaby two for roughing and Niedermayer two for same. Offsetting penalties, but it's a start…

7:40 The first goal of the game! Patrik Elias scores, assisted by Brian Rafalski, and it's 1 - 0 Devils! Have I mentioned yet that Brian's been pretending to root for the Rangers so that we don't get killed? I'm having some problems with that so I just don't cheer at all, doing my best impression of Dustin Hoffman in the Rain Man. "Penalty! That was definitely a penalty! Two minutes for Wapner!" Brian stands up with the rest of the Ranger faithful and boos Elias' goal. Now I have Elias on my fantasy team and he's been kind of cold all season so I just simply sit there with a small smirk on my face feeling all kinds of happy inside! Little does Brian realize that his actions have in fact angered the hockey gods…

7:42 Well that didn't take long! Joel Bouchard (who the f*** is this guy?) puts the biscuit in the basket, with helpers for Messier and Kasparaitis for the Rangers, tying things up at one. Yes, Benedict Brian's cheering this one too. Don't worry, the hockey gods have indeed taken notice!

7:43 Almost an entry a minute here! Double Sin Bin action as Barnaby gets two for goalie interference and Malakhov goes off for hooking. Can you say "5 on 3"?

7:44 Rangers successfully kill off the aforementioned 5 on 3. Is that clapping I here, Brian?

7:45 1st period ends, time for some waiter service, we order two hamburgers and a beer and charge it to Mr. Underhill's credit card.

7:50 Zamboni! Actually there's two of them and they've each got a small child strapped in and riding along. "Now remember kids, when riding the zamboni, please fasten your seat belts and keep you arms and legs inside of the vehicle at all times. When the ride stops you may exit to your left, we thank you for patronage. Please enjoy the rest of your day at Wally World."

7:55 An announcement that some game in February against the Thrashers is Bobby Holik Bobblehead Night. Now ain't that precious? I'm not even going there! What I really want to know is, when is Mike Richter Bobblehead Night? All fans 15 and under receive a free Mike Richter Bobblehead. But don't wiggle it! Mike might get another concussion!

8:00 2nd period begins, and it's only 8PM! One more hour 'til WWE RAW starts. A few hurry up face-offs, no traffic in the Holland Tunnel and who knows? Maybe I can make it home in time for the Stacey Keibler/Trish Stratus evening gown match?

8:05 Scotty Gomez (assisted by Turner Stevenson and Brian Rafalski) puts the Devils ahead 2 - 1. An earlier goal that would have put the Rangers ahead had been disallowed and let me tell you the crowd was not pleased! In fact a couple of fine looking gentlemen in business casual attire to the right of us threatened to "go Moltisanti" on the ref!

8:07 Kasparaitis two minutes for holding. Is there anyone else in the world named Darius? Well except for lead singer Darius Rucker, but we all know him as Hootie anyway. Sorry Kasparaitis, no Blowfish in the penalty box.

8:10 Speaking of holding, the very tightly dressed Coors Lights Girls come into our section touting some kind of in-house promotion. Brian immediately gets 2 minutes for "holding his stick"!

8:12 Colin White gets a deuce for roughing. Slow night for Colin, took him until 10:34 of the 2nd period before he did something dumb to hurt his team. Now he gets to go in the penalty box "to feel shame".

8:16 Some guy just shouted out a threat to do something very messy involving a rusty pipe and Martin Brodeur's "crease". Wow, tough crowd!

8:19 Newly acquired Rangers goalie Mike Dunham makes a spectacular glove save, reminiscent of old Mets first basemen Willie Montanez, he snatches the puck as his glove rips back from his wrist then he quickly snaps the glove forward in front of his wrist and around the back before presenting the puck to the ref for the ensuing face-off. Are you getting my visual? Even you Yankee fans? Pretty stuff when you're sitting this close to the action.

8:23 Revenge of the hockey gods! We're sitting in the corner of the rink, just past the end of the protective netting, on the "unprotected" side and a Mark Messier dump-in (yes, contrary to popular belief, the Rangers do occasionally dump the puck into the zone) has rung quite loudly off the metal pipe between the two panes of glass directly in front of us, sending Brian jumping out of his seat in sheer terror! For the rest of the game, Brian decides he's better off not cheering for the Rangers. For the rest of the game Brittany Cecile jokes abound! The hockey gods are happy with these decisions.

8:28 "Hit him with your purse, Eric!"; "Nice dress Stevens!"

8:30 2nd period ends (and there is much rejoicing).

8:32 Checking out my program, there's a rookie on the Devils named Jiri Bicek. And why does Freddie Mercury immediately pop into my head here? "Bicek-cul, Bicek-cul, I want to ride to ride my Bicek-cul, I want to ride my bike"…

8:35 Zambonis, The Sequel. No kids this time, I hope they didn't fall off in the back! OK, where's Score-O? And why isn't anybody driving a Cadillac Escalade all over the ice? Oh, never mind here it comes. And is that a kid strapped to the optional ski rack?

8:40 A Rangers.com ad appears on the Jumbotron scoreboard. What? No free shipping for the holidays?

8:45 3rd period begins. Why do these guys have to come out and skate in circles before every period? Some kind of ancient muscle stretching ritual to appease the hockey gods hungry for ACL's? Why not just cut out all the skating and sacrifice a minor leaguer's hamstring instead? Oops, better watch out, don't want to anger the hockey gods! Hey, where did my brother go!

8:48 Have I mentioned that the music kicks ass in this building? So far I've heard about 5 different Metallica tunes and R.E.M.'s "Orange Crush"! You definitely don't get this at The Meadowlands.

8:52 Looking over behind the goal a patch of brown ice is slowly forming along the back wall! Either someone in the front row behind the goal is taking a Bobby Holik or their Stanley Cup has runneth over! Oh wait, I bet it's just a spilled beer.

8:55 Sure enough, it's a stoppage in play as the puck goes off the net (and this ain't the Arena Football League so we don't "play it off the net") and here comes a guy with a shovel to address the spreading "brown ice" situation. Hey buddy, be careful there, you might need a pooper scooper and a plastic sandwich bag turned inside out instead!

8:59 Colin White will once again have some free time to think things over as he gets 2 minutes for the always popular cross check.

9:02 A fight has broken out way above us in the Blue Seats! What took you guys so long? And wait, if you listen closely enough I think I can make out a faint "Beat you wife Potvin!".

9:06 Penalty! It's the aptly named Cory Cross getting sent to the box for a cross check, he must've been watching Colin White about 7 minutes ago. Come to think of it, isn't every check by Cory a Cross check? Sorry, didn't mean to go Andy Rooney there.

9:08 "Matteau! Matteau!" No wait, that's Richard Lintner (again I ask you, who the f*** are these guys?) scoring on the power play for the Rangers, tying things up at 2 and it's beginning to look a lot like overtime folks! Sorry 'bout the Matteau excitement, must be the old ghosts haunting this building!

9:12 New Jersey's Turner Stevenson gets two minutes for interference. Yeah, as in interfering with the Devils offense! What's this offensive juggernaut doing on the ice during the last 2 minutes of a tie game? Where or where has the "A" Line gone?

9:15 3rd period ends with the score tied at 2. And they were forced to eat Robin's minstrel.

9:16 One point guaranteed for each team, now we go to overtime, where the losing team could get a number in that dreaded "4th column" of the standings, the "overtime loss". Folks, the stakes are high so let's play The Feud!

9:20 OT starts. We're skating 4 on 4, then it'll be "ladies choice", then a "couples skate", followed by a "reverse direction" and then if we're still tied, we go to "Goon Penalty Shots"! I love these new NHL rules!

9:23 The game's almost over and I really have this urge to start a "1994!" chant but something tells me that wouldn't be prudent.

9:25 OT ends, it's a tie, everybody kiss your sister and go home. Thank you for coming to Madison Sqaure Garden, we hope you enjoyed our show, please make sure your company car drives you home safely. Good night and have a pleasant tomorrow…

Well that's the diary folks! Remind me not to do that again, major hand cramp and not enough paper. See you all again in seven days or so. By the way, does anyone know if the Ottawa Senators offer direct deposit? Just wondering... 'til next week…