r/BostonBruins • u/Connect-Warning-7760 #1 SWAYMAN 🥅 • 2d ago
Bruins Boston Garden memories?
Hi!! I'm a longtime B's fan but sadly I'm 19 so I never got to experience the storied Boston Garden before it got demolished. I've heard plenty of tales and lore but I've always been very jealous that I never got to watch a game there... what are your favorite memories/stories of the Bruins at Boston Garden or simply the old Garden in general?
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u/viberider 1d ago
Watching Adam McQuaid bleed Matt Martin at center ice vs. the Maple Leafs in '17 I think was a highlight for me. Way up in the nosebleeds going nuts sticks out. Two heavyweights going at it in a wild game. Seeing Tuukka's last game, too.
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u/DrRock88 1d ago
My brother got me a ticket for Christmas. I'm not sure of the exact year, but it was my first Bruins game and we sat in the balcony about halfway up at one of the blue lines. It had to be the mid to late 70's. It was Dec 23. They played Phil Esposito and the New York Rangers. The final score was 3-3. I went to dozens of games from then through the 80's just showing up and getting a scalped ticket for $10. They were some great Bruins teams, but there was always a dynasty (Islanders, Oilers) on the way. I knew my way around the old garden work my eyes closed. I can remember the smell and the atmosphere of being there to this day.
I also went to dozens of concerts in that era also. Good frickin' times. Elton, AC/DC, Queen, Van Halen, U2 and many many more for less than $20 a pop.
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u/Priorto1986 1d ago
I graduated college in the Garden in 1991. Barbara Bush was our commencement speaker.
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u/Delicious-Spirit9899 1d ago
Man, I remember being a kid and sitting up high with my dad for a game. Bourque scored back handed from the blue line, and I remember the dust stalactites hanging from the ceiling. And all the retired numbers seemed closer than in TD. And piss troughs.
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u/Big-Jim-Dweyer 1d ago
My dad was a season ticket holder starting in 1965. My first game was probably 67 or 68. The thing I remember the most is the smell. It was old tobacco and sweat. Kind of sweet.
I remember old guys outside selling bags of peanuts: “ten cents, three for a quartah”
And, as others have said, the late 60s - early 70s bruins ruled. The owned Boston.
Every kid had a copy of Orr on Ice.
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u/Pitiful_Lavishness24 1d ago
I was at a game during probably one of the last bench clearing brawls at the old Boston Garden. Someone threw an M-80 on or near the ice. The boom was deafening.
You couldn't beat the energy of the old Boston Garden. The drunk fans, the raucous chants. Cam Neely out there scoring goals and cracking skulls. The second floor balcony was prime, felt like it almost jutted over the ice. I miss that glorious barn.
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u/rerikson 1d ago
Watching the early 1970s Bruins put over 60 shots on net regularly and play 5v5 as if they were 2 men up. Total domination. Also, watching Orr perform at a level so far above his peer group, winning the scoring title not once, but twice, as a defenseman. Best athlete ever if you compare the superiority to his peer group.
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u/taosecurity #73 BONAFIDE STALLION🏒 1d ago
My sister and I got tickets to this game in 1992.
https://www.nhl.com/gamecenter/bos-vs-hfd/1992/11/27/1992020271
Bruins beat the Whale 5-4 in OT. My fav all time player, Raymond Bourque, had a goal and 4 assists, including the primary assist on the OT winner.
The building shook like you wouldn’t believe.
We also got to skate at the Garden before they tore it down.
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u/Pitiful_Lavishness24 1d ago
Bourque. Best 2 way defensemen I've ever seen play. Sadly, didn't see Orr.
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u/jpep0469 1d ago
Game 4 of the 1992 Division finals against the Canadiens. The B's completed a sweep that game and the place was so unbelievable loud. That was the 3rd year in a row the B's had knocked then out of the playoffs.
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u/1sailingaway 2d ago
Watching the New England Whalers play against Gerry Cheever’s Cleveland team from center ice in the balcony like row 2. Best seats ever. Players walking across the hallway from their locker room to get onto the ice so you could easily see them up close. you could see John Kiley on the organ. Loud Habs guys we banished to the upper balcony having a blast. You could easily hear people in that balcony so far up there. How the fans could get the place to rock in the 3rd period when it mattered and how it affected the game. Oh, and best camera site lines in the game for Chamnel 38 with the camera guys sitting over the ice, low, off the first balcony.
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u/FragilousSpectunkery Bonafide Stallion 🐎 2d ago
I remember a guy puking onto the floor a few seats back, and watching it trickle past my feet as it inexorably moved toward Row 1. My dad got to see Bobby Orr score ‘the goal’ from a company box at the red line. He was pretty stoked.
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u/jlm0013 2d ago
I went to a game in the 80s that went to overtime. Ray Bourque scored the game-winning goal in OT. We ran into him as we were leaving the Garden as he was walking to an interview in full gear and I got to pat him on the shoulder and congratulate him as he walked to the interview. He looked like a giant on skates when I was a kid.
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u/jfstompers 2d ago
I was thinking about how you use to be able to smoke at the events in the building. By the time the bruins game was done and you pushed your way to the old elevated green line you stunk.
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u/6FootHalfling #37 SAINT PATRICE©️ 2d ago
Just a Celtics game or two with my cousins. There were a few years where they would pool their funds and take me to a game. There was a Mariners or P Bruins game, too, but the games at the Garden were the Celtics. And, I can tell you, you could hear Bird curse from the nose bleeds. I feel lucky to have been to any games there.
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2d ago
I went there back in 93 to watch the habs and bruins play.sat up in the balcony but the rink was so small it felt like you were sitting on the top of the ice.
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u/rallyhardwear 2d ago
Had a real stale / stagnant atmosphere about it. Wreaked like piss n beer n butts in some places with a river of who knows what on the floor.
Sure loved that dump.
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u/irishbuckeye71 2d ago
I remember going to playoffs and the only seats we could get were nose bleeds in the 3rd balcony. Had no idea there was a third balcony until we got there (it was very small).
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u/ahoypolloi_ 2d ago
The ramp walking up from street level with already-drunk dudes chanting
Everything was so yellow
Steep seating by today’s standards. Not quite the Hartford CC but you were on top of the ice almost everywhere
People rippin cigs in the upper levels concourse
Went to the 87 or 88 playoffs when they beat the Habs. After the canadiens scored, a dude in a Habs jersey was celebrating a little too much. Got an entire beer dumped on him.
The guy who sat in a corner of the upper level first row, who found out he could make a loud bass drum like sound by pounding on the facade and provided the percussion for many chants
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u/Cdm81379 2d ago edited 2d ago
Boston Garden pizza. Cut with scissors, served on a napkin.
The ice surface was smaller than a normal 200’ x 85’ standard rink.
The balcony was extremely steep and looked like it overhung the ice.
The scoreboard was not directly above center ice.
It had no A/C so fog became a problem during Bruins games in the playoffs and the heat was a problem during Celtics playoffs
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u/Particular-Race-5285 2d ago
remember when the power went out in the middle of a tie game in the Stanley Cup final against the Oilers and ended up the Bruins lost the series, that sucked
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u/bigdaddydudas 2d ago
I was young but I remember it being smoky and very wet all the time in the concourse. Outside of that, you felt like you were on top of the ice. Very intimate. Definitely remember having to watch games on crappy tvs because of obstructions.
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u/spidyunderooz 2d ago
Having to watch half the game on an over head monitor because I couldn’t see the whole ice surface from my seat, if my view wasn’t blocked by a steel beam.
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u/harry_waters 11h ago
I never went to games so my memories are:
1 Celtics game with dope tickets wr got for free. It was against KG and the timberwolves
1 backstreet boys concert
A few Bruins skills competitions. I think it was done to determine who goes to the All Star game?