I took a similar road trip a few years back through the old UHL (back in it’s glory days of 14 teams, before becoming the unimpressive 6 team IHL of today), and I wound up with a lot of neat stuff along the way. I always bought a puck at every game, but this being the minors, there was often something extra. A caught t-shirt, a magnet schedule, some signed item, or something unique. Part of the fun of going to all these places is having something to take home with you.

This is what I got last night.

First off, let me say that overcharging for a puck should be a federal crime. I understand that beer prices are going to be high when consumed indoors out of a plastic cup, and you will shell out more for food than at your local Denny’s, but pucks aren’t that expensive to make. I remember complaining about paying seven dollars for a Roanoke Valley Vipers puck, only to be told that it was the inaugural year, and that’s why it was more than the average (around $5 on that road trip). Know where the Vipers went after that season? The slush pile, never to be seen again.

L.A. Kings, $10 for a puck is criminal.

Ohhhh, official. Who cares? Actually, I wanted one with the new 3rd jersey logo, but it wasn’t to be found.

Mind you, something a little different, now that will get my attention, and make me complain a little less. Such as…

That’s right, game used net, with what I assume is a puck mark. Mind you, there were a ton of these still there, but I got it because it was interesting, not to sell on ebay.

A little reading material as well. I don’t expect this to be deep or anything, but I haven’t read a hockey book in a little while.

This final piece came gratis. I got to the counter to check out, and that was when I saw the sign. If you bought more than $25 dollars of stuff, you got this:

Yeah. After last night’s game, I think fans wanted to use it like this:

BOOM!!!!

And I just want to say this about last night’s game. I felt like I was in some sort of bizarro hockey land, where Mike Cammalleri was booed, but Todd Bertuzzi was not. I can’t figure people out sometimes.

If you want the quick updates, I started a microblog for the trip. You can see it here, as well as subscribe to it’s feed. There should be a lot of content there along the way.

And all the West Coast Hockey Tour posts can be found by clicking here.