Brandon Walker and the Nashville Predators are inching closer to the Stanley Cup.
The Predators are currently battling the Pittsburgh Penguins for the right to raise hockey’s holy grail, and Walker, the Preds’ Duncan-born director of hockey operations, is enjoying the quest.
“It’s so much fun,” Walker said on Monday afternoon, prior to the Nashville’s 5-3 loss to Pittsburgh in game one of the Stanley Cup finals. “The fans are into it, the city is excited about it. Hopefully that will be an advantage to us when we come back for games three and four. Hopefully it’s something that translates into success in the ice.”
Nashville has embraced the sport of hockey and thrown itself fully behind the team’s goal of bringing a championship home.
“It’s unreal,” he said. “They’re expecting 15,000-plus outside the arena for a viewing party [Monday], and it’s supposed to go up to 30,000 by the time we come back. That doesn’t include the 17,000 inside the arena. They’ve shut down Broadway, which is the main road in front of the arena with all the bars, and they’ve put screens at both ends of the street.”
Walker personally is “a little busier” than usual with his team in the final.
“Everything is ‘more,’” he said. “There are more requests, we have to be more careful with the players’ time, there’s more security around the hotel, more owners are travelling with the team. We’re just dealing with a larger group, and that’s great.”
As mandated by the NHL, the Predators got to Pittsburgh two days before the final started, something that allowed them to better adjust to the circumstances.
“It kinds of gets some of the excitement out of the way early,” Walker explained. “Players are creatures of habit, so when they can go back to their regular routine, it becomes just another game. By coming earlier, they are able to take a lot of the distractions away.”
Walker has been with the Predators since 2002, just four years into the team’s existence, and is thrilled to see many of his longtime coworkers experiencing long-sought-after success.
“For the franchise, one of the coolest things is to see how in 19 years, they’ve gone from an expansion team to competing to being in the final,” he said. “It’s rewarding to a lot of the people who have been here since day one, starting with my boss, [GM] David Poile.”
It’s not just the front office that’s getting to do this for the first time: while the defending champion Penguins have more than two-dozen rings between them, the Preds have only one player, captain Mike Fisher, who has even been to the finals before, when his Ottawa Senators lost to the Anaheim Ducks in 2007. Head coach Peter Laviolette, however, has plenty of experience: he won the Cup with the Carolina Hurricanes in 2006 and coached the Philadelphia Flyers to the 2010 finals where they ultimately lost to the Chicago Blackhawks.
“The fact that he’s been there a few times and has won makes all the difference in the world,” Walker said. “For the players, all they’ve got to do is worry about playing the game and doing as well as they possibly can.”
The rest of the organization is soaking in the international attention.
“This is really cool for our franchise to be front and centre,” Walker said. “We’re the only game every night for two or three weeks. It’s gonna be awesome.”