OUTSIDE, it resembled one of those late-summer mornings when the Giants have an early kickoff, when the people arrive just after 8 o’clock in the morning and fire up the barbecues, toss around footballs, crack open their first beers of the day. The Meadowlands was hosting a party, was getting ready for a week the likes of which it had never seen before.
And the serious revelers wanted to get a head start on the proceedings.
“Who knows when we’ll ever see the likes of this again?” asked Lou Bravone, a lawyer from Montclair, N.J., munching on a freshly-grilled steak sandwich, nursing his first Corona of the day. “I’ve been coming to this arena for 20 years, saw some awful hockey, some worse basketball, and now we get a week like this.”
Bravone took a swig from the Corona, and pointed to the big white arena looming a few football fields off in the horizon, the one that’s been named for both a politician and a plane.
“I mean,” he said, “look at that sign, will you?”
Yes, high atop Meadowlands Arena, in the building formerly known as Brendan Byrne Arena and formally known as Continental Airlines Arena, there was a most improbably piece of signage, dominating the front.
“Arena of Champions!” it proclaimed this holy piece of land. “Win for New Jersey!”
It’s true. As the people gathered in the Meadowlands parking lots yesterday afternoon, preparing for Game 3 of the NBA Finals between the Nets and the Spurs, the Meadowlands itself prepared for a week for the ages, a week for all time, the first – and, logic screams, last – time this building will ever be so electric for so long without a certain regular tenant named Springsteen taking up temporary residence.
Forgetting the history that no NBA home team has ever won the middle three games of a 2-3-2 format, the most electric truth in New Jersey heading into last night was this: It was entirely possible – maybe not likely, but possible – that the Meadowlands could host two championship celebrations within the confines of the coming business week.
Tonight, the Devils will challenge Anaheim in a winner-take-all Game 7 for the right to give Lord Stanley’s favorite chalice a tour around the arena’s ice. And come Friday night, if all worked out well last night, if all works out well Wednesday night, it is possible – again, maybe not likely, but most assuredly possible – that the Nets may be able to do the very same thing with the Lawrence O’Brien Trophy.
“I mean, who ever would have believed that?” Bravone asked, shaking his head.
“It’s almost funny, thinking about New Jersey as the capital of the sports world,” said his wife, Jo. “I remember he’d drag me here for Devils and Nets games when we were dating, and it was almost like, ‘Are you trying to get me to break up with you?’ They were so boring. So dull. So . . . awful.”
There have been exceptions, of course, none of them having anything to do with short pants or ice skates. In 1996, Kentucky outlasted Syracuse in what will undoubtedly be the last Final Four to ever visit the metropolitan area. Three years later, Bruce Springsteen sold out 15 summertime shows in about 15 seconds, and there are some who believe they can still hear the roar of those crowds echoing throughout the building’s chambers.
In truth, Springsteen (joined by the occasional U2 or Dave Mattews Band appearance) has been the true home team at the Meadowlands, playing this building close to 50 times since he opened the $85 million facility on July 2, 1981 with the opening chords of “Born to Run” giving a fine jump-start to the proceedings.
That may seem a tad ironic now, of course, since both the Nets and Devils are trying to flee from the swamp, if not for the fickle embrace of a Newark arena than somewhere else, in-state or out. But before they go, if they go, they will give everyone in this overworked, overlooked state a hell of a week for the ages.
The Stanley Cup will be in the house tonight. The O’Brien Trophy may be here as soon as Friday. A week for the ages, in the most unlikely spot you could possibly imagine.