Hockey is a Family Sport

On Saturday I went to the Sheffield Uni winter varsity hockey game.  Now Sheffield doesn't actually have any varsity sports, mostly it's just the equivalent to a mix of intermural/club teams at home.  From what I can tell you have to try out to be on the team, but the teams don't play other schools (at least I don't think so).  So this was an exciting event because every winter they have the winter varsity games where Sheffield Uni (my school) plays against Sheffield Hallam (a school closer to the city center).
So apart from the fact that this was a once in a year event (there's also spring varsity but different sports) I didn't have to pay for my ticket.  Granted the regular student price was only 3 quid, I still didn't have to pay for it.  One of my flatmates (Amanda) had won 2 tickets earlier last week at the activities fair.  On Saturday morning she received an e-mail saying to go to entrance B to get a yellow band.  Well we took the tram to the arena bummed that we got to the free buses too late but luckily we didn't have to pay on the tram because it was too crowded for the ticket person to get through.  When we got to the gate the woman there didn't seem to know what was going on.  Amanda's name wasn't on any of the lists.  At first I was concerned that we weren't going to be able to get in, but Amanda told her that she had won tickets and got an e-mail telling her to go to that gate, which was true.  I guess the woman didn't know what else to do but she gave us VIP passes and led us to the VIP room.  There we were able to get free drinks and food in between periods.  This was nice since neither Amanda or I had eaten lunch.

My VIP badge:)

The game itself was quite fun.  It was the first hockey game I had ever gone to.  I would think that a NHL game might have been more exciting but it was still good.  We played well but ended up losing in the last couple of minutes of the game.  We had a group that led some cheers that were quite interesting, such as "We go somewhere you don't go, Uni, Uni.  We go somewhere you don't go, University! University! University! We go somewhere you don't go University"  I was a little confused by this since both schools are universities.  Amanda and I got on the wrong bus going back to campus but it was just going to one of the other student villages.  It was a quick walk back to our flat and we weren't the only ones who had made the mistake!

Go Uni!