Great Hockey Riots #10

#10- Montreal Riot of 2008 beat Boston Bruins/ 1st round

Montreal, the most exotic city in all of North America.  The heart of Quebec province in Canada, it's poutine-bloated inhabitants love two things; hating English people and their hockey team, the Montreal Canadiens.  The Canadiens were once to hockey what the New York Yankees continue to be to baseball; storied champions of their respective leagues.
At one time, Montreal and the Yankees were neck and neck regarding championships;  The Yankees continue to dominate, now having won 27 World Series championships and continue to be a year in, year out dominant force in major league baseball while Montreal continues to be just barely in Canada.  The last time the Canadiens won their 24th Stanley Cup, Bill Clinton was President, Windows 3 was introduced and Jurassic Park was the last time anyone paid to see Jeff Goldblum be Jeff Goldblum.  

"This is the pre-riot riot.  The real riot starts in an hour."

Now, the best way to summarize the NHL playoffs, which basically is an entire 2nd season is this; after a grueling 82 game schedule half the teams make the playoffs.  A team, once qualifying for the playoffs, needs to win 16 games against 4 opponents in series lasting seven games.  The least amount of games a team would play is 16, the most 28.  It's a long pro-acted affair that manages to hold all of Canada's (and whichever American teams that don't get eliminated attention).  It's like the American election only it doesn't happen every four years - it happens every year (in theory).      

Yet in 2008, there was a glimmer of hope besides Obama.  The Canadians had finally returned to the Big Dance, and their first opponent was their historical arch nemesis, the Boston Bruins.

The Canadiens won the series (4 games to 3) and to the Montreal riot faithful, it was as good as a championship.  And what better way for nostalgic Montreal fans to celebrate not only their long history of championship hockey and rioting by having a riot?

Sixteen police cars were destroyed, nearly equal that to the Bandit's total in Smokey and the Bandit.  Over five hundred thousand dollars in damage was done.  And do you know how many were arrested?  Sixteen!  And it takes sixteen games to win the cup!  Yet, despite the police car for each playoff win theory sounded promising, the rioters could have stopped at five, as despite all this hockey enthusiasm, the Canadiens Stanley Cup hopes were crushed as they were soundly defeated by the Philadelphia Flyers four games to one.


http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2008/04/22/mtl-habs.html