They went to a hockey game, and a fight broke out – but not on the ice.
A war of words over the Iraq conflict erupted into an international skirmish Saturday night as a group of Canadian fans say they were verbally and physically attacked by overzealous Americans, reports the Ottawa Citizen.
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Four residents of Canada’s capital city drove south of the border to attend Game 4 of the NHL playoffs between the Ottawa Senators and the New Jersey Devils in East Rutherford, N.J., only to be called names including “f—ing communists.”
“They told us they were disgusted by our presence,” Lee Piazza told the Citizen. “They called us [pansies] for not participating in the war on Iraq. All of these people were full-grown men.”
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Piazza and his friends Ted Mirsky, Brian Herman and Mike Prior, all 18, were decked out in Senators and Canadian national team jerseys, with Mirsky draping a Canadian flag over his shoulders.
Even before the game started, some fans reportedly booed when the Canadian national anthem was played.
“We told one young man that he had no right to mock an entire nation and that we were here to see a game, not engage in a foreign-policy debate,” Piazza told the paper.
Piazza says a Devils fan grabbed his sign in the first intermission and threatened to knock him out, while people in the washroom told Mirsky they were going to burn his flag.
“By now, we were feeling uneasy and we were sticking together,” Piazza told the Citizen.
On the smoking patio in the second break, they were surrounded by dozens of people yelling obscenities, calling them terrorists and shouting “SARS.” One American reportedly tried to butt his cigarette on Mirsky’s flag.
While leaving their seats after the game, Prior and Mirsky were physically attacked by two men, and all four got involved before security guards pulled them apart.
Piazza told the paper the situation outside in the parking lot became a “battlefield.”
“Dozens of people threw food at us, uttered discriminatory insults, shoved us, pointed at us and laughed at us. It felt like a nightmare. The hate directed toward us was like nothing any of us had experienced before,” he said.
Six police officers were needed to safely escort the Canadians to their car.
“I can’t even imagine how some minority groups must feel [being] subjected to this kind of discrimination on a daily basis. For me, the 2003 Stanley Cup playoffs have lost their innocence,” Piazza said.
The situation is reminiscent of another hockey-related skirmish between Americans and Canadians which involved children in a youth league.
As WorldNetDaily reported, a road trip for a group of U.S. peewee hockey players to a tournament in Montreal in March turned into a foray into enemy territory as the boys were barraged with anti-American insults and witnessed protesters trashing the American flag.
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