A Farewell

Islanders at Nassau Coliseum: One final memory

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One final parking lot tailgate. One final walk through the way-too-narrow concourse. One final puck drop. One final chant ribbing the cross-town rivals. One final eye squint trying to read the small, outdated scoreboard. One final goal eruption. One final dramatic game. One final memory.

One last time, fans packed into Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum to watch Long Island’s only professional sports team take the ice for its last regular season game in the 43-year-old arena off Hempstead Turnpike.

The Old Barn, as its visitors affectionately call it, has served the New York Islanders and their fans since 1972. Last Saturday, in front of the 27th sellout crowd of the season, that hockey team and those fans sent the building out in style, beginning with a pregame ceremony featuring bagpipes, video tributes and the family of longtime Islanders coach Al Arbour (who was unable to attend because of health problems) leading an honorary faceoff.

The game itself featured up and down action, lead changes, huge roars from the crowd and ultimately, a disappointing result, with the Islanders falling 5-4 to the Columbus Blue Jackets in a shootout.

Generations of fans crammed into the Coliseum wearing their blue and orange to pay their respects to the building and soak in the atmosphere before the team moves to the Barclays Center in Brooklyn in the fall.

“I called the Coliseum my second home,” said Jodie Rafalowitz, a Baldwin High School graduate who fondly recalls the Islanders’ four consecutive Stanley Cup championships from 1980 to 1983. “I was up here to see the Islanders play Minnesota in March, but I’ve been planning to go to the last home game since December.”

Rafalowitz now lives in Virginia, but made the trip to Long Island for the occasion. “I just had to be here for it,” she said.

Those four Cups, and 19 consecutive playoff series won, hold a special place in the hearts and minds of many Islanders fans, including Keith Doran of Rockville Centre. On May 24, 1980, when Islanders legend Bobby Nystrom scored his Stanley Cup-winning goal in overtime of Game 6 against the Philadelphia Flyers, Doran recalls getting home from playing hockey at the Rockville Centre Recreation Center to see it.

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