First puck drop: It'll be a 10-hour party for Utah Hockey Club's first game

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah Hockey Club coach Andre Tourigny wants to be able to soak it all in on Tuesday night.

The crowd, the lights, the sounds, the atmosphere, everything. It's not often you get to be part of a new franchise's first-ever game.

It's been a frantic six months for the Utah Hockey Club. The team moved an entire team from Arizona, turned the Olympic Oval into a temporary practice facility, broke ground on a permanent facility, and put two NHL-caliber locker rooms in the Delta Center.

All of that was in preparation for Tuesday, Utah's first-ever regular season game.

"You want to enjoy the moment. You don't want to miss anything of it," Tourigny said.

It might be hard not to miss something on Tuesday. The Smith Entertainment Group has turned Tuesday's franchise opener into a block party.

The schedule?

• 12:30 p.m. — Team owners Ryan and Ashley Smith and NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman will hold a live press conference that fans can attend.
• 2 p.m. — ESPN will begin a live broadcast from outside the Delta Center. Steve Levy, Mark Messier and P.K. Subban will do pregame, intermission and postgame shows for an NHL triple header concluding with Utah's game against Chicago.
• 4 p.m. — Fan festivities around the Delta Center will begin, including DJs, free hockey activities and games.
• 5 p.m. — Utah Hockey Club players will arrive for a special entrance.
• 5:30 p.m. — Popular recording artist Shaboozey (of "A Bar Song (Tipsy)" fame) will perform outside the stadium on 300 West and South Temple,
• 6:30 p.m. — Hill Air Force Base pilots will do a special flyover.
• 8 p.m. — The game begins. The Delta Center plaza will turn into a watch party for those who couldn't get — or afford — tickets. The game will be shown on giant screens on 300 West at the corners of South Temple and 100 South.

It's meant to be a celebration for Utah's newest pro team — a team that seemed like a far-fetched idea even earlier this year.

"I know for a fact there are multiple other cities that would love to have NHL right now, and when that happens is kind of a big question mark for them," Ryan Smith said. "We were in a spot to be able to do it. But Utah was in a spot to be able to do it because no matter how great we are or how well funded we are, or how ready we are, the state's going to carry the day, the city's going to carry the day. The people showing up are going to carry the day."

So far, Utah has shown up.

There were 15,000 people at the welcome party in April. The team has sold 8,500 full-season equivalent season-ticket packages (for an arena barely going over 10,000 "unobstructed" seats, no less). The team sold $160,000 in Utah HC merchandise during the preseason game — the second-highest total in arena history.

And Tuesday is expected to be a party — both in and outside of the arena.

"We're just excited," Smith said. "I hope everyone gets a chance to take in this moment in history. My biggest fear is that we don't sit back and actually say, 'This is a moment.' I hope everyone takes a selfie and sends it to someone."

But after all the pregame festivities and what is expected to be an electric team introduction, there is still a game to be played. Tourigny wants to give the fans a reason to keep the celebration going long after opening night.

"We have a job to do, we have make sure we're doing our job, so the party can take off," he said. "We're here to be a good hockey team, play a good game. We have a great opportunity to start in front of our fans with a lot of energy. There's a lot of enthusiasm around the team. So we want to be up to the challenge."

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