MILAN (AP) — The puck dropped Thursday on the first game at the Milan Cortina Olympics in the newly built hockey arena that needed a rush to the eleventh hour to finish.
The women’s game between host Italy and France followed several days of practices on the brand new sheet of ice that had to be worked on following a series of test events at Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena. Ice master Don Moffatt was worried as recently as early last week about getting the surface ready in time for the Olympics.
None of the years of scrutiny and worries over construction delays were evident inside the seating bowl, even if there was still a stretch of rubber matting across one side of the ice until roughly 20 minutes before pregame warmups.
It was business as usual for the Zamboni and arena operations staff, while fans filed into the stands. Many took seats that were only installed within the past couple of months, and even so the capacity was reduced to 11,600 from an original plan for 14,700.
On the concourse, it was obvious that some corners had to be cut to complete the job, but concession stands were operating and the clutter and construction that lingered into Wednesday were nowhere to be seen.
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