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Colorado Avalanche vs Minnesota Wild: Fan Fight

By Nadia Archuleta

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A Minnesota Wild fan sucker punched a Colorado Avalanche fan in the back of the head. The Avs fan’s friend had to restrain him from punching back.

Just reading those words, you’re probably on the Avalanche fan’s side. Where it gets a little tricky is that the Wild fan is a woman. The Avs fan is a man — and he looked ready to punch the woman.

Here’s the video that shows the sucker punch (brown jacket, 0:11):

After that is quite the melee. People who see only the following video blame the Avalanche fan entirely — because he’s a guy:

In fact, the sports blog Dead Spin does just that — trying to paint Avalanche fans in a nasty light.

Frontier Justice — No Gender Boundaries

Ok, once you watch both videos, you see that nobody comes out of that melee smelling like roses.The Avalanche fan was already getting talked to by security. The man is drunk. I’m sure he was saying nasty things. He was probably being an ass.

However, the woman in the brown jacket is taunting the men as they’re getting confronted by security. She waits until the Avs fan turns around, and she then she sucker punches him in the back of the head.

My thought on her action is, if you decide to go frontier justice on him and sucker punch a drunk, angry man in the back of the head, you ought to expect the same back in return, gender notwithstanding. That said, the man should have had enough presence of mind to not attempt attacking a woman — there’s no winning outcome. Either he’s a brute who hits a woman or he’s a sissy who gets beat up by a woman — lose-lose.

Nonetheless, I’m disgusted by all those women hiding behind their gender, antagonizing the man because they get to look like the victims if he reacts. That is the opposite of feminism, and it infuriates me. The idea that men are not supposed to hit women is to protect us from abusers, not to give us carte blanche to act violently and expect no response. Those women had many better choices than “sucker punch and taunt the drunk, angry man.”

Ugly Guests

The other infuriating aspect of this situation is the game took place in the Avalanche’s home arena, the Pepsi Center. Colorado is a destination state, and we have a lot of transplants — who apparently stay loyal to their hockey teams.

More from Avalanche News

Opponent fans certainly have the right to buy a ticket and support their team, but they need to be conscious that they’re in

someone else’s home.

They should support their team while respecting the home team.

That credo is not tempered by “unless my team wins — then I get to be obnoxious.” That credo needs to be in place especially if your team wins.

Being supportive of your team, win or lose, in someone else’s home arena looks like wearing your jersey to the game and cheering when your team scores a goal or does something exciting. That’s it. You’re a guest. You don’t get to boo or chirp the home team same way you don’t get to walk around in your underwear and put your feet on the table in someone else’s house.

And it’s never proper etiquette to antagonize your hosts.

There is not a fine line between being supportive of your team and being confrontational about your fandom — the line is very wide, in fact.

The Minnesota Wild fans crossed it in the game against the Colorado Avalanche at Pepsi Center.

Next: Fallout From Avs-Wild Game

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