Mostly through random luck, I recently had the pleasure of taking in a Blue Jackets game in the Lexus Lounge, one of the luxury seating areas in the Nationwide Arena. If you haven't already listened to the podcast, you can check it out here:
The random luck was that we had won the tickets through an arena contest sponsored by Atlas Butler, which we joined when we visited Nationwide in November to see the Flyers in town. As someone who never wins anything, I was pretty thrilled when I found out where our seats would be.
This is the first time I'd ever had to go downstairs after entering an arena, and that made me a bit skeptical of the "luxury" nature of the experience. The entrance also seemed fairly unimpressive:
Once inside, we were greeted with an expansive bar and seating area, plus other amenities I'll get to in a bit:
A waitress seated us and took our drink orders. By the way, the ticket includes two drink tickets! The menu is decently diverse and has something for everyone:
The food is serve yourself buffet style, and was also equally diverse. Pictured below is an Asian-inspired salad, various crackers and dips, roasted veggies, a farro/vegetable salad, and this is just the start. As a person who tries to keep to a plant-based diet, I was more than satisfied with my options:
For meat-eaters, there was also a carving station:
And if you want more of a standard arena fare experience, there was a nacho bar, soft pretzel bar, hot dog bar, and popcorn to get your fix:
However, my favourite food item of the night came from the cold station. Thankfully I occasionally eat fish, because missing out on this tuna poke bowl would have been a travesty:
Each one is handmade to order, and it was an absolutely delicious complement to my "appetizers" that I showed above.
Juuuuuust in case you're not already full after all of those options, there's also an ice cream and dessert bar to boot:
The dessert can take on any life you choose for it, even if all you want is to mix Reese's Pieces and peanut M&M's:
In case you forgot, there was also a hockey game happening this evening. Behind the main restaurant seating area were two portals that led directly up to ice level:
I'd experienced club boxes before, but nothing like this. In my opinion, this was far superior. I looked up the price of tickets and for what you would pay for a box after the upcharges for purchasing your own custom food options, you just about break even on the cost, and with the lounge price, your food is unlimited, so you probably end up saving money. We were pretty happy with the evening so far, and pre-game warmups hadn't even begun:
This is the approximate view from the seats. Definitely not too shabby:
We happened to choose a game against the Minnesota Wild (more on that later), which gave me the opportunity to see former Flyer Ryan Hartman. You may remember him as the guy who came over in the Wayne Simmonds trade:
The real reason I told my girlfriend to pick this game was because I really wanted to watch young sensation Kirill Kaprizov. Ek and Zuccarello aren't too shabby either, even if Zucc is a former Ranger:
By the way, Kaprizov was drafted by now former Flyers' GM Chuck Fletcher. He got at least one thing right. Unfortunately it wasn't for the Flyers. Anyway...
I have a tradition of snapping a photo of the National Anthem. Columbus' regular singer Leo Welsh is pretty great at his job and I always appreciate hearing him:
The aforementioned Kaprizov scored along with Brandon Duhaime to give the Wild a 2-0 lead heading into intermission, which ended up being the final score of the game. During intermissions, everyone from the Lexus Lounge is obviously allowed to head back downstairs for refreshments and use of the private restrooms, an added bonus:
There was a solid contingent of Minnesota fans in the building, including this guy we spotted across the arena:
And of course, I have to throw in some token pics of Johnny Hockey, who you may remember should have signed with the Philadelphia Flyers last Summer if not for a bumbling executive who is now out of a job:
The real added bonus in the selection of this game was that my girlfriend got to see her favourite player for the first time since he was selected away from the Penguins by the Vegas Golden Knights in 2017, that being Marc Andre Fleury:
Flower picked up the shutout that evening. It's tough to see, but there's a contingent of HIS fans hanging around near the team tunnel to greet him:
I say HIS fans because as I mentioned on the pod, there were people who were there wearing Fleury jerseys from every team he's played for: Pittsburgh, Vegas, Chicago, and of course Minnesota. Pretty cool to see fans following their favs, which made me think about my favourite athletes I've followed over the years.
As I mentioned above, the final score was 2-0, and I'm super glad we randomly got to have an enjoyable, unique, and completely unexpected experience at a hockey game.
10/10 would do again. I might even pay for it next time. ;)
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