ST. LOUIS -- Three months before the Cardinals open the 2017 season with a primetime home game against the rival Cubs, Busch Stadium served as the epicenter for another St. Louis-Chicago showdown on Monday afternoon.
In a spectacle that brought together the city's two professional sports teams, the Cardinals lent their stadium to the Blues and Blackhawks for the National Hockey League's ninth Winter Classic. With 46,556 fans in the ballpark and an overflow crowd packed inside neighboring Ballpark Village, the Blues used a pair of third-period goals by Vladimir Tarasenko en route to a 4-1 victory.
"As I told the players, once the puck's dropped, it's 85-by-200 [feet], and it's a glassed-in hockey rink.