It is late Sunday morning when the doors at T-Mobile Arena open before a recent Golden Knights game against Calgary and a stampede ensues at The Armory, the official team store.
This must have been what the Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889 was like.
Inside the team shop, 200 hockey pucks stamped with the logos of the teams and the date are stacked behind the checkout counter. They won’t be there long. They’re called limited edition pucks, and like everything else about the Golden Knights in their inaugural season, they’ve become a thing.
People line up an hour before the opening face-off to collect them, or a souvenir poster, or just about anything else which might have emotional value, or monetary value on eBay after the game.