Living in New York City, I know I can afford to see the Timberwolves once a year when they come to Brooklyn. Buy nosebleed seats for $40 (might be even lower this year), then make multiple attempts to breach the sparsely populated lower bowl. The picture below is from two years ago and the gentleman in the “Best” hat was a security guard who proceeded to walk me up the stairs about two seconds after this photo was taken.
The Knicks, however, are a different story. Here is the seat map from SeatGeek
for their upcoming game in January. North of $200 just to get in the door. Around $400 for upper deck on the side. Approaching $1,000 for the lower bowl.
I am on sabbatical this year and my son’s high school has half days on Fridays, so we started scouring the schedule for Friday or Saturday games that are within a reasonable commute. Wizards? Possible. Sixers? $$$. Celtics? $$. A Friday game in New Orleans?
$22 seats!
We checked the flights and there was a 3:30pm option that arrived at 5:40pm. Enough time to catch the $1.25 RTA bus at 6:00pm into the Central Business District, drop off bags, and get to the game. I have family in the airline industry so we can fly standby and there were plenty of seats. We even found a reasonable room at the hostel on Canal street, a convenient location for the game and the French Quarter. All that remained was to get Mrs. eshold’s permission and the journey was on!
Friday morning rolled around and so did rain showers and thunderstorms. Warnings of flight delays were given, but ours still said On Time. The available seats had dropped to 4, but we remained optimistic. En route to the airport, the available seats dropped to 2. It was early, so LaGuardia Airport security was a breeze. We arrived at the gate to see a 30-minute delay. This would make it tight, but still okay.
As we were waiting, the seats dropped to 0, then -1.
We began to make peace with the fact that we may instead be attending a St. John’s Volleyball game instead (which are quite fun, and free.) The 30-minute delay turned into 45. Boarding began. Suddenly, three seats materialized out of nowhere. We had a chance!
Our patience was rewarded. We boarded and after shoving myself into the middle seat in the back row and enjoying “Die My Love,” the plane touched down at 6:35pm. We had missed the bus, but we could still make it before tip-off! The free NBA Cup t-shirts given to the first 6,000 fans were off the table, but we were in NOLA! We had made it, but apparently the ground crew had not as we sat short of the gate for 25 agonizing minutes. By the time we had deplaned and jogged through the airport it was 7:15pm. The game had just tipped. No time for a bus, so we had to take an Uber or a cab. Pulled up Uber and it showed $97 (almost 100 times the price of the bus)! Lyft was $78. No problem, we’ll take a quick cab.
Then, we saw the line below, seemingly waiting for taxis that did not appear to be coming.
The basketball gods continued to test our patience, but all we could do was wait in line and follow the box score. “Who is Karlo Matkovic and why is he the leading scorer?” At about 7:30pm, it was finally our turn! When our taxi driver heard we were associated with Canis Hoopus, he sped to the hostel and agreed to wait for us while we dropped off our bags, then take us to the game for a modest overcharge.
At around 8:05pm, we made it to our seats before the end of the first half! We were up there, but not bad for $22. The Wolves were down by a few, but within moments we were treated to a LaMelo Ball drive that culminated in a thunderous Rudy dunk. My inability to capture sports and nature via photograph is well-known among my family, and that tradition continued as I captured a blurry picture of the drive, then lowered my phone to see the dunk.
A few minutes later, Zion Williamson scored. I checked the scoreboard and was shocked to see that it was his first field goal of the half. I assumed Jonathan Kuminga and/or Jaden McDaniels had locked him down. Halftime arrived, and with it, what is probably the best halftime entertainment I have seen at an NBA game. It was just six guys playing Zydeco music, but it was better than any of the gimmicky stuff one usually sees. This is a hot take, but I vastly prefered it even to the Red Panda.
We took a lap around the arena, looking for some beer and some Barq’s. There seemed to be some decent food options. The barbeque smelled good and they even had jambalaya, but we were saving ourselves for later.
The third quarter saw a comeback from the Pelicans and some offensive doldrums from the Wolves. Jeremiah Fears had some nice drives. I got concerned every time Saddiq Bey touched the ball. Things never felt out of reach, though. As the third quarter ended, we decided to try and improve our lot in life by sneaking down to the lower bowl.
Now that is what I am talking about.
We were sitting right next to a 10-ish year old kid from New Orleans who cheered and berated the refs nonstop. They were finally calling some fouls on the Pelicans and he was crying persecution. It was pretty funny and I gave the kid respect because as a Wolves fan I certainly know what it is like to feel persecuted by the officials.
The fourth quarter saw Ayo Dosunmu and LaMelo Ball hit some big shots while the defense clamped down as the Wolves were able to churn out a victory. It was close enough to be a fun and exciting game while still feeling in the bag the whole time. After reading glowing reviews about the Pelicans announcers, I must say the vibe in the stadium was kind of the same. They were cheering passionately and complaining about officials, but also recognizing good plays from the other team and keeping some humor about it. Definitely a fun crowd.
After the game and a quick check-in to the hostel, it was time to grab a street beer and walk over to 24-hour deli Verti Marte to grab a deliciously messy and sloppy Shrimp Po’ Boy with ham, turkey, mushrooms, cheese, and wow sauce. There wasn’t open seating, so we ate po’ boys and gumbo on a stoop on Royal Street.
We then headed over to Frenchmen’s Street. New Orleans bars and clubs often have video poker machines and as such are very strict about being 21+ to even enter, so we just walked around and listened to some music through open windows.
I was heartbroken to see that Checkpoint Charlie’s, the former 24-hour music bar/laundromat, had closed. It has long been a favorite of mine, and I recently learned that Alex Chilton used to live in an apartment upstairs. One of my favorite memories from Checkpoint Charlie’s was when an artist who went by “Slewfoot” told Jacques Cousteau’s grandson “F*ck off, I am tired” after the young Cousteau had asked Slew to keep playing well after 2:00am.
In memory of that, I will leave you with a video I found on YouTube of Slew covering Dylan in Checkpoint Charlie’s. Enjoy and Go Wolves!
