Anaheim Ducks vs. San Jose Sharks

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The 6:30 faceoff is the tell that somebody scheduled this one around Thanksgiving travel. It is the Wednesday before the holiday, half the county is at the airport or on the 5, and the people who choose a hockey game instead have made a quietly excellent decision — the roads around Katella are emptier than any other November night and the building has the relaxed feeling of a room where nobody has anywhere to be in the morning. San Jose is the opponent, which still carries an edge for anyone who remembers the 2009 playoff series, even though almost nobody on either roster was alive in the league for it. California hockey rivalries are stranger and more durable than outsiders assume. Bring somebody who thinks hockey is incomprehensible: a 6:30 start and a half-empty midweek building is the easiest possible first game, because you can actually follow the puck and hear the hits. Puck drops half an hour after six, the night before the night before Thanksgiving.