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Syracuse Crunch set indoor attendance record, honor Leah Still

Via Syracuse Crunch
Via Syracuse Crunch

In 1996, the Tampa Bay Lightning set an attendance record for an indoor pro hockey game in the United States. In 2014, that record finally fell, thanks to their minor league affiliate.

The Syracuse Crunch of the American Hockey League drew an announced crowd of 30,715 at the Carrier Dome at Syracuse University on Saturday night, shattering the record of 28,138 set by the Lightning vs. the Philadelphia Flyers in a Eastern Conference playoff quarterfinal game held in what was then called the ThunderDome on St. Petersburg, Fla.

The Crunch defeated the Utica Comets, the Vancouver Canucks’ farm team, 2-1. Here’s a look at the scene:

From the AHL:

Tonight’s turnout also represented the second-largest crowd in the 79-year history of the AHL. The Syracuse Crunch were also the first AHL team to put on an outdoor game when in 2010, a crowd of 21,508 fans – then the largest ever for an AHL game – packed the New York State Fairgrounds to watch the Crunch.

The game opened on an emotional note, as the Crunch skated out for warmups wearing Cincinnati Bengals jerseys in honor of Leah Still, the four-year-old daughter of Bengals player Devin Still. She’s battling Neuroblastoma, a Stage 4 pediatric cancer.

The jerseys were to be autographed and auctioned off to benefit Ronald McDonald House.