Buffalo Hockey Tournament: From Pond to Parking Lot
Many of the thousand of participants who signed up for this weekend's Labatt Blue Pond ice hockey tournament in Buffalo, N.Y., were saddened to hear that their 5th annual event was shifted from an ice hockey affair on the local marina to a street-hockey affair to be played on a nearby parking lot.
With a brutally cold Canadian air mass taking aim on the Great Lakes and Northeast this weekend, the forecast looks ideal for a winter classic in Buffalo with lake-effect snow showers expected all weekend with afternoon temperatures topping off in the 20s.
Unfortunately, all of this will be too little too late to deplete the stored warmth of the lake caused by this year's exceptionally mild winter.
Event organizers made the call to cancel the on-water aspect of the tournament in late January when an absence of ice and expected continuance of mild weather made prospects for ice formation on the Buffalo harbor by this weekend bleak.
To insure safe play, event officials require a 12-inch thick layer of ice on the waters at the Erie Basin Marina.
According to officials, they decided to keep the hockey tournament in Buffalo this year in the unlikely event that the city would enter into a deep freeze.
During a typical winter, Lake Erie would be over 85% ice covered by now, but this year ice formation on Lake Erie and all Great Lakes remains scarce.
According to AccuWeather.com Meteorologist Todd Miner, "the official water temperature measured offshore of Buffalo on Friday was a balmy 36 degrees Fahrenheit, a record high value for the date."
When looking at records back to 1960, the Lake Erie temperature at Buffalo on Feb. 11 has been above freezing in only five of the 52 years according to Miner. The years in which this happened were 1983, 1998, 2002, 2006 and now 2012.
Given the approach of winter's end and the fact that the AccuWeather's Long Range team are not expecting any extended period of arctic chill across the Great Lakes in the foreseeable future, chances are pretty good that 2012 will be one of those rare winters that Lake Erie remains largely ice-free.
More than 1,000 players, many coming from out of town, and 65 teams will take part in the three-day event. Originally, 144 teams were registered for the event, but 79 teams withdrew from the tournament after the event was changed to a street hockey event.
All 144 registered teams received a full refund for their original $250 registration fee, and will have automatic entry into the Labatt Blue Buffalo Street Hockey Tournament at no cost.
The Labatt Blue Buffalo Pond Hockey Tournament is run in conjunction with Buffalo's Winterfest.
AccuWeather Meteorologist Todd Miner contributed to the content of this story.
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