The Jewish Canadien

Here is a shocker. It has been months since I’ve mentioned my main man Omri Casspi on this blog. As I said countless times, I love Casspi not only because he is an Israeli, but because he plays for the Sacramento Kings, for which I am a die hard fan.

But the Kings stink. So when playoff season rolled around, the Kings players grabbed their golf clubs. But that doesn’t mean my sports fix was left void. Because I have a second team that, at least in the past, I’ve considered to be “die hard” for. That team is the Montreal Canadiens (yes, that’s how it’s spelled).

To be fair, these past two years (and especially this year) I’ve been a terrible Habs fan. It’s just SO hard to watch hockey in the U.S. It is never on T.V. unless you watch Versus on a regular basis, and we all know that you don’t.

But since the Canadiens shocked the #1 seed Capitals in the first round and have forced a Game 7 tomorrow night against the defending champion Pittsburgh Penguins, I’ve been able to jump right back onto the Habs bandwagon.

And my lord has it been awesome. I’ve recently fallen in love with Mike Cammalleri, whom the Canadiens signed as a free agent last summer. And he has been on fire lately, leading the NHL playoffs in goals with 11, including two last night (highlights below).

Speaking with my brother and mom after the game, they both rather nonchalantly mentioned that Cammalleri was Jewish. I was shocked. How did I not know that the best player on my favorite team was Jewish? How bad of a fan am I?

So I decided to look it up. And according to the never lying Wikipedia, yes, Cammalleri’s mother is Jewish, and the daughter of Holocaust survivors. Supposedly, he also grew up observing Jewish holidays.

I vow to now only root for teams with Jewish players on them. I’m looking at you Taylor Mays of the San Francisco 49ers. Oh wait. I’m already a Niners fan? God must love me.

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