Santa Brawl Holiday Tale remains a playful part of NY Islanders lore decades later

It wouldn’t be the Christmas season without reminiscing about the infamous Santa "Brawl" at the Nassau Coliseum 21 years ago on Dec. 23, 2003. As background, the New York Islanders were hosting the rival Philadelphia Flyers. Seeing that attendance would not be what it should be for a game during the holiday week, the Islanders offered anyone who showed up dressed as Santa free admission and the opportunity to parade across the ice during the first intermission. 

What could go possinly go wrong?

The promotion resulted in more Santas showing up than anyone could have imagined, including a group of lifelong Long Island friends that was a mix of Islanders and New York Rangers fans. They playfully plotted that while on the ice, they would strip off their cheap Santa costumes purchased hours before and reveal they were Blueshirt loyalists. What transpired afterward became part of the Islanders-Rangers lure and received national attention in the following days.

The New York Times’ Dave Caldwell was on hand that night and provided a play-by-play of how a lighthearted holiday promotion to drive up attendance turned into a wild and unforgettable scene.

"The Islanders thought their promotion might draw about 250 would-be Santas. Instead, double that number showed up. One Santa even brought a sign that read ''All we want for Christmas is a new G.M.,'' a criticism directed at General Manager Mike Milbury. The team invited the Santas to parade on the ice after the first period. Some of the Santas, many of them young men, began sliding across the ice, happy to be part of the festivities. Soon, however, there was trouble. A few Santas ripped off their red jackets to reveal Rangers jerseys. That was too much for the many Santas who were Islanders fans. It was as if the clock had turned back two years, and Theo Fleury, then a Ranger, was back on the Coliseum ice doing the chicken dance to mock the Islanders."

Last week, Chris Botta, the team's former VP of Communications, and Andy Francess, an Islanders fan who helped organize the Santa event with his friends, appeared together on the Isles Fix Podcast for the first time to discuss the events of that day from their perspectives.

Botta was handling his game-day duties and preparing to secure a first intermission guest as dozens and dozens of Santas readied to take their holiday ice stroll around the Coliseum. "I think at one point, there was a discussion. 'Do you know what? I don't think we could do this on-ice thing.' There are so many of them," Botta said. "But one thing I could tell you is that anybody who tells you they saw this coming or thought it was a possibility would be lying."

Things were going relatively according to plan until the first Santa revealed their Rangers jersey and got an instant reaction from the crowd. "When he takes that off, I push him, and the crowd cheers," Francess recalled. "That's when all the other non-affiliated Santas got the cue. They wanted that same reaction. They wanted to have the same cheer."

"It's like a couple of friends fake pushing each other and then others pushing. Never a punch to the face," said Francess. "Nothing like that. But if you only read the articles, it makes you think how many stories grew in lore because there wasn't day-to-day evidence."

The bad Santas weren't thrown out of the arena. Instead, they returned to their seats, laughed about what happened, watched the Islanders beat the Flyers, and headed home. The following days saw the local evening news, the New York Times, and others play clips, including a humorous one of a kid Santa trying to take down one of the Ranger fans that had infiltrated the Isles' home ice. "It was a war on ice, ill-will toward men," NBC sportscaster Len Berman said in his Spanning The Globe segment.

The Islanders avoided a fine for delaying the start of the second period, as the NHL and everyone else saw the humor and harmless absurdity of the situation. MSG Networks gathered Botta, Francess, and two of his perpetrator friends for a short documentary two years ago. For now, there are no plans for the Islanders or any other NHL team to recreate the holiday magic from over two decades ago.