PHILADELPHIA - Sean Walker lay awake in the early hours of Friday morning, still winding down from a Game 3 victory for his Carolina Hurricanes in Philadelphia the night before.
It's a good thing he was.
Around 1 a.m., his phone rang, and he knew exactly what the call was about.
His wife, Taylor, was in Raleigh and on her way to the hospital, where she was just hours away from welcoming the couple's firstborn child.
"She had an appointment on Thursday, and they said things were kind of getting going, but they weren't too worried about it," Walker explained, following Saturday's series-clinching Game 4. "After the game, she called me and said her water broke, so I called (Manager of Team Services Mike Brown) right away, and thankfully, there was a 6 a.m. flight."
Making it in time for the arrival, Quinn Walker was brought into the world healthy, and all went according to plan on that front.
"The baby gods were on my side, and I got to experience it all. It was amazing," the defenseman added.
With mom and the newborn well taken care of in North Carolina, Walker was all systems go to head back to Philly and rejoin his teammates for a potential close-out contest.
Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon had a private jet ready for Walker, with a few open seats on it. Instead of letting them go to waste, a few Hurricanes Season Ticket Members (STMs) were offered the opportunity to jump aboard in exchange for a donation to the Carolina Hurricanes Foundation.
Tim Thomas, a longtime STM in Section 103, received a call with the offer on Friday night and jumped at it.
"We wanted to see a sweep," Thomas laughed as he prepared to join a happy ride home to RDU with the Canes on Saturday night. "We were glad to see that (Sean) had his kid, everyone was healthy, and it was fun to ride with him."
Taking in the game from Dundon's suite inside Xfinity Mobile Arena, the Thomas' and six others watched Rod Brind'Amour's roster become the first team to go 8-0 since 1987, when all four rounds of the Stanley Cup Playoffs became best-of-seven series.
