Islanders Fans Meet Up with Jon Ledecky in Florida

Rob Viala and Blair MacGregor were enthused when they found out that the New York Islanders were coming to the Sunshine State for the Semifinals against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Rob, who runs the Isles Meetup Tampa chapter, and Blair, who runs the Orlando branch, immediately got to work on organizing watch parties for their usual members and the additional fans who would be making the trip down to the area for the series.

But on the eve before Sunday's Game 1 tilt between the Islanders and the Lightning, Rob and Blair each received a phone call to let them know that Islanders co-owner Jon Ledecky was inviting them to join him at Amalie Arena to watch the Islanders' eventual 2-1 Game 1 win.
"It was surreal, I still can't believe it happened," Blair said. "It was quite the experience. Jon was amazing. I had a ticket plan with the Islanders back when I lived in North New Jersey. I'd go to about 10 games. I hadn't met him before, but what a great guy. We did a whole group FaceTime and I FaceTimed him and my dad. It meant a lot."

Both Rob and Blair became motivated to initiate new Isles Meetup chapters after connecting with Mike Ryan, who founded the overall Isles Meetup network. Similar to Mike, Rob and Blair are from Long Island and grew up as avid Islanders fans. Upon making their respective moves down from the Northeast to Florida, they both found themselves missing their Blue and Orange family and wanting to recreate that community in their new towns.
"It makes it feel like home," Rob said of the Tampa meetup group, which he took over with Alan Brower back in February of 2020. "I obviously loved going to games and thought when I moved down here I'd want to fly back to New York every chance I could to watch a game in person. I definitely still miss it, but it's so amazing to have a great group to watch games with."
The Orlando-based meetup group has now been around since 2019 and has a steady group of attendees. The Tampa-based meetup began last year just ahead of the Islanders' Eastern Conference Final run in the bubble and has already received a big boost of interest with this year's rematch in the semifinals against the Lightning.
"It was overwhelming when the Islanders clinched against Boston," Rob said. "I immediately had my phone and the [Tampa Meetup] twitter account blowing up. People were sending messages and wanted to know details of where and when the watch parties down here would be. I was like - we don't even know when Game 1 is!"

While Rob and Blair had the special opportunity to watch Game 1 in person with Ledecky, Tampa and Orlando still held respective watch parties that night and plan to continue doing so throughout playoffs. To further show appreciation to the Islanders' faraway fans, Ledecky welcomed representatives from the Jacksonville and South Florida chapters to Game 2. These four chapters are just a few of the 32 Isles fans groups located around the world.
"I still just can't believe it happened, it was such a special moment especially because it was my first live hockey game since COVID," Blair said. "It was really cool, it was a great experience. Just top-notch all the way. It's so great to see committed ownership from the top down. It's world class. We had a great time. We got the win, which obviously made it better."