It fell in swirling, mad, white flurries, creating the snow globe backdrop the NHL always pines for at these outdoor events.

It made for beautiful television. But it also made the snow shovellers the co-MVPs of the Winter Classic, with their forays up and down the ice every few minutes during stoppages changing the momentum of the game as much as any player on the ice.

Images from Wednesday's Winter Classic

Video: HBO cameras put Leafs under more scrutiny

The Big House was a mad house, for the players, the coaches and the 100,000 or so fans that braved it all in the stands but they found a way to pull it off.

I was watching them shovel it and you could see the piles by the time they were done there they were this high off the ice, Toronto Maple Leafs captain Dion Phaneuf said, raising his hand waist high.

He was still wide-eyed with excitement, his lip bleeding from a high stick, after playing a key role in a 3-2 shootout win over the Detroit Red Wings, a game that will be remembered as the snowiest of hockeys growing number of Snow Bowls.

This wasnt attractive hockey in a literal sense, with players remarking afterward that the unshovelled snow was such a barrier to stickhandling they were skating like peewees their heads down, watching the puck bobble and hop, their bodies exposed should an opponent come barrelling in as they would in any other game.

It was tough to get your head up, Leafs veteran Jay McClement said. Im surprised there werent some bigger hits out there every time you looked down, the puck seemed to stay where it was so you had to keep it on your stick and couldnt really push it ahead.

On the Wings bench, head coach Mike Babcock a veteran behind the bench in his second of these events who has learned to adapt on the fly was watching and pleading with officials for an unscheduled shovel before one key power play.

Link:

Maple Leafs beat Red Wings in shootout at snowy Winter Classic