from Nicholas J. Cotsonika of NHL.com,

The stage is set.

It sits smack dab in the middle of Broadway, as wide as the street, as tall as the honkytonks, topped by a banner with the logos of the Stanley Cup Final and Nashville Music City.

Standing in front of it Friday, you could hear hammers mixed with guitars as workers finished their preparations and musicians performed for crowds at Legends Corner, Tootsies Orchid Lounge, Rippy's Bar and Grill, and all the other joints on the strip by Bridgestone Arena. You could smell the barbecue.

You could only imagine what it will be like Saturday, when Alan Jackson, the newest Country Music Hall of Fame inductee, takes the stage and the Nashville Predators take the ice against the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 3 (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVA Sports).

Tens of thousands of people will listen to music and watch hockey as the Predators play in the Final at home for the first time. They'll watch live in the arena, on TV in the honkytonks and on three giant video boards outside.

"Our party will be … spilling everywhere," Predators President and CEO Sean Henry said.

That's what this will be, a party, and it will be full of surprises, per tradition. Expect another A-list anthem singer, the towel-waver to make sure the crowd is ready for hockey, a legend to join the house band between periods and celebrities all over the place.

"The fever is at an all-time high," NHL Chief Content Officer and Executive Vice President Steve Mayer said. "This is the most popular event to happen here in a long time. I've gotten hundreds of people asking for tickets from the celebrity world. The crowd that will be here [Saturday], even if they're not performing, will be a who's who of the entertainment world."

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