from Neil Best of Newsday,

Islanders fans finally got their turn on Saturday night.

For a decade and a half, they had watched new or rebuilt sports palaces rise across the region, from Newark to Queens to the Bronx to East Rutherford to Brooklyn to, yes, midtown Manhattan.

But it never, ever was about them, fans of a team that has been looking for a modern home to call its own for as long as many of those fans have been alive.

Now they not only can say they have one but can argue — and probably will — that they have the best one of all:

UBS Arena, the $1.1 billion facility that opened with the Islanders hosting the Flames before a crowd that spent much of the night oohing-and-aahing its way through wide concourses and architectural flourishes.

"I’ve been waiting for this since the early ’80s; it’s unbelievable," Mike Galligan of Deer Park said as he watched the third period from his seat in front of the Tailgate Bar. "I can’t believe I’m here tonight."

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KK member Kaszycki and his Krew was at the game and gave his views in the comment section of this post.