Hockey 'fan' stabs and kills a rival supporter over team loyalty.

In one of the most disturbing incidents in recent memory, a New Jersey Devils' fan stabbed a Philadelphia Flyers fan to death Sunday morning, simply due to the fact that his loyalty to his team did not align with his own.

Action News has reported that a 25-year-old Flyers' fan was celebrating St. Patrick's Day with friends across the street from Rittenhouse Square at around 3 a.m, when things took a fatal turn. A man who was described as a a 5'8 African American male, sporting a blue Devils' hat, approached the Flyers' fan randomly. The Devils' fan immediately asked if the victim was a Flyers fan, before engaging in a heated altercation before stabbing him in the stomach. The man in the Devils' hat then fled the scene and managed to get away after the assault. The Flyers' fan, who hailed from Bucks County, was pronounced dead after being sent to Hahnemann Hospital.

Local police released this statement to NBC10 News:

"There was a brief verbal altercation, a struggle ensued that lasted a few seconds, and by witness accounts, the offender stabbed the complainant," Philadelphia Police Capt. Nicholas Smith said at the scene. "Then [the attacker] fled the area going southbound on 19th Street, then eastbound on Manning Street."

What makes this incident all the more bizarre is that fact that Rittenhouse Square is considered one of the safest and most expensive areas in the whole of Philadelphia. Many of the Flyers' players, including captain Claude Giroux owns homes in the area, and an icident like this is practically unheard of.

This is obviously not a representation of Devils' fans as a whole, but rather a senseless act of violence with no excuse to be had.

Hopefully the police will be able to track this murderer down and deliver swift justice for his brutal crime.

Here is the full report from Action News:

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