Whoa… Imagine my
Keanu Reeves impression there… Whoa. We
not only won the D4 Championship again, we pretty much totally destroyed Team
America in the process. We won 7-2! Let me say that again... 7-2. I don’t think we ever had less than a 3 goal
lead in the entire game- except maybe for a few minutes in the 2nd
period, when the score was 3-1. It was one
of the best game the Icemen have put together, ever.
I have to admit, I had some reservations that we were going
to repeat in a straight D4 championship, especially against Team America. We
didn’t beat them all season- although we always gave them a tough game. I was really pleased that Big Bear changed
the final schedule. We were supposed to play on the 24th of November.
If we’d played on the 24th,
half our team, including me, would have been gone. I’m guessing that Team America had the same
issue, so we got rescheduled for the 2nd of December. We had a full bench of three forward lines
and two defensive pairings, with our incredible goalie Adam in net.
I played right wing with Justin in the center and Herman on
the left. I’m not going to say we were
the best line in the game, but we did score.. oh, 5 of the goals in the
game! Herman had 3 and Justin had
2. I assisted on 2 of them. I also had a load of shots on goal, including
a couple that should have scored. I was
only a +4 for the night though, since I left the ice right before Justin scored
his second goal. We scored our first 3
goals in the first. I assisted on the third,
and was just to the right of the goal when it went in. The Team America goalie lost his mind. He slammed his stick on the post and started
yelling at his team. I thought he was
going to go after them.
The penalties were about even, although I think Team America
had a couple more times on the PP. They
scored one of their goals a man up. We
did get called for one bad call (a supposed Holding on Brian, when he was just
going for the puck), but they didn’t score on that one. Still no penalties for me.
I played a really good game.
In the way I do, I blocked loads of shots as Team America tried to leave
their zone, and was able to plunk the puck to someone on more than half of
them. I was also able to get the puck into
play when Justin won a few face-offs in my direction, including a nice drop pass
to Sean in the third. I lined up against a couple of TA’s newer
players- at about my level. Towards the
end of the game, the left winger I lined up against in face-offs would just grab
onto me to keep me from joining into the play.
I eventually just started swerving on him, which surprised both him and
me- I’m getting better on my skates. In
fact, I think I’ve gotten to the point that I can spend less time thinking
about my feet and start paying more attention to my stick. I missed a few pucks
that I could have sent towards the net or the TA zone.
After we won, the time keeper took our photo and gave us our
winner beers and t-shirts. We celebrated
on the ice for so long that the Zamboni driver had to wait for us, just sitting
there while we reveled. We continued our
celebrations in the dressing room, and then about half the team went to a local
sports pub for more beer and wings. It
made for a great, but late night. We may
very well be on our way to a dynasty!
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