Sun Aug 28, 2016
Hockey (league)
Championship game this week and as you can see in the picture we won! Yeah we get a little mini Stanley Cup which is cool but will ultimately become clutter. We also got these nice light-weight hoodies which are pretty decent.
The game was a close one. I was score-less until late in the first period when we took a stupid too-many men on the ice penalty. They won the draw back to the d-man who took a shot which deflected off of two sticks and into the net to make it 1-0. Not too long after that we answered back with a nice wrist shot goal to tie it 1-1.
In the second period the other team benefited from a few lucky bounces and manged to go up 3-1. The game was pretty even but we just couldn't find the net. Thankfully late in the period we got a lucky bounce of our own as our guy banked a wrist shot off of their d-man's thigh and into the net to make it 3-2.
In the third period we started to press a bit more and build some momentum. About halfway through the period I took a faceoff in the offensive zone and off a scramble I managed to knock the puck to my right winger who flipped the puck over the goalie. It hit the crossbar and bounced out but hit the goalie's back and trickled into the net, tying the game at 3-3. For the rest of the period both teams had chances but both goalies stood their ground and the period ended tied so we were off to overtime.
In this league overtime is played 4 on 4 with only changes on the fly allowed. Right off the opening faceoff their best player knocked the puck passed me and charged in on our defence. We managed to keep him from getting a good chance but I totally thought "fuck this guy is gonna blow by me and end the game in 10 seconds". However he was totally in "do it all myself" mode so we just blanketed him and eventually he coughed up the puck.
Both teams had a few chances before I eventually picked up a loose pick in the offensive zone. I deked around one guy and protected the puck from a second guy. At this point their last defenseman rushed at me but before he could get to me I slide the puck to my winger who was wide-open in front of the net. Their d-man dropped me on my ass but it was too late and I watched from the ice as my winger buried the championship winning goal.
Overall this was a great season. The competition is always a bit weaker in the Summer but we played really well as a team and had a couple of come from behind victories to pull it out in the end. We were also missing our #2 scorer for the semi-finals and finals which I think shows how well we play as a team right now. A lot of the teams at this level (it's fairly low to be honest) are carried by one or two strong players but we have pretty good all-around scoring.
We now have 3 weeks off and then we're back at it for the Winter.