roller hockey is over

My team hit the playoffs for what would be a doubleheader last Monday.

Our first game was to give us the right to play a second game later that evening - which was the second round of the playoffs.

I had easily my best start to any game in our first game.

Intense and playoff-ready from the drop of the puck. We went into the intermission up 3-0 on my first period HT. We cruised from there into the second game, where we lost to a faster, much better passing team.

Now, I look forward to next season, hoping for an invite to the all-star game, mostly because I want to try my hand at the skills contest.

Un-believable

No one gave them a shot to get this far. All season long, we were reminded that the finalist usually finishes out of the playoffs or loses in the first round.

They lost Marian Hossa, Ryan Malone, Adam Hall and Gary Roberts to free agency.

They were out of the playoff picture with 25 games left to play.

They brought their minor league coach up to the big club.

They got beaten 5-0 in the series to force them to win the next two games.

And by god, they did it.



I really have few words to say to describe how I'm feeling right now.

Mike Lange doesn't that problem.

All a-twitter....

Two more goals in the bag for me on Monday night, but I'm really REALLY just jittery about Friday night's Game 7.

I'm a vet of three completed Penguins SCFs now, so obviously, this will be the first Game 7 of a Finals series in which I have a vested interest.

I was crushed when the Oilers lost to the Canes in that game 7 and when the Flames lost to the Lightning in that game 7, but this is MY team: The black & gold squad whose logo I'm planning to have permanently inked onto my body in the near future.

I've not ever had them in a winner-take-all game for the giant mug.

I'm already in a very emotional state because of my personal life, so it'll be interesting to try to step outside myself and observe my behavior Friday night. I'll be wearing my white Crosby sweater all day and listening to the first period at work.

But when I get home, will I still have the motivation to watch the rest of the game, or will the Pens be in a hole? Will I want to get happily shit-faced, or will it be drinking in anguish?

Sometimes, it just happens

I added three more goals to my ice hockey totals... that's eight in three games.

And they were each pretty darn lucky goals.

One, where seemingly the entire opposition was on the wrong side of their defensive zone, with me alone in front of the goalie. Puck came to our pointman who just fed me the puck. I swivelled and put a backhanded pass into the net. It was so bizarre that I thought I missed a whistle. Nope. Goal counts.

Then, I stole the puck from the point while short-handed. Just before I got to the slot, I looked up to see the goalie diving out at me. I had just enough presence of mind to slide it underneath him as we made contact - some saying I flipped two times; others saying I flipped three times before landing on my back.

And then on my second breakaway of the night, knowing he was coming out again, I just sidestepped him and tucked it away.

I was creditted with three assists as well, but I don't remember those as well.

a goalscorer

Dang, it feels good to still be a goalscorer.

My production in roller hockey has dried up a bit, mostly because we have a huge team and limited playing time.

But in my two ice hockey games in less than a week, I've managed five goals, one assist.

Thinking back to the beginnings of my hockey career, yeah, I wanted to score goals. I had five in my two high school seasons.

But it didn't really start until the beer leagues. My ability to use speed to get around defenders began then. Mostly, it was because I had been playing three or four years at that point, so my skating was improving constantly - and I was entering my prime at age 19 and 20.

I'm so glad that the ability to put the puck into the net didn't desert me once I found a hockey home out here in California. I was able to experiment an awful lot during pick-up, with different moves and positions. I feel like I've learned an awful lot just from playing against different calibres of skaters and goalies.

So, when I finally made it onto a real team, I was able to start scoring almost at will.

Nowhere was that more apparent than last night. After a cleanly won faceoff in our defensive zone, the opposing team's pointman tried to shoot, but I skated straight at him. His shot hit my pads and bounced to my feet and I was gone. As I crossed the neutral zone on an uncontested breakaway, I had the profound feeling that I was going to score.

Never, ever... not even when there was a wide-open net in front of me, have I ever gotten the feeling that a goal was coming.

I was to the net in a couple seconds completely confident and knowing exactly what I was going to do. I put on my forehand-backhand move and after getting the goalie to go down, I lifted the puck over him and into net.

I've done it

It's taken me years, but I've finally managed to be part of two teams playing simultaneously.

On Monday nights, I'm playing roller hockey - a totally different game than I'm used to, whose participants even express fear of the ice version of the sport.

And starting this past Saturday night, I'm subbing with my old mates in the Bay Area. A three-point performance in a 3-0 win, sees me returning to help out this Wednesday night.... late Wednesday night.

And Saturday saw me score my first ever empty-net goal. In all my years and (humbly as possible) all my goals, I've never been able to convert into an unoccupied net. I came closest in the winter 2007-2008, but my shot was taken with players offsides and was stopped, anyway. But on Saturday, I actually stole the puck in our zone, carried it up to their blueline and let a shot go between the defenders' legs and into the yawning cage.

It's cold in there

Saturday should see my return to the ice.

I've been asked to sub for my old team. It should be so much fun since I loved those folks.

In the meantime, my roller team lost our unbeaten streak with an undisciplined 8-5 loss.

How could I forget

I neglected to mention my latest "tough-guy" incident. Now, bear in mind, that despite me being a pretty weak individual, I've withstood some pain in my life: shattering my two front teeth on a monkey bar; having six cavities filled without novocaine and then being only on novocaine while getting four wisdom teeth pulled; returning to work two days following a vasectomy, which only makes me tough because of the area being cut open while I was wide awake...

Well, the new incident was breaking a rib in late February/early March without knowing about it. I just went through my game recaps and there's nothing in there about it...

What happened was following one of my breakaway goals. When I get a breakaway, I get myself going at top speed to lessen the chance of a defender catching me. I do pride myself on my speed, being one of the few things that sets me apart from my peers.

So, yes, I went in, scored, then couldn't stop before hitting the end boards. What I've been wont to do, since I'm terribly excited is jumping into the glass like Malkin.

This one time, my humourous bone poked into a rib on the left side. Yeah, it hurt. Yes, it even hurt to breathe for a bit, but I finished the game.

A week or two later, I realized that I was developing a lump on the spot that still hurt. It took until just three weeks ago before I was convinced to get it checked out. By April 30, the pain had all disappeared, so I saw the doctor who told me that I "probably" broke a rib and that when the bone heals it leaves a callous which would be there for a "long time." He says as long as I'm not in pain, not to worry about it.

I'm such a tough guy. I'm going to grow a goattee and get a barbed wire tattoo next.

***

And without getting into it, Ovechkin's knee-on-knee hit on Gonchar last night was terribly dirty and he should be suspended like everyone else.

Ok, hiatus is over

I'm starting to dig my way out of my own self-pity, so that means, rejoining the Penguins in their quest for the Stanley Cup.

Listening to game four of the Pens/Caps now as I type this, but I primarily wanted to talk about my personal roller hockey season.

We lost what I thought was game one of the season, but have won the next three. Turns out, game one was "pre-season" so it didn't count. Which also means my four points that night, didn't count, either.

So, we're 3-0 and have added several high caliber players to the team. Which means less playing time, which means less chance to pad my stats.

Doesn't matter though, since the goal is to play as much as possible, which means play deep into the playoffs and get our hands on that trophy at the end. I think we will be the team to beat. We only lost the pre-season game because we had two subs on the bench.

Each subsequent game, we won lopsidedly.

Hiatus

Sorry to my one or two readers, but I have been on hiatus for a while.

Life-changing events has led to my focus leaving hockey. Of course, I'm still following the Pens, but it's now via text alerts as opposed to analyzing and overanalyzing everything like all the other blogs.

And aside from Lodi losing in the championship game (despite my two goals) I have not played.

Take care until the next update.

82