Week 13-15: Mark It Zero vs. Nice Marmot/Lebowski/The Green Hornets
When work heats up, the blog suffers. Hockey recaps stall, memories fade, buildings collapse. The latter more because of structural impurities & shoddy engineering than my being busy w/ pilot season, but I digress. Here are my recollections of the last 3 (grimace) games:
VS NICE MARMOT
I didn’t bring my usual Marmot game offensively in this one, but we were able to get a lead on these guys. I’m not sure how much we were leading them by, but they caught up so it was 3-2 midway through the 3rd period.
After about a 35 second shift, there was a stoppage and Ben asked if I wanted to come off, advocating for shorter shifts. I motioned for just a bit more time on the ice. The ensuing action was all in our defensive zone, and just when we were about to clear the puck out finally, Marmot kept it inside our blue line, and threw it on net. I remember the puck doing the following: hitting off of a back/chest, off Andy’s face, and onto a Marmot player’s stick. All the caroms left Justin out of position, and the game tying goal was buried easily. On my way back to the bench, Derek in his passive-aggressive glory uttered, “See, another :30 turns into 2:00”. I let him know I thought he was an asshole. Game’s still tied.
On the next shift, Derek - who doesn’t pass - lost the puck as he was busy dangling near our own net. The Marmot player stole it, fed it in front, and Marmot was ahead 4-3 with about 4 minutes left.
Justin was talking about how one of the Marmot scoring plays were offside but the refs didn’t blow the play dead. I’m guessing he’s talking about when they tried to keep it in our zone during the shift Derek was timing from the bench.
Speaking of, one funny moment was when Miller and I looked on from the bench as Derek predictably brought it into their zone himself, had the puck in their corner as he looked to our open defenseman (good players pass at this point), CARRIED the puck to the right defenseman, then CARRIED the puck across to the left defenseman. At this point Miller snaps, yelling “PASS THE FUCKING PUCK!” in a quiet rink.
It’s a horrible loss to be a part of, but it didn’t eliminate our chances of finishing the season with the #1 seed, we just made more work for ourselves and “made things more exciting”. Bleugh. I went scoreless for the first time in a while, but thought I played well. Frustrating…
VS LEBOWSKI
Derek wasn’t available for this game, so we were sure there would be a lot of passing in this one.
Miller brought the wood this game, notching 4 goals. I’m trying to remember them all, but I assisted on 3 of them officially, one of them unofficially, and a teammate’s goal unofficially. The prettiest one came when I was angling on the right side of the slot, circled back, and found Miller’s forehand with a nice, backhanded thread across the slot. Steve released it quickly to the top shelf. That assist was credited incorrectly to Darren, but I can’t be pissed because Darren’s the man. I take this lapse of officiating as a compliment, actually, at how sick the pass was. The ref just didn’t think it was plausible that it was me who made that pass but rather someone in closer proximity to Miller…whatever I cry nightly about it…
This game got out of hand early. We had scored about 8 goals (at least) in the first period. Justin took the high road at the first intermission, telling us that we should take it easy and work on passing. We came out the 2nd period looking obviously different. A bit more passive, working it to our Ds. We still played, but the urgency was obviously not where it was in the first period. When the second intermission came, some representative (I’m guessing their captain) came over to our team huddle and told us to destroy them - to keep playing. We had respect for that, so we obliged.
A later goal Miller notched (his 3rd or 4th), was a product of our forechecking. Their defenseman had the puck in their corner and panicked as I brought the pressure. He committed the cardinal sin on defense by throwing the puck right in front of his own net, where Miller was waiting. BOOM! I was exited at both my influence on this play and his excellent read & positioning that I had my hands up after what was probably the 10th goal of the evening, so some Lebowski bench players had some words for me for acting excited to play the game. I understand how this behavior could’ve been perceived as irritating, but what did you think was going to happen when you tell us to run up the score?
Final score - Too much - Not Enough
VS THE GREEN HORNETS
The way our league is broken down, Da Bulls, Nice Marmot, and us are in a dogfight for 1st, and The Green Hornets & Lebowski are the bottom feeders fighting for the last playoff spot. This one was anticipated to be another ugly one but you never know when one of these teams will surprise you like when Lebowski had a quick 3-0 lead on us earlier in the season.
I can actually provide accurate scoring information on this game as I have the scoresheet (framed) here.
Goal 1: Miller and I are in the high-slot on our respective sides of the ice. Steve’s carrying the puck and tries to get it across to me, but it’s a high pass (perhaps deflected) fluttering towards my chest. I gloved it to my stick, and shot it through.
Goal 2: This one started very typically with me coming into the zone hot on the left side off a sick pass from our defensemen. They played this one well with two defensemen back. I passed it across to Miller when he entered the zone, and crept behind him. He found me with a sick backhanded saucer on the right side and all I thought was DO NOT MISS THIS. Filthy play.
Goal 3: This was essentially a breakaway, even though there was a defender on my right side the whole way. I was bearing down on the goaltender going about 9/10ths speed, faked across and went to stuff it in the left side backhanded. The fake worked, sending the goalie flying to the right, but I had run out of space and stuffed it outside the post on the side of the net. The puck sorta stayed there for Miller, who made a heads-up play in taking out the trash. It just occurred to me that I could’ve scored a hat trick in under 10 minutes.
Goal 4: This was Ben’s goal, but Miller and I assisted. Are you paying attention? Miller and I have a 4 goal point streak alive right now. WTF? I wish I could’ve remembered this goal a bit better but the more memorable one came later when Ben roofed it.
Goal 6: I have a vague recollection of this goal. I know I was on the left post and that I had been given a sick pass across. Turns out it was from Miller. GO FIGURE. Hatty.
Goal 8: This was Ben’s roofjob. Sick. He fit it over the netminder’s shoulder in the smallest opening. At least from my perspective it looked small but maybe it was a better idea from where he was standing. Love it either way. Steve and I got assists just for witnessing this. It made sense at the time. This is how the refs work.
Goal 9: On this rush later in the 3rd period, our lines did a half-change and I found myself on the ice with Ryan and Gregg. Ryan had the puck and either missed the net or dumped it - perhaps both - and it ended up in the left corner. I pivoted and saw both players bearing down on the net. I threaded it to Gorski (in better position), and he put it away. The assist goes to…Ryan. Whatever, bro.
Goal 10: On the power play, Andy and I were together 2-on-1. We played catch with it for 4 passes as the goaltender was trying to figure out who would shoot. Andy did.
Miller (1g 5a) and myself (3g 4a) scored 13 points combined. This output was a new career high, but even in a blowout success like this: what stays in my mind are the missed opportunities. I tried to wrap one rebound I corralled in front of the net around the sprawled out goaltender, and hit iron. One clean breakaway I just blew (I think I lost possession), and on the broken scoring breakaway where I missed a wide open backhand put-away after juking the goalie. That one needed The Finisher to come in and git’ er done.
We play these guys again next week, but at the moment we’re gearing up for Da Bulls tomorrow. As you can see they have 5 players that are top scorers in the league, where we have 3:
They have some fast guys and will send 4 players up on offense (at least) so we’re going to have to play loads of defense. Should be a fast pace.
