Hockey :: Insane Puck Posse
August 15, 2004 / Sunday
Insane Puck Posse Game 15: Red Fury
Our last game! The season's over! What a great season it was! I'm going to miss this team. Such an awesome group of folks.
So, last game, final score: 2-2. Yeah, we tied, but the two goals that went in were silly, so you know what? I consider this a shutout win. Yeah, okay, the scoresheet says otherwise, but who's counting?
Everyone but me, I know. 
Got me a goal! I had another one of those skate to the goalie and actually see the net (instead of the goalie) and shoot where I was looking moments. When I replay it in my head it's surreal. I'm amazed that I can now shoot without looking at where the puck is first. The puck is on my stick, and I don't need to actively think about it anymore. I can focus on the net instead. That's cool.
Got me an assist, too, but that was mainly due to Julie's positioning and persistence in front of the net. Go Julie! Always where she needs to be. Most awesome.
Got a good blog-related chuckle on the ice. Cap'n Heather and her Scarlet Fever teammate Anne subbed for the opposing team tonight, and while on the ice they would skate up to me and oink. Oink? Yes, oink. At one point, Cap'n Heather was skating alongside me, covering me, oinking every step of the way. What craziness! Must have been 'cause I bumped her head earlier in the game.
Brought another 3 new subs in to play with us tonight. It's really cool that almost every game we bring in someone new, they will make a comment afterward about how they loved playing with our team and/or how they learned something from our coach. Yeah, our coach, he's rad. Three cheers for Kevin!
After the game, my teammates gave me a present for playing captain this season. Gotta love this posse. So check it, I got an official team lunchbox and thong. Yes, a thong with an insane hockey hatchet man on the front. I'm not quite sure how and when to wear it, but it sure is funny.
Yes, my team has its own shop. It has its own website, too. Today, the NCWHL. Tomorrow, the world!
A season I can look back at and smile big about. Priceless.
10:49 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
August 12, 2004 / Thursday
IPP: Green MVP City
I just noticed that my women's team has all three MVPs from Green Division last season.
Yes, that's us, the Green Division talent hogs.
Actually, I think we're the overall Green Division hogs, too.
Oink oink.
Wait, do hogs oink?
08:39 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
August 11, 2004 / Wednesday
Insane Puck Posse Game 14: Red Inferno
Holy crap, what a frantic night! I got to the rink 30 minutes before gametime. As I got out of my car, my team's goalie of the night came up to me and said, "Hey Viv, you wanna play goalie?" What?! Turns out she'd hurt her neck the day before and couldn't move her head. Before we could finish our conversation, my phone rang. It was Marci, telling me that she and Julie were stuck in traffic. I got inside and started to change. I pulled my phone out and saw that I had voicemail. It was Kim, telling me that she and Sharon were stuck in traffic. Then our goalie walked in, and said she didn't have any pants. Then I got another voicemail. It was our coach, telling me that he and Doris were stuck in traffic. So let's see here, we had a goalie who couldn't move her head and had no pants, no coach, and we were 5 players short. Oh, and at this point, there was me and one other player on my team who were actually at the rink. 20 minutes to go. Great!
Things worked out in the end. My goalie located some loaner pants (thanks, other goalie!), and the rest of my team eventually made it to the rink. We had a few confusing first shifts, but things got smoother after that. Still, the game felt frantic. I don't know why.
Final score: 1-0. Yay, we won! Yay, I scored our lone goal (with plenty of help and 0.9 seconds left on the clock)!
This one deserves its own line: Yay, Camille finally got a point this season!
Tonight was her last game with us. She's been quite the eager student, and has had a great attitude about listening and learning and playing hard. What a positive addition to the team.
Our goalie, with the stiff neck and borrowed pants, came up big. She got her first shutout this season, facing no fewer than 39 shots. 39 shots! Go Karen!
My achievement of the night was that I *finally* made it past Cap'n Heather with the puck ... once. Granted, she stopped me the other five times, but once, just once, I managed to get past her. That's all I wanted. I'd only spent 2 freakin' weeks visualizing it. Now I can sleep.
Ha!
While I'm on the topic of hockey ...
I was too lazy to write about Monday night's A-Team II game. We won, 6-1. Woop! Got me a goal and an assist, too. Woop again!
10:51 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
August 01, 2004 / Sunday
Insane Puck Posse Game 13: Scarlet Fever
This was the team that'd beaten us twice this season. Going into tonight's game, they also had more wins than we did (how did that happen?). The last time we faced them, I traded away our good goalie and they stacked up with awesome subs. They beat us. This time, I kept our goalie and brought in a couple of those same subs. I wanted to see how it would work the other way around ...
Final score: 7-2. Hrmm, I think it worked pretty well (for us).
I realize that this is my blog, but so as not to piss off and/or bore my readership, this is the part where I talk about myself, mainly so I can document for future reference (my blog is my memory bank). Skip to the end of the talkaboutself section if you don't want to read about me me me.
<talkaboutself>
Holy crap, I got faster! Power skating camp has now paid for itself. I chased down every puck that went into the corner, and I had so much time with it that I was able to wait and look for a lot of dead on passes to my linemates. It's amazing what being patient with that extra second will do for you. Had a few breakaways, too, and instead of two-hand handling it most of the way, I was comfortable poking with one hand and skating with it until I got into the other team's zone.
Tonight, I got my first ever hat trick in my women's league. It only took me 5 seasons and half a week of intensive skating lessons.
First goal, got a pass from Julie and took it up the boards on the right. There was a D on me, but I skated past her. For the first time ever, I looked not at the goalie, but at the net, and shot it exactly where I was looking. I watched the puck hit the back of the net, three feet off the ice. Did I just do that? Whoa, I did.
The second goal was a funny one. I chased the puck into the right corner, got it, looked for a pass, but Julie and Doris were both tied up. I skated it up high and shot it, but it went wide right. It bounced off the boards behind the net and came out on the left. I skated at it, and knocked it in as the goalie tried to get over on that side. I unintentionally passed to myself. Ha!
Third goal, another breakaway. I got by 2 D just past the blue line, approached the net left-center, the goalie came out just a little too far, I pulled the puck right, and slid it in around her.
We had a lot of fans in the stands today. They cheered when we scored. That was rad.
After my third goal, Kevin started shuffling the lines, and I got put on D halfway through the 2nd period. I was totally fine with that, since by that time the other team had decided to send every skater in my vicinity at me. Ow, quit trying to knock me over!
</talkaboutself>
Playing D is hard! I was totally exhausted by the end of the 2nd. How do you D folk do it?
Amusingly, I kept falling on D, and not because I was shoving people, but because I'd skate my ass off to the puck at the end of our zone, and as I tried to take it around the boards, I'd realize I was going too fast for my abilities and I'd run myself into the boards and fall down. Yeah, that's me, fresh off a hat trick, falling over untouched twice a shift.
At one point, we had 2 D playing foward and 2 forwards playing D. That was pretty amusing. What's that? Keep the puck in front of the blue line hash marks? It worked out just fine, though.
I finished off the game with a high-sticking penalty. Final tally: 3 goals, 1 assist (nice shot, Julie!), and 1 penalty. Marci got 1 of each, too. Now if Marci and I had gotten into a fight, we'd have had the complete set.
As an added bonus, I'd had lunch with Scully (no, that's not her real name) earlier, and she gave me a bunch of homemade cookies. I brought them to the rink, and we all got to have cookies after the game. Thanks, Scully!
And in a final post-game note, I zoned out analying game excerpts on my drive home, blew by the 380 interchange, and didn't realize it until I was well into Brisbane.
At least it wasn't Berkeley.
10:26 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
July 24, 2004 / Saturday
Insane Puck Posse Game 12: Red Inferno
What a game! Our team had 46 shots on goal today. 46! The other goalie, however, came up biiig. She let only 2 of those through.
Final score: 2-3. At least we had to go into overtime.
I can't say it wasn't exciting. We tied it up with 12.7 seconds left on the clock. We pulled the goalie, threw me in, wound up with a series of faceoffs in the other team's zone, and on the third one, Julie's faceoff win back to me made it into the net. Holy moly! That shot felt like pure luck. It pinged off the middle of the left post. Phew!
And then, Terry had to go and complete her hat trick in OT. Siiigh.
If only I'd had an extra period. I wound up with two for the night.
We lost, but we played well. This was one of those games where the goalies made a huge difference. Not sure what else to say to that. Mary (a.k.a. the brick wall in front of the net tonight) pulled some amazing moves. Some of them, unfortunately, were on me. On the upside, I'll remember those well, and will be sure to try them when I find myself on the receiving end of shots in the future.
I tweaked my knee today. Just in time for the power skating camp. Great.
11:51 PM | Injuries:Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
July 22, 2004 / Thursday
Insane Puck Posse Game 11: Red Fury
Finally, we win one again! It's been far too long!
Final score: 6-3.
Some good stuff from my team tonight. Every one of our 6 goals was because of good passing and positioning and communication. That's how it oughta be!
I ran the puck down the ice (or tried to) only once tonight, and only because I was wide open for a pass. It's nice when the team is playing so well that there's no pressure to make something happen. It was just like, hey, this feels pretty good, let's keep doing what we're doing. That's just awesome.
Next game is Saturday. Let's hope for more of the same.
12:44 AM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
July 14, 2004 / Wednesday
Insane Puck Posse Game 10: Scarlet Fever
I hate losing. I hate hate hate hate hate losing.
Waah.
So, final score: 0-2.
I'm not sure what to say. What do you do when you face the best goalie and the best subs in the division? Was that it? Part of it, I guess. Feels like we just never had a chance to find our rhythm. I guess for me, it didn't help that my legs were tired from yoga. I think it was that damned pretzel, uh, I mean eagle pose that did me in. I had no get-up-and-go today. I skated my hardest and people still kept up with me. I went for pucks in the corner and had half a second instead of two to do something with it.
Who would have thought that yoga would do me in?
At least I learned something. Slashing isn't allowed on sticks. I always thought it was, until I got called for it. My first IPP penalty. I'm such a thug, I know.
Anyway, there's not much more I want to say about the game. I do, however, have a post-game blurb that I promised Cap'n Heather:
After the game, I got back out to the changing area, and someone from the other team had taken my spot. I know she wasn't there before the game, because I was. Usually (read: almost always, because people in this league are courteous), when this happens, the person sitting there, whether they are rightfully there or not, will ask if the other person needs some room. No such offer. It wasn't a huge deal, 'cause there were plenty of people I wanted to talk to. But then she looked at me, and said, "Can I move your bag out of the way?" That was all she said to me, and then she finished up and left. No excuse me for sitting my ass down in your spot, no thanks for waiting, no bye / good game, no nothing.
I took her name. Cap'n Heather, thanks for providing it.
I thought about asking her to sub once. I'll forget I ever had that thought.
I took her number when I got home (thank you league website). The next time I see her, she will be getting some extra attention from me ... in the best possible way, of course.
11:44 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
June 30, 2004 / Wednesday
Insane Puck Posse Game 9: Red Inferno
Okay, I think we've achieved some sort of balance. After some goalie swapping and line shuffling in an attempt to keep people happy, we wound up with a spirited contest and another tie. We didn't lose, so cool. It wasn't quite what I had in mind (win win win win win!), but given our shuffledness and the badassness of the opposing goalie tonight, I think we did all right.
Final score: 3-3. Really I felt it should have been a 4-3 win. We had an unfrozen puck whistle, half a second before Doris knocked the loose puck into the net. Oh well, what can you do? 'Tis the nature of the game.
This happened toward the end of the game, however, and by then I was so riled up that I uncharacteristically yelled at no one in particular, "THE PUCK WAS NOT FROZEN!!!" Several times, in fact, and at the top of my lungs. I generally don't complain at the refs. They're doing their best, and I know that.
Marci had a nice game. She got two assists, skating D! Most excellent!
I had two goals, and was trying hard for a hat trick. I was trying a little too hard, perhaps. In my 3rd period riled up-ness I got the puck, skated it around the back of our net, fought and ditched a forechecker, skated it out of our zone, and decided to take it all the way in. I saw Doris at our blue line, and I saw Julie skating through the neutral zone in front of me, but for some reason I had it in my head that I was going to take it all the way, and it just looked like everyone on the ice was moving at half speed and I had all the time in the world to skate around them. So I did, or tried, at least. One of their D put up a good fight at their blue line, but I kicked the puck loose, and headed for the goalie. And then, well, I have a sucky backhand shot. I should have faked left and gone right. Oops.
I felt like a puck hog after the play. Sure, if it'd gone in, then great, but it didn't, and it left me wondering whether I should have passed it. To Doris? I don't think she had momentum. To Julie? The thought definitely crossed my mind, but I wasn't sure how to pass to someone directly ahead of me. I don't know why I thought it would be easier to carry the puck past the defender along the boards than to bounce the puck past her for a pass to Julie. I just did.
Oh well, next time. That was my only puck hog moment of the night, I think. If I can keep those down to one per game, I'll take it, as long as my linemates don't tell me to quit hogging.
On the flip side, I spent most of the night chasing down pucks in the corner and sending them back out to my linemates. It's amazing how many pucks go into that corner. The best part? I think I got to all of them first. Yeah!
Gotta document the two goals. Goal one was off a pass form Doris in the corner. I got the puck, shot it, had it deflected, dove for it, knocked it a little to the right to get it away from the goalie, and knocked it in from there. Yes, I made a falling deke move. On purpose, no less! One of the other team's skaters even gave me props for it! Have I mentioned how much I love this league?
Goal two was off a cross-ice boards pass from Marci. The puck bounced out into the offensive zone's left faceoff circle. Skate skate skate, need more speed, must get to it first! Got the puck, curled right, managed to do all that without losing any speed, sent it at the net ... five hole!
Huh, how did I do that? If I were skating that fast at public skate I'd be afraid I'd kill myself.
Only one penalty today. No goals scored on us during the ensuing penalty kill. There, that's better!
12:02 AM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
June 27, 2004 / Sunday
Insane Puck Posse Game 8: Red Fury
Dammit, we didn't win. We didn't lose, either, so I suppose that's a good thing. We should have won this one, though. The penalties just killed us. We gave up two goals and they were both because we had someone in the box. We had four freakin' penalties today. Four! The first one was total bullshit, too. Bullshit on our part. Too many players on the ice. WTF? They scored on that one, too. Goddammit.
Final score: 2-2. Take those penalties out of the equation, and I think we woulda won. That, and we weren't our usual roster and lineup. Okay, so that wasn't so bad.
Oh, but I want this team to win! Win win win!
To that end, I contributed a goal. It was pretty sweet, too. I was sick of being down 0-1, so in the 2nd period, when I got a nice breakout pass from Doris at the hashmark, I decided to skate it in. Fortunately, I had a good 10 feet of ice to pick up speed. Tracy was on me, but she thought I was going to the boards, so I headed toward the center of the ice, around a couple of my own skaters, and in toward the goal. The goalie stopped my shot, but left me the puck and just enough of a gap for me to turn, fall on my stomach, and knock the puck in with my now-sideways stick. 1-1. There, that's better.
For a little while, we were up 2-1, but we got yet another penalty and soon gave up our lead. It stayed that way for the rest of the game. Rarr.
I guess the good news is, we didn't give up any full strength goals.
Next game: Tuesday. Let's hope for fewer penalties (and more goals!).
11:02 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
June 09, 2004 / Wednesday
Insane Puck Posse Game 7: Red Fury
Yeah! We won! Another shutout! Those are the best!
Final score: 2-0. I finally scored my first goals of the season. Yes, goals plural. 
Not without help, of course. Julie (goal queen) and I (assist queen) switched roles, and she got the assist on both of my goals tonight.
The first goal was a fairly straightforward rebound try. There was one sweet little bit to it, though. I saw the puck and saw opponent sticks about to get to it, so I made one little backhanded push to get the puck into a little patch of open ice (maybe 4 square feet?), turned the blade over, and took the shot. Five hole! Yeah!
Speaking of goals, Marci had one, but unfortunately the refs didn't see it. The puck came out to her, I yelled "Shoot!", she whacked a backhand, I jumped to let the puck get by, and when I turned around, I swear the puck was over the line. My teammates who were right at the goalline said it was over for a good 2 or so seconds, but there were no refs in place to see it. The final score should have been 3-0, darnit!
Okay, this being my blog, back to my goals. Goal two was pretty sweet too. We had a little over a minute left on the clock, and one of my teammates got a penalty. The other team pulled their goalie. 6-on-4 with a faceoff in our zone. Somehow, we got the puck out to the other end. Julie tangled with some of their players, the puck came out to the front of the net, I tangled with some of their players, I fell on my ass, and as I was on my back, I saw the puck, so I took my stick, which was, at this point, flat on the ice, and pushed the puck toward their goal. It sliiid ... into their goal! I think that's my first ever flat-on-my-back goal ... shorthanded, too! WhoO!
Frustrating moments of the game: watching my some of teammates on the ice just stand there. Pleeease don't just stand there watching the puck! Move those feet! It's okay to skate in circles! Keep up your speed! Please please please please please!
That, and go for that puck! It's yours! Yours! Funny thing about pucks: usually they don't come to you; you have to go to them. Just don't hurt anyone trying to get to it, that's all.
For the most part, though, my team played hard (we got 31 shots off!), and it's nice to see that we've been listening to what our coach has been telling us all season (and in seasons past, for those of us who have gotten to play for him before this season). I think he spends a decent amount of time between games thinking about what we need to work on. The best part is, it really shows. Would we be doing as well this season without him? Definitely not.
On somewhat of a side note, we had our team photo taken tonight. I brought my camera in and Wendy (the league photo coordinator) very graciously took mug shots of everyone on my team for our website. We're gonna be all cool and stuff and have our pictures on our player pages. Raaad. Thank you Wendy!
10:46 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
June 06, 2004 / Sunday
Insane Puck Posse Game 6: Red Inferno
Finally, a win! Felt like it'd been a while since our last win, though it was mainly 'cause we've had a lot of time off. Tonight was some much needed ice time for my team.
Final score: 2-1. One of our players scored the 1 for the other team, so it was really more like 2-0, or 3-0, depending on how you want to look at it.
Julie, Camille, and I started off the first forward shift. 12 seconds in, we scored. Julie knocked the puck back, Doris passed it up, I took it up along the boards and in, saw Julie with no one on her heading for the goal, sent her a pass, and while the goalie was busy trying to cover my side, Julie got the puck and sent it into the other side of the net. 12 seconds. Holy moly.
Then, to make things interesting, Doris knocked the puck into our own goal while trying to send the puck around the boards in the 2nd period. Too bad she didn't get points for that one.
Fortunately for us, Jen knocked one in in the third. That probably made Doris feel a lot better. Hooray for Jen.
I'm totally diggin' my new stick. In warmups, I could shoot wherever I wanted with little to no effort. Left, right, high, low, wow! Need to adjust to the new stick weight, though. Gotta push a little harder 'cause the stick's lighter. A couple kids at the rink were oohing and aahing and wowing at it today. Cool.
Turns out I didn't really lose my water bottle. It was hiding in the side compartment of my bag. Phew.
2 games down, 2 more to go. All this hockey is good for me. It gets my mind off other stuff.
Speaking of other stuff, I'm gonna go write in my journal now. Yes, my journal. You guys don't think I share everything in my blog, do you?
09:52 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
May 22, 2004 / Saturday
Insane Puck Posse Game 5: Scarlet Fever
Man, what a game! It was hard-fought on both sides. We felt pretty evenly matched tonight, goalies included. Our two teams ended regulation tied 2-2. Then came 5 minutes of sudden death OT.
The O line before mine started OT, and as much as I wanted to get back out there, I never made it. The LW came off, the center came off, and the puck came back down into our zone before the RW (my position) could change with me. A minute and a half into overtime, the puck crossed over our goal line. Siiigh.
Final score: 2-3. It was a good game, but gosh, what a heartbreaker!
We were coachless tonight, so Marci and I drew up lines and wrote up some points and sent them out to the team earlier in the week. We did all right for not having much guidance during the game. At the very least, we decided we liked the lines we had created, and liked our new system of signalling for line changes.
Our team also gained a player, Camille. We put Camille on my line at LW. At first she seemed to have some trouble finding her groove, but 3 or so shifts in she was cycling comfortably with me and Julie. I told her to be at the far post for passes and rebounds, and every shift after that she'd be right there as the puck bounced out. Shift after shift we (with help from our fantabulous D) kept the puck almost completely in the other team's zone (and kept their goalie plenty busy ;). I think Camille will do just fine on our team! Even better, she has a great attitude about wanting to improve and learn how the team operates.
I got me another assist tonight. I took the puck in, headed left, had a feeling Julie would head for the far post, glanced up briefly to check that she was there, sent the puck, and bam! A beautiful shot into the back of the net! It worked so well it felt like a play from the Powerpuck Girls days!
I burped curly fries all game. Blech.
Oh, and I had a few almostgoals too.
11:26 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
May 13, 2004 / Thursday
Insane Puck Posse Game 4: Red Fury
Sorry about the delay ... I got home late from the game last night and have spent the time since showering so I'm not stinky at work, sleeping so I'm awake for work, working on something for a meeting, attending said meeting, and debriefing on said meeting. Almost a whole day has passed since gametime. Fortunately I jotted notes so I know what to write about.
I am happy to report that my team is still undefeated. I am not so happy to report that we only tied. Final score: 1-1.
Red Fury is the team that we beat 8-0 the first time we faced each other. They've since undergone some changes: a couple trades, new coaches, and the benefit of not having one of their more negative players show for last night's game. It's nice to see that our efforts at rebalancing the division worked ... even if it's partly at my team's expense. As much as I want to kick everyone's ass, I want even more to see that everyone has a good time.
It's starting to look like we have two sub philosophies within the division: invite solid, experienced players so your team can kick ass, or invite new Red / current Green players so they can be challenged and get better. I'm definitely torn on the issue. Last night, we invited Jena from Green Division to play with us. What a good choice; she scored our only goal! It was her first ever Red game, too. Go Jena!
Some of you are probably wondering what the hell I was doing playing hockey after being doubled over with food poisoning the last day and a half. Well, around 4 PM I decided I was sick of lying there in a fetal position and popped some Advil. Half an hour later, I felt better. I felt good enough to consider playing. 7:30 PM rolled around, and I decided to pop some more Advil and play. Painkillers rock!
I didn't play the best game of my life, but I didn't die, which I half expected. I was on D (2 lines total) for the first two periods. Partway through the 2nd period my body started telling me I was an idiot for trying to play a game while still recovering from my bout with bad Chinese food, so I asked to play wing (3 lines total) in the third and in overtime. D is hard for me when I'm tired, not only because there are more shifts, but also because shoving people around takes a lot out of me.
This was my first ice time in over a week. I'd hoped that 8 days of rest would let my tweaked left hand heal, but no luck. It still hurts. Boo.
In other hockey related news, Doug my imaginary boyfriend finally made an appearance! I was a little surprised at his decision to come since he was sleep deprived and the game was late, but nonetheless was happy to have him there. I think last night was the first time I've ever seen anyone fall asleep in the stands at a hockey rink. It's cold in there!
After the game, I returned Doug to the streetcorner where I found him, paid him his $50 for making an appearance, paid him extra for having to meet 5 times the number of people he thought he was going to meet, and headed on home, where I took some more Advil and dined on Wonder Bread. Whoo.
05:49 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
May 04, 2004 / Tuesday
Insane Puck Posse Game 3: Red Inferno
We won! We won! Final score: 3-0. Julie had a hat trick night. Most excellent! I'm glad she's back to her high-scoring self.
I played D tonight. It was the first time I've played D in this league since my little D stint that ended with my not being able to breathe properly last season. I'm still not quite sure what's up with that, but fortunately I didn't have the same problems tonight. I'll just contribute it to better conditioning and leave it at that. Right.
I didn't suck, but I wasn't stellar. My problem on D is that I play a little too conservatively. I don't want the puck to get past me, so I play behind the blue line when the puck is in the other team's zone. I got a good talking to by my goalie between periods (much appreciated!), and even though I was a little more aggressive afterward, I still did it some.
On the upside, I played puck hog a few times and at least tried to get the puck on net. I believe the philosophy is, get the puck on net, and if that doesn't go in, try for rebounds. Well, on my last trip down, it paid off. I took it in, I shot, I missed, I got the puck, I sent it back out, and hooray! ... Julie was there! She put the puck neatly into the other team's goal for her hat trick. I got my point for the night, and everyone was happy. Well, everyone on my team, at least.
I slammed into the boards getting that pass back out, though. After the game I noticed my left hand was having trouble maneuvering the stick. It's not swollen, but it's definitely sore. I wonder what I did to it. Boo for injuries.
An amusing little foreign language moment: Amber and I dash for the puck. I get to it, she winds up with it, she loses it. "Scheisse!" she screams, as I hit the puck out of her reach. "Danke!" I say as I skate away. Multilingual hockey, gotta love it!
11:43 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
April 27, 2004 / Tuesday
Insane Puck Posse Game 2: Scarlet Fever
First off, I'd like to say, that's a damned fine team you picked, Cap'n Heather! Your D is a force to reckon with.
Why do I say this? Well, the other team had no goalie tonight. No goalie, you (the reader) say, wow, that must mean IPP scored a lot of goals!
Well, no, unless 3 is a lot. Sure, we won, 3-0, but against a goalie gearless skater covering the net? Pfft!
Why else do I say this? Because every time I took the puck into the other team's zone there was no one open that I could pass to. Every pass either got deflected or just slid right by the intended teammate because she was tied up. Every pass. Damn.
Andrea was kind enough to sub for us tonight. She contributed a very nice goal in the 3rd period. Go Andrea!
I contributed no goals. Early in the 2nd period I had a, uh, little run-in with an opposing player. I ended up on my knees with my head in some big player's stomach, her full body weight bearing down on me. I thought my head was going to snap off. I wound up facing the end of the rink, kneeling or sitting, I don't know. I pulled my helmet back on straight and got up. I skated two steps and must have fallen backward, because I somehow found myself on my butt. Fortunately I was only a few paces from the bench, so I crawled over and got off.
Before my little near-head removal incident I was having a good speedy game and was doing a good job taking the puck into the other team's zone. After that, I kept skating in aimless circles, running into people, and every time I tried to pick up speed I'd lose my footing and go down.
Whiplash? Mini concussion? I had a bit of trouble judging vehicle speeds on my way home. That, and I missed my 380 exit and had to circle back. The head hurts a bit, as does the neck. I suppose I should be glad my neck's not broken. Maybe I'll go visit a chiropractor later this week.
11:21 PM | Injuries:Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
April 25, 2004 / Sunday
Insane Puck Posse Game 1: Red Fury
Whoo, what a game! We won, 8-0. This is good and bad.
It's good because we had an excellent game. A good number of us have played together in the past so our lines were already clicking. We have some great scoring forces this season ... I had expected great things, but wow, so soon!
One of our players had a hat trick tonight. She's newly promoted from Green Division. That's pretty damned cool, if you ask me.
I felt like crap before the game, and I feel like crap right now, but fortunately the adrenalin kicked in and I was okay for long enough to play. I got an assist in the 3rd period. I'm once again doing that thing where I skate it in and look for a pass every time down the ice. Passing is good, but I need to mix it up. I didn't take one shot on goal all night. Made a lot of cool passes, though.
Toward the middle of the third period I started working on stick handling instead of skating the puck in for points. At one point I got the puck on the left side of the rink just outside of the other team's blue line. I decided to see how long I could hang onto it. I took it to the other side of the ice, into their zone, down to the end, behind the net, to the other side, and was going to keep going, but Marci was open and calling for the puck so I figured I should pass it to her. Yeah, good thing. I was being a puck hog. Bad Viv.
I worked on passing the next shift, and got a few back and forths with my linemates in the other team's zone. That was nice, too.
Ooh, I even managed a couple stop-really-fast-and-change-direction moves. It really does get the D off of you. I'll have to remember to do that some more.
So I mentioned bad earlier. Yes, so this could be bad. What if they decide the teams are unbalanced and try to break us up in an effort to balance us? That definitely would not be so cool.
Next game is Tuesday. Game on!
10:29 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
April 22, 2004 / Thursday
Insane Puck Posse
My Red Division team finally gets a name ... and a badass logo to go with it!
Time to go find a cool ICP song for the team ...
02:52 PM | Insane Puck Posse| Comments (0)
April 13, 2004 / Tuesday
Cap'n Viv
Finally, I'm doing my part and playing captain for my Red Division team this season. We held our draft tonight and I chose my team while dining on Riblets and fries. What now? I get to schlep around a bag o' pucks in addition to my already heavy hockey gear. That, and I get to do organizationally things. Hey, it's time to pick a team name. Anyone wanna share their ideas?
