Sunday, January 29, 2012

Holy puck

Wow! We played hard. The tournament is over and it was good and we made it into our division playoffs where we were creamed by a not-so-novice team. Not only that, they were pushy. Pushy as in very physical. I'm not sure what I would have done if I hadn't known to expect that.

Backing up; our first game on Saturday was a loss. I'm having trouble remembering how I played, probably just okay. I do remember coming into the bench off my first two shifts feeling really shaky, telling myself to calm down and take some breaths. We lost 0-1, I think. It might have been 0-2.

The second game Saturday was okay. I didn't get that shaky feeling but I was tired and feeling some muscles in some parts that I haven't felt for awhile.

Part way through the second period one of our players went out with a injury (but not before she scored a goal) so we had to dump one of our defensive players to offense. It changed it up quite a bit not to play with the same person at every switch.

Our sub offense ended up scoring a goal, her first ever! Those are fun.

Most of our players from both teams got together for dinner after our second game. Can you imagine 30 people coming in together wanting to sit near each other, separate checks, someone bought a round of shots. We were pretty noisy, but I gotta say, we are a polite, patient, not too fussy group! I was also impressed with the customer service EVERYWHERE in Spokane! Everyone was awesome!

Anyway, it was late when we finished dinner, so back to the hotel and then off to the rink first thing in the morning to cheer on the intermediate group. They won all their games including their championship game.

Our third game was pretty good. And it was only a few hours ago, but I am so tired I can't remember much. Unfortunately the same gal that got hurt in the second game got REALLY hurt in the third game. She had to leave the ice and she never came back. It sucked to see one of us go out like that. She wanted so bad to get back out there too. I have more to say about that, something about dedication and devotion but my thoughts aren't totally processed yet.

We won game 3 and we were in the championship game. Several people warned us about our opponent that they were more physical, in your space players, that they had quite a few intermediate players. Yeah. They slaughtered us. Fed us to the cows. Creamed us 10-1. And they gave us the one. bitches.

I'm not as wound up about their players as everyone else, I just played my best game possible. The coach told me he wanted me "be aggressive" and I think I did. Someone else said to play so we had no regrets tomorrow morning. I KNOW I did that.

So the thing is, the other team scored 10 on us. On me. On our defense. We didn't, well I didn't have it together. I'm feeling pretty shitty about how many goals got by. I know it's not all on me, but it sucked to skate off when they had scored. Sucked. But that's good, right? Make me more aware for next time, gives me something to work on for the next time.

Next time, that's only two weeks away. Canada, here we come!

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