Eliminated

Last week was pretty rough. There were no insane double-headers like the other week, but Ray and I had 3 games in 4 nights. First was the last game of the regular season at Hot Skates on Monday. Wednesday was a late night game for our ice league at Central Park. Finally, we finished it off with the semi-final playoff round at Hot Skates on Thursday.

I was going to write up the anticipation for the playoffs at Hot Skates, but decided not to so I wouldn't jinx it. Didn't do any good as we lost 5-3. Expect a season summary soon.



I was pretty amped all week long. Honestly, I would sit on the train during my commute and think about it. Although it's just a beer league, and the lowest rung, it was the first time in two years since I had last made the playoffs. First time ever since playing at Hot Skates. Hell, it was the first time in two years where the team had more than 1 win.

It just wasn't to be, and we lost. We were down 5-0 with about 10 mintues left before we even scored our first goal. Losing stinks, but usually I can shake it off easy and look concentrate on the next game. We actually lost the first two games last week. Whatever, no biggie. Those were just regular season afterall. The game at Hot Skates didn't even matter since we clinched our seed for the playoff rounds.

The tricky part is when it's the last game of the season, and you're on a good team. We legitimately had a chance of going all the way, and even came close to tying it up when we were down by 5. But losing with no more games on the schedule leaves that empty feeling. It's not the end the world obviously. Like I said, just a beer league which I practically use as a glorified gym membership.

Bear in mind that this isn't a team we put together. It was thrown together by the league from free agents. It gives it almost like a pro level feel, because you know not everyone will be back next season. Even Ray and I are skipping next season at Hot Skates since the Central Park league conflicts with the days. That means next time might drop you back to mediocrity real quick. That's the tough part of crashing out of the playoffs. You just never know if you'll make it back.

It's also an impetus to get better. Actually the entire reason I started at Hot Skates was because I wanted to continue playing hockey after the awful season I had last year at Central Park. Of course it wasn't my play which made the team lose, but being better certainly could help us win.

That's another difficult thing with losing. I'm no Wayne Gretzky, and the 1 goal I scored this season was my all-time season high. Oddly enough though, the first game at Central Park a few weeks ago and I score on a breakaway (my career highlight). When that's the case, you know you need to contribute more and be a big game changer. The biggest play I was apart of in the playoff game was drawing a penalty for taking a big check when my head was down carrying (more like juggling) the puck.

Regardless, time for the offseason. That's the best time on working fundamentals I lack. Except Central Park is already in full swing. But as luck has it, I have a 2 week break before the next game. It'll be hell though, because the schedule for the next few weeks just came out, and it's back-to-back games to start it off. I thought last week was tiring, yet Ray and I seem to explore new ways to get exhausted.

Hockey Double-Header

There are many great journeys through out history. Magellan's trek across the world, Moses crossing the desert, and what happend last week when Ray and I had a double-header in two different rinks.

Now most people are willing to travel at least 30 minutes to get to a rink. Hell, it sometimes feels that long just walking from the subway to the Chealsea Piers rink. But few people are usually up to the challenge of riding for 45 minutes right after a game straight to another game.

It was a lucky combination of things that even allowed this to happen. Think of it like the stars and moon aligning for one special night of hockey...yeah. For some odd reason our roller game at Hot Skates was early last Thursday, with a 7pm drop of the puck. That's the one and only time this season we have a game that early. If you think about it, that's early enough where it's actually difficult to get home on-time and then to the rink with your stuff.

It also just so happened to be the first game of the season for the Central Park ice league at Lasker rink. The drop of the puck for that game was scheduled for 9:30pm. That was perfect! There would be just enough time to make it from the end of one game to another. According to Google Maps it would only take about 40 minutes total.

Of course our first game was a tight match against a team we'll likely see in the playoffs. It ended up going into OT and we were running a bit behind getting out of there. Luckily by this time there was little traffic on the road. Due to the rush hour traffic we ran into on the way to Hot Skates for the first game, it was actually quicker for us to go from Hot Skates to Central Park than it was from Bayside to Hot Skates that night. I cannot emphasize accurately in words how much I hate rush hour.

We made it with more than enough time to Central Park. The only thing I get worried about is parking, but there was a spot right in front. I have to admit, I was a little gassed the second game. But that's a bad excuse, especially since I barely played the second part of our game at Hot Skates earlier. Long story short, we got railroaded on the ice that night, 14-4.

We finished our game around 10:30 and finally got back to Bayside at 11:30. That's about 6 hours total for our hockey marathon. Bear in mind we both had work the next day. The real downside of the trip was going from the high of the OT game we had at Hot Skates, to the first game of the season shellacking we received at Central Park.

On the trip back we went through the usual motions of dissecting our performance. And as bad a taste the second game left in out mouth, we did bring up the fact that the first game was great, and the second game was a new team. In fact, if you don't count the first period from the game at Central Park, then the final score would only have been 6-4.

Overall the entire trip was worth it. First of all we already paid for both leagues, so might as well get our money's worth. I also feel it's important to make it out for the first game of a new team to meet the rest of the guys. Either way, who the hell wouldn't want to play more hockey anyway?