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Our last game of the SSWHL season was on Sunday. We were standing at a respectable 8-10-2 on the season (much better than last year’s 4-15-4 record!) We’d lost the game the weekend before, which was tough since it meant we couldn’t finish at .500, but still, it was so much improvement from the year before!

So this last game of the season was against the NH Panthers. A few of us sometimes sub for their non-SSWHL team, and some of their SSWHL players are on that team too, so we know a few of them. This particular NH Panthers team was also the only undefeated team in our division this season, coming into the game at 17-0-1. If I were a betting woman, I’m not sure I’d have bet against them this week.

As we’re getting ready for the game, WES and LisaO, our two injured players, showed up, pumped and ready to cheer us on from the bench. Coaches Steph and LisaA were there as well. We had a full bench, but one skater was late, so as Steph was making lines, she turned to me and asked if I’d like to play forward for a while. Would I? I would! So I paired with Jonesy and went out there trying to figure out what the heck a forward DOES all the time she’s on the ice. When I watch hockey on tv I never watch what the forwards are doing with any precision; my focus - when I’m looking for systems - is always on the defenders and what they’re doing. So I was a little shell-shocked at first.

But the first shift we’re out there, Marcia at center ended up getting the puck behind the net. She drove wide to the left, came up about 3 feet above the goal line, and drilled a shot at the net. The goalie totally missed being on her post and the puck hit nothing but net! Black Ice 1, NH Panthers 0. Nice start to the game!

A few shifts later, Amy, Lib, and Mich ended up on a 3-on-1 breakaway. There were a bunch of pretty passes as they drove into the zone and Amy ended up taking a sweet shot that went right past the goalie. Black Ice 2, NH Panthers 0. Hmmm… I’m liking this! We all were.

Partway through the period, our one late player showed up, so Steph asked me to move back to defense at the end of the period so they wouldn’t all die of exhaustion (seriously - it was a hard, fast game for us, and we were all sucking wind in the first period.) I was sad that I didn’t get too many chances to try to put the puck in the net that first period, but hey! We were up 2-0!

In the second period the Panthers came hard and fast at us. Lynn stood on her head blocking shots left and right. The defenders and centers all must have put happy hexes on our sticks that night, because we managed to clear every single puck out of the front of the net that Lynn couldn’t cover. There were at least 2 that I managed to pick out of the crease and send up the boards - in short, things were Going Our Way. And for this game even! What could be better?

Both teams got a couple of penalties - we couldn’t capitalize on our power plays, and in fact gave up our only goal on our power play… Ah well, we couldn’t be perfect. We did a great job of killing our penalties, though. At one point, Lynn had stopped a puck (it was under her leg, but no one could see it so kept on playing) but had also come a bit out of the crease in the effort. Marcia took one look at the partially unprotected net and threw herself at the front of the net at the exact same time that LisaT did the same thing from the other side. So as the whistle blew, there were these three Black Icers laying in a heap in front of the net. But there was no puck in the net and that’s really all that mattered!

One of the best things about the game, in my opinion, was how we all focused in on their top scorer and Shut Her Down. As the game progressed, she got more and more frustrated, taking it out on us in front of the net, tripping Amy (she did get sent to the box for that), and at one point throwing her stick into the bench as she was getting off the ice. I shouldn’t laugh at someone else’s frustration, but she’s had so much success this season already (scoring around 35% of their goals) that I was thrilled we effectively disabled her.

As it began to sink in that we might actually win the game, we all got more focused, quicker and faster on the ice, and played better. Some of the comments from emails we’ve been sending around the past few days are telling:

• Well for the fans who missed, it was the game of the season! Black Ice, with a spectacular effort stymied the UNDEFEATED New Hampshire team and handed them their first defeat of the year. Please everyone feel free to email your highlights of the game. I’ll start with Tracey Lee putting forth a Herculean effort against #13’s breakaway, twisting her into spaghetti and NOT getting a penalty! (LisaO)

• The best part was to watch Black Ice play as a team! I mean a real team - where everyone contributed - gave it their all and SHOWED UP to PLAY!! You dont always see that - all you guys had to do was shut down their star player. You make it nearly impossible for the other team - you can begin to dominate as a force; that coupled with how everyone played not just their position but jumped in “literally” when help was needed whether back checking or even in the goal….that was true team play. (WES)

• You know that image we often see on Nova or other wild animal shows where a seal or penguin comes shooting out of the water onto a rock or icy surface- skidding along happily on its belly, arms/wings out and with a smile on its face. Well …. there we were in a scramble for our hockey lives and the puck is precariously teetering between Lynn and the goal line. I am clawing to get around the net (no, I wasn’t entirely tangled in it - but almost), muttering all sorts of expletives because the puck is certain to get flicked over the line. Then, out of no where - it must have been from under the ice — come my two seal teammates, gliding along, belly first, feet in the air, arms stretched out - first one and then the other. It was great entertainment and a shame it wasn’t video taped. Go Flipper. (Blue-Line Nancy)

• It was like slow motion with Bruiser yelling… N-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O! (Holly)

• Then, after we stymied their repeated attempts at scoring for the first two periods - all of a sudden I think we all realized WE MIGHT ACTUALLY WIN THIS! Brought out all sorts of heroics from everyone. One of my favorite parts? When Amy got #13 so mad that she threw her stick into the bench as she was getting off the ice. Big baby! My other favorite part? Seeing Coach so happy! (Libby)

So not only was it good to end our season by winning, but we beat a really tough team AND we played up to our potential - all of us, all at the same time. Truly fabulous! A much better end to our season than we’d expected; 9-10-2 is almost .500, right?

In two weeks we’ve got our annual scrimmage against the Rage (the team we practice against and so HATE to lose to during the season), and then tournament season begins - April Showers and the Champlain Shootout. Should be fun. Go Black Ice!

Seems like we just played this team, and you know what? We did! Last time we played them we lost 3-4; this time the score was lower, and we still lost - 1-2. Sigh.

Things I remember about the game:

• Marcia scored our goal - a sweet wrister from the left side of the net that just zipped past Wendell (their goalie).
• We only had 3 defenders, and yet we played 3 pairs of wings and 2 centers… still trying to figure that out. Since this was a FAST game, it would have been smarter for us to run 2 wing pairs, 2 defensive pairs, and 3 centers. That said, the three of us did really well out there.
• One of their goals was simply us losing the scrum in front of the net. Neither Amy nor I can remember how their other goal happened (she was one of the 2 centers, so she was sucking wind too!)

And that’s about all I remember. It’s weird not remembering much, but there’s a good reason: immediately after our game was done, Amy, Libby, Marcia, and I grabbed our bags, hauled them to the locker room next door, and played a second game with the Storm, one of the C-level teams in our league and organization (Storm Women’s Hockey.) We played against a team they’d lost to 0-6 the last time they played them. This time the game ended in a 3-3 tie, which I think means that we didn’t drag them down too much!

That second game was a lot of fun, even if I was beat from our Black Ice game. I played with one of their feistier defenders and although she was a better player overall than me, the difference between our skill sets wasn’t as huge as I feared it might be. Guess that means that I can hang with a C-level team, huh? (At least with that team on Sunday!) Amy, Libby, and Marcia all played quite well too - it was a lot of fun to play with all of them at the higher level.

What happens when you take 16 skaters, 2 goalies, 2 coaches, 2 refs, and a puck and put them out on the ice? Well, you’ve got a game, for one thing. And you’ve got two rather tired teams for another.

Yeah, we normally have 10-13 skaters for any given game, but on Sunday we ended up with nine (the RI Panthers only had 7, so I’m only complaining a little bit…) That meant that we played 3 defenders, and whenever that happens there’s going to be some inopportune moment when one of us D is bailing off the ice and possession changes in the blink of an eye and then WHAM BAM we get scored on.

We ended up losing the first period 0-3, and winning the second 2-1 and the third 1-0 - which means we lost 3-4. Grumble.

Their first goal: about a minute into the game, Jonesy and I end up behind the net trying to grab the puck away from each other. We miscommunicate, I completely lose sight of the puck and pop back in front of the net on the goalie’s right side. She thinks I’ve got the puck and follows me. In the meantime, Jonesy kept going around the boards and came out also on the goalie’s right side. Unfortunately, we both left the RI player behind the net with the puck, so she walked it right around the left side and BOINK.

Their second and third and fourth goals: variations on this theme - defense and/or center does something boneheaded either in front of the net, behind it, or on our offensive blue line, RI player gets the puck, and BOINK.

Lest you think the game was all doom and gloom - it was not! Only that first period really stunk. The second period we turned it on and Amy scored twice. I was on the ice for both her goals, and set up the second one. Since I was involved more in that, I remember it better…. In our defensive zone, a RI player coughed up the puck to me. I had room so I skated it through the neutral zone and between Amy and Marcia into our offensive zone. Since I threaded between both of them at the blue line, I knew one of them was most likely trailing right behind me. As the RI defender stepped up to challenge me, I dropped the puck behind me to a rather surprised Marcia. She took the shot, it rebounded out, and Amy got it and stuffed it in! Too bad the score sheet only has one box for assists, because I think I deserve that one.

The third goal of our was due simply to Marcia’s tenacity - she just wouldn’t give up and kept the puck alive and out of the goalie’s grasp until she had the tiniest of openings, and then BOINK!

I had some really funny exchanges with the player who scored three of their four goals. My favorite was down in front of our goalie when she and I hit each other, somehow got arms, legs, and sticks wrapped into a huge pretzel, and ended up on the ice (and how I didn’t break her stick given how it was in my legs and under my butt I will NEVER know!) - there was all sorts of “oh my gosh, are you okay? I’m okay, yes, you? Yeah, I’m fine but how about you??? Oh I’m good!” That came shortly after I’d moved her out from in front of the net, at which point she said, “Oh! There’s someone there!” I replied, “Just your friendly neighborhood defender doing my job!” We both laughed. That kind of banter really hasn’t happened much for me this year, and it was refreshing to get a bit in before the season ends (SOB TOO SOON).

So we’ve got two more games left in our regular season. We’re 8-9-2 right now, and I’d really like to end up at least at .500 this year. Unfortunately I think we play the one team in the league that’s undefeated next week… Gah!

Our GF/GA numbers are great this year compared to last year - I think we’re only at a -2 overall whereas last year we were at (shhhh) -43 (in other words, our opponents scored 43 more goals than we did). Lynn’s stopping so much more this year than she did last year; this game was one of the highest-scoring games we’ve been in all season, whereas last year we often gave up 5 and 6 goals in a game. I know it probably makes her feel better to give up fewer goals, but as a defender, it makes ME feel a ton better knowing that I’m also part of the equation, and one that’s getting better and better for us.

Tournament time is coming up - I can’t wait!