January 20th - 22nd
Hockey-Life's very own "London Hussars" took part in a tournament this past weekend at the Brookside Ice Park.
The tournament spanned over three days and included a final round on Sunday with the grand prize being $ 200 and a boat load of pizza.
Our boys started out Friday night about as bad as they possibly could, losing to the London Aces 4-0 in the opening game. Out played for most of the game it was clear that this was the first tournament for this specific group of players, playing together under one name.
Regrouped and ready to go, Saturday afternoon rolled around and a showdown with Insights Landscaping was on the schedule. What started out as a tight game slowly got away from The Hussars. Some bad bounces and miscued plays left the team relying on Jorge Goulart to keep them in the game. Players from the opposing team were skating past the bench asking "what's your goalie on?". Eventually the team was handed their second straight loss at 5-3.
The second game on Saturday afternoon would prove to be a critical one. After a blowout in the locker room between game two and three, the troops were ready to go into what was dubbed a "must win" game. A couple personnel changes, a couple beers and some food left high hopes in the hearts of the Hussars. Heading out to the ice for the final game of the round robin the hallways echoed "Win and you're in"....
The Absolute Pylons were the next opponents. Having lost their first game and tying their second game, the Pylons felt like they had a good hold of the final playoff spot. Taking at least a point away from the Hussars would lift them into the Sunday semi-finals.
The game started out as one would expect, both teams came hard and ready to play. You could feel the hostility in the air as the first half proved to be a penalty filled affair that left the Hussars down 2-1. The lead came with a cost to the Pylons, who had a couple of players ejected from the game for unsportsmanlike conduct.
The Hussars had a team huddle between periods and made a pact not to get caught up in the head games and chirping that was taking place between the Refs and the Pylons. Their resolution paid off as the second half started off with a couple of power plays and two quick goals from Marc "The Pride of Creemore" Corbeil who finished the game with a Hat-Trick. The frustration continued for the Pylons when the Hussars tightened up defensively. Any chance that they managed to get was turned away easily by Jorge Goulart. Having a few more players ejected from the game was salt in the wounds for the Pylons as the Hussars cruised to a 5-2 comeback victory.
Their games may have ended for the day but some of the boys stuck around and watched the final two games to see if they would get to play on Sunday. The calculators were out as players were formulating all of the possible outcomes with goals against, points and wins coming into play. After the smoke cleared, the Hockey Gods would smile down on the Hussars and allow them a shot at revenge on Sunday morning against the Aces, who had defeated them on opening night 4-0.
Sunday morning.... 11:00 am.
Most of The Hussars had arrived at the rink on what was a frigid morning in London Ontario. To add to the cold, dressing room #8 was assigned to the team. For those of you not familiar with the famous # 8 room, let's just say it's colder than the stare you would get from Matt "I only fight at Hockey" Spence, while trying to crash the net.The team was in high spirits as they opened the scoring and held a 1-0 lead for most of the first half. The Hussars were more like pit bulls in their own end, jumping on any loose pucks they could see and killing penalties with text book precision.
It took a truly special play to break the shutout. A perfect shot from just above the circle made the iron sing as the puck ended up in the net tying the tilt at 1 apiece.
The Hussars continued to skate with the Aces and deserved better than the 3-1 score line suggested heading late into the second half. A couple of scrambles in front of the Aces net saw the puck slide across a wide open goal mouth. Jorge Goulart turned in what had to be his best performance of the weekend, keeping the highest scoring team in the tournament to only 3 goals.
With time winding down, The Hussars managed to pull one back and just like that it was 3-2. The tides were shifting as they could feel a third goal was coming.
Jorge stonewalled the Aces on a breakaway late in the half giving the Hussars a chance to tie it. Adam Klimowicz caused a turnover deep in the Aces zone with less than a minute remaining and fed a pass to Marek Klimowicz at the point. Marek stepped in, wound up and.... Faap, what was originally thought to be a fanned shot has since been revealed to be a broken twig. The Aces went the other way. Jorge made another quick stop which gave The Hussars another chance for the tie.
Brad Amberley came streaking into the zone with Adam Klimowicz on the wing. The Aces collapsed hard and before he could make a play, a sliding D-man sent him head over heels as the buzzer sounded.
That my friends, is how the first official Hockey-Life team did in their first tournament. We believe we got a good taste of what it takes to compete with some of the other teams around town. For a relatively new team trying to find their place among the many divisions around we are pretty happy with the end result.
Did I mention that the Aces ended up taking the Final by a score of 7-2? .... Congratulations go out to them.
