On Sunday night we played the Flyers for the second time this season. The Flyers are defending a premiership. We haven't beaten them in three seasons. They'd beaten us by five goals when we met before xmas. They had lost a couple of games recently and, for the first time since round two, been knocked out of first spot on the ladder (by the Blades, after their victory over us the night before). Therefore, we knew they'd be keener even than usual for a win.
Against this, we knew that if we are to avoid a playoff elimination game we had to win this one. Anything less would leave our playoff chances subject to the results of other games. So we also had a pretty good 'meta-reason' to win the game. The fact that we had ten skaters against their seven wasn't going to be as decisive as it ordinarily would have been as we were playing within twenty four hours of our shootout defeat to the Blades. Both teams are known as fairly aggressive. It was going to be a tough game.
We ran with four defencemen for the first two periods, switcing it up in the final period to only three on the rotation. I was on the ice for their goal, and for both of ours had only literally just stepped off the ice at the end of a shift as they went in.
From memory, they had us under severe attack in the first period, outshooting us about 10 to 2. In a sense we were lucky to be tied at 1-1, and owed the game at this stage to Tommy the Goalie (do teams owe every game they win to their goalie?). He was definitely on fire, stopping everything they could throw at him except a hard shot from the inside of the offensive dot which deflected just enough of the shaft of my stick go over the top of Tommy's glove and into the back of the net. I felt slightly responsible but those are the risks of getting in the way.
We went up by a goal in the second period, which was much more even in terms of shots than the first had been. The game was being fought out significantly in the neutral zone and I was getting an edge on their lesser players around our goalfront, especially as some of their fancier skaters realised that I didn't need to be as good a skater as they were to screw up their plans. Similarly, their larger more bullish players were beginning to understand that I was still willing to take them on and was willing to work hard to put myself into a position of advantage to do so.
Probably the most heart stopping moment I had on the bench was when one of their larger wingers found himself on a breakaway 1 on 0 against our goalie, and blew the shot. Go Tommy! Ealier in the period the same winger had started tapping my stick to irritate me, but I had tapped him back and we had just got to the point where a ref was skating over in case he had to get between us when I skated off with a small moral victory under my belt. I'm not great fan of bullyish intimidation, so I enjoyed this fellow fluffing his shot later.
Both teams were physically tiring by the end of the second period, though you could guarantee we'd all come out strong after a couple minutes rest and it would boil down to a battle of wills in the final few minutes. Which is the way it turned out to be.
The game's pace picked up again in the third period, with strong forays being made by both sides and good goal keeping at both ends. Penalties began to flow, but they tended to be matching and thus there was no outsized disparity such as the last period had seen (when we had killed off about at minute at 5 on 3, and then the remainder of the regular powerplay).
Entering the final minutes I was pretty convinced that, as tired as we all were, they would be battling the effects of fatigue on their decision making abilities as well as, in their less conditioned players at least, the effects of 'jelly legs' due having only seven skaters. Against this, they were a more well drilled unit, with back passing forwards, late trailing snipers, set plays at face offs and a history of winning, so we battened down the hatches and put in our hardest minutes of the game.
For me, this was perhaps typified best in the following three incidents. In the first, I blocked a shot by closing the space on the same forward who had deflected one into the net in the first period, in an almost identical situation (I'd also blocked a low shot in the second, with the front of my boot (which stung a little for awhile)).
The second incident occured as they came in on one of several forays on our right wing resulting in our centre battling with theirs on the boards. Their winger was waiting several feet away to take the plunder. I knew he was a slick skater and had a good snapshot, so proceeded to involve myself with him to the point that, as soon as the puck was in our reach, he was on the ice. He started to complain aloud to me, so I told him to 'stop your whining' as I skated off after the puck to clear it.
The third was on the opposite boards, when I was first to the puck and consequently became involved in a board tussle. I did my best just to hold the puck in, push it forward. He, on the other hand, was trying to strip it and concentrating more on me than the puck. As a consequence, the butt end of his stick ended up in my sternum with some force just as the whistle stopped play for a roughing penalty against my opponent.
I saw out the game on the ice, almost in a penalty killing role as they pulled their goalie with a half minute to go (we'd kept the puck in their end for at least a couple minutes before that).
It was a sweet victory indeed.
Our team game was more measured than it has been before, more deliberate passes finding their target, more holding onto the puck to make smarter decisions, a greater willingess to carry it if opportunity presented, less undisciplined play, smoother line changes, greater support, better breakouts (even I carried it behind our goal at least three times, on one of those occasions even doing a reverse of direction to shake the forechecking forward). I think our coach would be reasonably proud.
I was pretty happy with my game. I lost my edges a lost less than the night before, got several shots off (including a couple that ended in the goalie's glove), did some nice breakout passes, managed to contain their best forward and disarmed the others, stood protectively over our goalie on a number of plays. I was surprised to see at the end of the game that my average heart rate and VO2 were both significantly less than the night before, the effort had seemed just as intense.
There's a lesson in that, what with a heavy hockey weekend coming up (four short inline games at the Viking Cup, followed by the final game of regular season on the ice, when we play the Rangers in a game of importance to both teams as we head into playoffs).
GP 15 G 2 A 3 Pts 5 +6 10/3/3/1 PIMs 12
Ice 3
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