Sarah and the Hockey Game

Rachel's Australian half-sister Sarah is in town for a few days. She arrived last night on a train from D.C. and is staying with us until early Friday morning, when she and a friend take off in a rental car for a (fiddle) gig in Vermont. While we were all eating dinner last night I mentioned that I had a hockey game tonight, fully intending to say that I didn't have to play if she wanted to do something else. Before I got that out, however, she said that yes, she would like to come see the game. She had never seen a hockey game before and was quite excited to come watch me play. She also told us as we were walking to the car before the game that she has a friend in Australia who has become quite the hockey fan recently and "knows everything" about hockey, but he hasn't yet gotten to actually go to a game, so she'll have to let him know that she's been to one now.

The game itself wasn't bad. I played center for the whole game this time, winning about 3/4 of my faceoffs. I again scored the first goal of the game, this time when I pounced on a rebound and flipped a backhand shot into the upper corner. Unfortunately, our opponents scored the next 4 goals, including 2 shorthanded goals on really bad plays by the defense. We answered in the third on a 2 on 1 where I made a nice backhand pass right onto the tape of the other player's stick and he slid it just inside the far post. That was it, though, and we ended with a 4-2 loss. We were lacking a couple of our better players from last week, though, and are still in the process of gelling, so I think we're okay. For myself, I felt I played a pretty good game, keeping my head in it and making smart plays pretty much throughout.

I did find out that it's pretty typical of the Connecticut Hockey League that there is just one referee who acts not only as referee, but also as scorekeeper. I really got spoiled by the GSHL. This league is really Mickey Mouse in comparison. Still, the games are clean and fun and the players on all three teams I've met so far seem like good people, so I won't complain too much. Not yet, anyway. ;-)