Prairie Cup Tournament 2012

The Renegades played in the annual Prairie Cup Tournament at the Terwillegar Recreation Center on the weekend of March 30 to April 1.  The average age of our team was 37, and we only had three players under the age of 30... one our goalie and one a girl!  But, because a few of our players were under the age of 35 we had to play in the age category of 19 and older.  Our first game was on Friday night, and we were pretty rusty.  We ended up losing to a team called the Ice Ninjas by a score of 7-2.  The game was closer than the score suggested as we were only down 2-1 after the first period.  These games only consist of two 20 minutes periods, but we had a short lapse in the second during which they scored four goals.  

Our next game was on Saturday morning at 8:00AM.  This time we faced off against a young, fast team called the Knights.  Once again the game was close and we were only down by a 2-1 score after the first.  We pulled our goalie late in the game, down by a score of 4-2 and they got an empty net goal to win 5-2.

A few hours later we played again, this time against the Sharps.  We are familiar with these guys as they play in our winter league, but six divisions higher than us.  We scored first and the game remained very close.  The score was tied 2-2 late in the second.  They got a goal with just a few minutes remaining and hung on for a 3-2 victory, and later went on to win the division.

We could probably do better in these tournaments if we would exclude our handful of younger players and play in an older division.  The tournament includes 35+, 40+ and even 50+ divisions.  But, we are a team and the tournament is just for fun, so we allow all our guys to play, and historically end up losing most or all of the games.  In past years this has just been a tune up for the playoffs.  This year since we did not quite make the playoffs it was just for fun...

My old carcass sure felt its age in the days after the tournament.  Three hockey games in a span of 16 hours sure takes its told on the oldest guy on our team.