Do or Die

The Renegades Hockey Team is still playing winter hockey, well into the spring.  After winning the Divisional Championship over the Itchy Beavers a week or so ago, we moved on to the City Conference Championship.  Division 8 in our Recreational League includes a North Conference [called the ERHL Conference] and a South Conference [called the CCRHL Conference].  There are a few inter conference games during the regular season but mostly we played against the seven other teams in our ERHL Conference.  Because we got moved up to Division 8 a little over halfway through the season, we only played games against two or three of the teams in the CCRHL South Conference.  I know this all sounds very confusing.....

At the end of the regular season my Renegades finished in Second Place in the ERHL Conference.  We knocked off the 7th Place Wet Bandits, the 4th Place Padres, and the 1st Place Itchy Beavers to win the Divisional title.

Then we starting playing the Best of Five Conference Championship Round against the Beavers HC, the winner of the South CCRHL Divisional Title.

We won the first game... a close one... by a score of 4-3.  The second game was on Thursday just before the Easter Long Weekend and we won that one by a score of 8-6.  The third game was last night, and it did not go our way.  Facing elimination, the Beavers came out flying.  They also got the benefit of some really piss poor officiating.  The game was intense, but not particularly physical.  The rough play was pretty even both ways, but for some reason the whistle-happy referee... or at least one of the two... insisted on calling virtually all of the penalties against us.  There are three 15 minute stop time periods in our games.... so 45 minutes of ice time.  The Renegades were assessed 30 minutes of penalties, while the Beavers only got 8 minutes... two of those coincidental.  This really impacted the outcome of the game, as we had our best player ejected, and played most of the game short handed.  We did get two short handed goals and kept the score close until the end, but ended up losing the game 5-2.  The series now stands at two wins to one.  We need to win one of the two remaining games to be the champions, while the Beavers HC have to win both. 
The officiating in this last game infuriated our team and we are going into the next one really motivated and prepared.  I have a full roster coming out to the game, and all of our lines and defense pairs set up.  We have a game plan, and are going to bear down and try to put an end to this tomorrow.

I complained to the league about the poor officiating, which I am generally not inclined to do.  But as team captain I felt I just had to speak up about the disgrace that the officials brought to our last game.  Of course this fell on deaf ears, and I suspect we may get some extra attention at the next game.  That game is tomorrow night, right after work.  Hopefully we can bring our season to a close with another championship.... and then I can finally shave this playoff beard.

I gave some concert tickets to my three daughters for Christmas.  Margarit and I were planning on dropping off the girls at the Ariana Grand concert at Rogers Place, and then going out for dinner.  The plan was to pick up the girls after the concert.  But... that concert is tomorrow... the same night as this Do or Die game of our playoffs.  So.... the girls are going to the concert... Margarit is missing out on dinner but hanging around downtown... and I'm going to play hockey.....  Needless to say this has NOT earned me any brownie points.  The girls will be fine about the concert, but I am going to have to make this up to Margarit at some point in the next week or so....  But, as the T-shirt that Hailey gave me for Christmas says.....  "Hockey is not just a matter of life and death... its more important than that"

Next Wednesday I have to attend a captains meeting to kick off the summer hockey season.  Our regular season games will start in the week after that.  Not much time to rest my old carcass before this starts all over again......