War wounds

I finally got back out to a hockey game on Wednesday evening.  The team is six games in to the winter season, and this was only my second game.  Work and life in general have been so busy in recent weeks and I've had too many conflicts.  It was great to get back out to the rink.

The team now has a record of 3-3... but one of those victories was against a team that has since been moved out of our division.  So for the purpose of standings within our division we have a winning percentage of 0.400 based on a record of 2-3.  I played in both of the games we won so maybe I'm a good luck charm and need to get out more often.  Last winter we played in Division 8 and won the championship.  This year the league has moved us up to Division 7 and we are near the bottom of the standings so far.  

Tonight we played against a team called the Bruins.  We won the game by a score of 6-3, which moved the Bruins down into last place.  They were a young, fast team and we quickly fell behind by a score of 2-0.  But we battled back and were ahead 6-2 with only a minute left when they got a late goal to make is look a little more respectable.  Despite being really rusty, I felt OK out on the ice.  Unfortunately I was on the ice for the first two goals against.  But then later I was on for three of our goals, and got an assist on one of them.  I think I probably should have been credited with the second assist on another goal, but the officials missed it.

About half way into the game I was defending when one of their defensemen stepped into a slap shot out by the blue line.  I was down in the slot, just below the hash marks and the shot hit me square in the shins.  I felt it through my shin pads, and knew I would have a heck of a bruise.  After the game I discovered that the shot had split my shin open and my pads and socks were soaked with blood.  It kept leaking for quite a while, and probably could have used a couple of stitches.  There was no way that I was going to wait at a hospital for that so I went home, had a shower, and taped it up before going to bed.

I'll miss our next game as I will be away on a trip out to Vancouver Island with my friends Rob and Brad.  But after that I hope to make it out to the rink on a more regular basis... including a tournament that we signed up for in Banff in November.