Post by Old Bucks Admin on Nov 6, 2009 8:31:59 GMT -5
So few skaters showed up for Week 7 the club almost adjourned for lack of a quorum. But don’t blame the Eagles-Giants game. All the Eagles fans showed up; it was only a small clutch of Giants fans that were out with nausea. Kenny was out too, but we did not inquire whether it was Giants related. Considering how many games he’s missed it’s a good thing he plays for free.
Eddie’s friend, Jamie, was back in the Red net for the first time since Week 1. Eddie, however, was skating for Blue to fill a void left by an absent Rich Cerbone. It put him in an awkward position, though, given that Jamie is his only friend. In fact, he purposely botched a breakaway to start the game out of his overriding sense of chumminess. “If he does it again, “ Saunders warned, “I will beat him.”
Larry Johnson, for Red, scored first, snapping a personal four-game goalless drought. Jim Heffern added another to put Red up 2-0. Blue did not look sharp. In fact, they looked like a Quaker meeting house on skates. Their mistakes ran the gamut from blown two-on-ohs to telegraphed passes in the neutral zone that Red jumped on and used to gain the offensive zone. When Saunders missed an open net his detractors (that is, the entire Red bench) howled with glee. What kept Blue in the game were goals by Rich Devlin and Dan Dougherty. Also Marty looked strong, apart from two head-scratchers that somehow got by him, including a snap shot by John Lupisella that one-hopped into the net as if the puck had been made from recycled old basketballs. The Blue bench, ever the comedians, dared each other to tell Marty, “You should’ve saved that one.”
The game was 4-3 Red when both teams started to succumb to the demanding pace. Legs began to give out, tongues began to loll, and play got even sloppier. Older players suffered the most from the short rests between shifts. Larry Johnson, for example, kept himself going by draining foot-long pixy styx that were leftover from Halloween. Tim White played like a composite of Bob Freiling and Bill MacDowell—fast going up ice, slow getting back. Mark Herr finally ejected himself from the game after being assessed a double major for gross fatigue. Someone, noting where he works, joked that A.I.G. must stand for: Ain’t Into Goin’ (the distance).
Mark’s departure left Red a man short. But this would not be a game won by weight of numbers, nor lost by the weight of Mike Dougherty. With the game tied 7-7 Greg Wright, skating for Red, put in two shifts that proved game changers. Until then he had played liked Shankapotamus, spraying shots everywhere but in the net, but then his short game came up huge and he chipped in two shots from the fringe of the faceoff circle, giving Red the 9-7 lead. Blue countered with nice goals by Craig Allen and Rich Devlin, tying the game again at nines. The last ten minutes were scoreless and a stalemate seemed likely. Then, with the clock winding down and the zamboni starting up, Greg Wright made one last drive into the Blue zone, drawing defenders toward him like flies to flypaper. Tim White planted himself in front of Marty and stood out like a peacock in a sunlit glade, but no one picked him up. Greg dumped the puck to him and he whacked it in the net for the season’s first walk-off homerun. In vain did Blue try to prolong the game. They forgot that no one returns from a walk-off homeruns, especially when the walk is in the direction of a cold beer.
On this date (2002): During the post-game Rich Corbett tells everyone how, the previous night, he had gone to see a new Bruce Willis horror flick called “The Sixth Sense”. The movie spooks him so bad he later has nightmares. The one dream which stands out involves a haunted hockey rink in which Rich is stuck, unable to find his way out of a labyrinth of dark locker rooms, damp furnace rooms, and moldering, rat-infested snack bars. The dream’s worst part is a recurring image of Haley Joel Osment, who meets him at the end of every blind alley, and whispers in his creepy little voice, “I see red people.”
Eddie’s friend, Jamie, was back in the Red net for the first time since Week 1. Eddie, however, was skating for Blue to fill a void left by an absent Rich Cerbone. It put him in an awkward position, though, given that Jamie is his only friend. In fact, he purposely botched a breakaway to start the game out of his overriding sense of chumminess. “If he does it again, “ Saunders warned, “I will beat him.”
Larry Johnson, for Red, scored first, snapping a personal four-game goalless drought. Jim Heffern added another to put Red up 2-0. Blue did not look sharp. In fact, they looked like a Quaker meeting house on skates. Their mistakes ran the gamut from blown two-on-ohs to telegraphed passes in the neutral zone that Red jumped on and used to gain the offensive zone. When Saunders missed an open net his detractors (that is, the entire Red bench) howled with glee. What kept Blue in the game were goals by Rich Devlin and Dan Dougherty. Also Marty looked strong, apart from two head-scratchers that somehow got by him, including a snap shot by John Lupisella that one-hopped into the net as if the puck had been made from recycled old basketballs. The Blue bench, ever the comedians, dared each other to tell Marty, “You should’ve saved that one.”
The game was 4-3 Red when both teams started to succumb to the demanding pace. Legs began to give out, tongues began to loll, and play got even sloppier. Older players suffered the most from the short rests between shifts. Larry Johnson, for example, kept himself going by draining foot-long pixy styx that were leftover from Halloween. Tim White played like a composite of Bob Freiling and Bill MacDowell—fast going up ice, slow getting back. Mark Herr finally ejected himself from the game after being assessed a double major for gross fatigue. Someone, noting where he works, joked that A.I.G. must stand for: Ain’t Into Goin’ (the distance).
Mark’s departure left Red a man short. But this would not be a game won by weight of numbers, nor lost by the weight of Mike Dougherty. With the game tied 7-7 Greg Wright, skating for Red, put in two shifts that proved game changers. Until then he had played liked Shankapotamus, spraying shots everywhere but in the net, but then his short game came up huge and he chipped in two shots from the fringe of the faceoff circle, giving Red the 9-7 lead. Blue countered with nice goals by Craig Allen and Rich Devlin, tying the game again at nines. The last ten minutes were scoreless and a stalemate seemed likely. Then, with the clock winding down and the zamboni starting up, Greg Wright made one last drive into the Blue zone, drawing defenders toward him like flies to flypaper. Tim White planted himself in front of Marty and stood out like a peacock in a sunlit glade, but no one picked him up. Greg dumped the puck to him and he whacked it in the net for the season’s first walk-off homerun. In vain did Blue try to prolong the game. They forgot that no one returns from a walk-off homeruns, especially when the walk is in the direction of a cold beer.
On this date (2002): During the post-game Rich Corbett tells everyone how, the previous night, he had gone to see a new Bruce Willis horror flick called “The Sixth Sense”. The movie spooks him so bad he later has nightmares. The one dream which stands out involves a haunted hockey rink in which Rich is stuck, unable to find his way out of a labyrinth of dark locker rooms, damp furnace rooms, and moldering, rat-infested snack bars. The dream’s worst part is a recurring image of Haley Joel Osment, who meets him at the end of every blind alley, and whispers in his creepy little voice, “I see red people.”