Monday, February 15, 2010

Legends Week (Part 1)

Well, I keep telling myself I should post here more often, but somehow when it comes time to do it, I always fall behind. It's been a very busy couple of weeks, with the Legends weekend and everything else that's been going on.


We finished off January with a 2-game road trip to Pensacola and Mississippi on the 29th and 30th. We bussed down to P-Cola on the day of the game and left with a 2-1 win over the Ice Flyers. The Snakes trailed going into the third, but goals by Kyle Lundale and Sam Bowles turned the score around and gave us the win. The game was pretty uneventful, except for the first professional fight of Jesse Cole. It kind of surprised all of us...even him. He said after the game that he didn't know what came over him. He did all right, though, considering he's not really a fighter.


After the game, we made our way about 3 hours East on the I-10 to Biloxi, Mississippi. We unpacked our gear and headed to the hotel to get some sleep. The next day was a regular game day, with a pre-game skate in the morning. After the skate, we went back to the hotel for a team lunch. I headed back to the rink in the afternoon to set up and get ready for the game. We didn't play badly, but spent much of the night in the penalty box and couldn't generate much offense. We were tied 1-1 in the third until Michael Richard dented the twine with just under a minute left in the game, giving the Surge a 2-1 win.


We boarded the bus and headed back home to enjoy our Sunday off before getting back to work on Monday.


Monday began a very long week for the Snakes. We practiced in the morning, as usual, but packed and loaded out at Midnight for our trip to Fayetteville. We arrived in Fayetnam at 7am and took the ice for our morning skate at 8:30. Then the boys headed out for lunch and to rest up for the game. I made my way to the Pancake House for breakfast, then headed back to the rink to set up for the game. There was a nice little bit of snow on the ground, but all in all the weather wasn't bad.


This was not our night. We got outplayed, outshot, outhit...we got out-everythinged. Chad Rycroft got peppered in the net and gave up 5 goals in the first period (of which he might have had a chance of stopping one). He finished the game and took a 9-4 loss. I don't know if it was the bus travel or something else, but we just didn't have it.

After the game we had the proverbial long bus ride home.  It was very quiet and very tense, like everybody was holding their breath.  We were tired and frustrated...and the week had just begun.