Even though the game wasn't slated to start until later, I left early to pick up my Fan Club. The Dan Fan Club that night consisted of two members, Sam and Jill. One was trying to show moral support while stifling her laughter, and the other was there to see a comedy show on ice and make no attempt to stifle her laughter. I'll let you decide who's who.
As I walked into the rink, the other half of our clinic (the Yellow Team) was playing their game. The score was 4-1 late in the second period, and I stupidly wondered who was winning. The answer, not surprisingly, was "not my clinic-mates."
After some words of hearty encouragement from the Fan Club, I headed over to the locker room to get ready. As I was walking around the boards, I noticed that the referee who had asked me where my cage was a couple weeks back was working the game. He saw me and, with play going on, leaned over the boards by the scorer's table and said, "hey, did you bring one for me?" and motioned to the Fan Club.
How dare he?!
"No," I replied, "I'm selfish. They're both for me." He laughed and skated away, clearly dejected from having been shot down so easily. Me 1, Horny middle-aged ref 0.
Getting dressed for this game brought a new wrinkle: I borrowed a cage from my cousin Conor, and was going to wear it for the first time. However, the cage had two snaps, and my helmet only had one. My ghetto solution? Just jam the second strap up into my helmet and hope it stays. Hey, that college education really worked!
As the seconds ticked away in the first game, one the Yellow Team would lose, 6-2, I noticed that we didn't have many players. In fact, we only had five forwards and two defensemen. Luckily, a few more people showed up, and we had a few volunteers from the first game stay for the second. In the end, we were able to ice three full forward lines and two defense pairs. I was slotted as the wing on the second line, skating with Bobby (whose name might not actually be Bobby, I don't remember) as my center.
Our first line started, and I sat back to gauge our level of competition. The other team was a mix of older guys and kids slightly older than me, with the one hotshot that every team has. They were better skaters than us, and better everything else's too, probably, but they weren't that much better. We had a shot.
Me, before the game
My first touch came on a loose puck by the blue line, one that I sent back to a defenseman, making the safe play. Phew. One touch, no goals allowed.
After getting back to the bench following one of our shifts, our coach told my line that the forwards (i.e. me) were too stationary, and that we had to move to give the defensemen an outlet. It was like getting yelled at for talking during class in middle school.
During a break in between shifts, I went to have some water, forgetting I was wearing a cage. What a project this turned out to be. At first, I considered unsnapping the cage and drinking like a normal human. However, when I remembered that I had to rig the strap into place using college-level logic and thinking and that it'd probably be easier to remove Bane's mask, that idea flew out the window.
So I settled on a kind of reverse-carnival game. You know those game where you have to squirt the water gun into the hole to make the character climb, and the first one to reach the top wins? It was like that, only my mouth was the hole, and I couldn't see where I was aiming.
First squeeze: all over my nose.
Second squeeze: chin.
Third squeeze: SUCCESS.
Having established myself as the Goldilocks of squirting water, I headed out for my next shift. Again, we failed to generate much offense, and actually ended up hemmed in our own end for a while. When the puck is down by the net, there's a sort of helpless feeling that takes over: I'm supposed to, by my assignment, stay by the points and help out along the wall.
However, seeing a scrum for the puck near my net, I kind of started drifting down there, only to see the puck squirt out to the point...where I was supposed to be.
"Uh oh..."
I hustled out towards the man with the puck and closed my feet together, attempting a blocked shot that would earn my praise for my "intangibles" from the between-periods analysts, only to have the shot sneak past me towards the net. I turned around, fearing a goal, only to see that my goalie had smothered it.
Bullet = dodged.
Later in the first, our best-skating defenseman (defensewoman, actually) took the puck up ice. I jumped into the play to turn it into an odd-man rush, but her speed caught the lone defenseman by surprise: she turnstiled him, leaving him in her dust and heading in on goal alone. I knew that the chances or her passing me the puck literally could not have been smaller (LITERALLY), so I stayed on my course towards the net, banking on a rebound.
My rebound never came, however, and instead I got a front-row seat to her backhanding the puck past the goalie and into the net. 1-0 Team Teal, and a +1 rating for me. SUCCESS.
In the second period, my line continued to have trouble moving the puck, and we found ourselves hemmed in our zone again. The puck was near the top of the right faceoff circle, and, jostling for possession, I somehow fell down. Shocking that I fell, I know. The puck was right in front of me, so I poked at it to get it out of the zone. Mission accomplished, but as I went to stand up, I fell down again. On all fours, I struggled to get up. I probably could've used a milk crate right then.
Embarrassed, I looked to see if my Fan Club had noticed my Benny Hill moment. Fortunately, they were too busy Instagramming to notice my foibles. Crisis averted.
Later in the period, we lined up for a faceoff and I found myself next to an older guy.
"Hey man," he said, "those skates look kind of loose. Are they too big for you?"
Feeling like I was in Groundhog Day, I said "nah, they're OK. I just can never seem to get them tied right."
I've decided that having the wrong-sized skates will be a running theme throughout this hockey odyssey.
Off of that same faceoff, the puck went back to the point. I skated towards the man with the puck, again trying to block the shot. This time, however, it worked: I caught a slapshot right off of the side of my foot, just next to my ankle. Granted, none of these guys were Zdeno Chara or anything, but it still stung quite a bit.
However, seeing my dedication and selflessness, I think I noticed the Fan Club visibly swooning at the sight of my manliness.
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| A book my Fan Club wrote about me after my blocked shot. |
The third period featured more of the same, pressure from the other team and occasional sojourns into the offensive zone by our side. My line continued to have trouble moving the puck, and at one point we took three straight faceoffs in our own end. Needless to say, our coach wasn't exactly singing our praises.
As time ticked down, the score remained tied at one, largely thanks to our goalie making a number of big stops. Late in the third, I was on the forecheck when I suddenly ended up with the puck at the attacking blue line. The nearest defenseman was by the right faceoff circle, a good three or four strides from me. After a step or two in, I was right in the slot, alone with the puck.
I saw the goalie crouch in anticipation of the shot, and was trying to decided where to go: up top, over the shoulder? Five hole? Down low to generate a rebound? Why am I so hungry? What am I gonna do this weekend?
As you can see, I thought a bit too much, and focused a bit too much on where to put the shot as opposed to um...actually taking the shot. Sensing that my time was running out, I flexed to shoot, only to look down and see the puck slowly dribble off of my blade and about a foot away from me.
Opportunity lost. Again, to show my displeasure, I bellowed an expletive. I wanted to make sure my teammates knew how angry I was that I didn't get a shot off, when in fact I still have no idea how the puck even rolled away. I'm convinced that the ice must have been slippery or something.
I skated one last shift after that, hoping for a chance to redeem myself and give my still Instagramming Fan Club something to cheer about, but nothing really developed. With about two minutes left, I skated to the bench to watch the rest of the contest.
As the final two minutes ticked away, one of our defensemen made a bad pinch. It was one of those pinches that you can see as disastrous from miles away, but there's nothing you can do about it. "Noooooooooooo......", and away the opposing skater went, alone on a breakaway from the red line in with less than a minute left.
I almost looked away, certain that we were about to suffer an ignominious defeat on a last-minute goal; however, I hung in there long enough to see our goalie stone the shooter, and our team hung on for the tie: 1-1 in our first-ever game. Not bad.
I dressed after the game, reliving my near-miss and contemplating how many sponsorship dollars I'd cost myself with that miscue.
As I walked towards the exit, I was welcomed with open arms by the Fan Club, as they sung my praises, admired my selflessness, and asked me for autographs.
And by all that, I mean that they were waiting for me out in the lobby, having left as soon as the final horn went.
I should've scored a goal. Girls love goals.
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