We were shut out in the late game at Gawler last night against Division leaders the Shufflers. They are now unassailable on top of the ladder. We are currently third, scrapping with the Rockers for second spot (tied on points, they lead in regular time wins). There are four games left in the season.
It was heatwave conditions for inline hockey (39'C) so all games were split into ten minute quarters rather than twenty minute halves. This resulted in us starting rather late.
Both teams had a full bench. At the start it promised to be a good game, perhaps with the edge to them. As things turned out, not the case. They were 0-2 up at quarter time, and we had Rick still to complete a hooking penalty. The shot clock was 11-3 their way in the first.
We evened the shooting up in the second, with five a piece directed at net. Towards the end of the quarter I noticed that our goalie, Jordyn, was having trouble moving any more than the absolute minimum. At half time they were leading 4-0 but that wasn't our main worry. Rather, our goalie was suffering badly and came straight to the bench and started taking off her gear. She was suffering heat stress and had to stop the game. Good luck to her, looks like she stopped in time before things got too much worse. She'd played the previous (U17) game also, perhaps something for the committee to look at with young goalies.
In the third quarter the demolition continued, with them putting on another two goals. Again, not the greatest concern on our bench as they appeared to be boarding one of our players with impunity and she ended up on the bench with a suspected broken wrist. Although I don't think the 'hits' were intentional, they were definitely reckless. Disappointing. The fact that there were no penalties called only made it worse. We had five shots to their three this quarter.
I also realised that their hulking forward was crowding our substitute goalie and resolved to go and help out. So, early in the final quarter I put some of my Knights training into operation and took him on from behind in an effort to clear the crease. He foolishly dug in and ended up on the floor. He wasn't so keen to make contact with our goalie after that. They put in a final shot before the buzzer, one of only two on net to our five. Not a good showing for the Wheelers.
My game was average at best. I was on for four of their goals, blocked a couple, won a couple face offs (lost none), more or less kept their prime scorers off the board from the middle zone where they love to score from. I hardly put any shots on net again, due to concentration almost entirely on defence against their inevitable break. I guess the fact that they scored almost all goals from either goal front deflection or jamming it in says something for our skating defence, but not a lot for our work near the crease. Only one of the four goals scored when I was on was from close in, and that was our cheeky substitute goalie having too much fun skating around the zone and getting caught. I had to grin at the time...
Our team was not too happy afterwards, we knew that a couple of their players had been playing pretty rough against some of our younger members. This subtracted from the skills and fun displayed by the rest of their team, sadly. I suspect we might hear more of this down the track.
On Sunday, I play with the Knights against the Predators at the Ice Arena. Next Saturday, Wheelers take on the luckless Bumpers (still to win a game this season).
Inline 5
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