Some weekend FUN!

I spent this past weekend doing two of my favorite things, playing hockey and drinking. I traveled to sunny, ok mostly cloudy, Pottstown PA to play in a hockey tournament. This was a twelve team tourney with each team guaranteed at least three games and the finals being the two teams with the most points from each of the two six team divisions (Point breakdown was; two for a win, one for a tie, and nodda for a loss) which means you loose one game and you are pretty much done. The ride to PA was pretty much uneventful, other than the freaking traffic which is expected in the DC area. The team "Englewood Jack" (we had to spell it with an “E” due to copyright laws and the fact that we have shirts, hats, magnetic signs and many other forms of useless paraphernalia) met in downtown Manassas about 1:00 on Friday and headed North (well actually West, then North but who the hell cares) we had about 14 cars, vans, and sport utilities filled with the likes of 40 pounds of steak tips, 100 hamburger patties, ten packages of hot dogs, who the hell knows how many packages of buns (but as Saturday would tell us it was not enough) 29 cases of beer consisting of everything from Bud to Ice cold Sammy Adams (of course staying with my Boston roots, I refused to pack my 60 gallon igloo with anything but Sammy) Our team captain had the whole trip planned out from start to finish, we would all meet at the Taco Bell parking lot at 1:00 and he would place us in vehicle order for the road trip (seemed a little anal until I figure out there was a method to his madness) El’ Capitan had it worked out so that those of us who carry get out of jail free cards where spaced with one in the front, one in the middle and two bringing up the rear, this was to ensure that the only thing issued on the highway was a DEA, US CUSTOMS or USSS tee-shirt, and a hand shake with a promise to keep our speed reasonable. Needless to say no one was stopped, and all in all the weekend only had one instance of local law enforcement interference which was quickly squashed when a couple of us badged up and agreed to stop drinking in the rink parking lot at the request of four local Pottstown PD. (I think this was the biggest show of police presence this town had seen in years, the let down on the corporals face when he realized he was busting up a group of feds was priceless.) So we arrived at the hotel (Holiday Inn express) at about five on Friday night and proceeded to check in, grab a quick snack, two or three or four cold beers, then it was off to the rink for our 9:00 PM game. We where not sure what to expect, but we knew one thing, we had 18 guys which meant almost four lines of skaters, we knew we could skate anyone into the ground come the third period. The game started off quick and the pace was fast, the team we faced was decent but had a short bench, only carrying nine guys. We scored about 30 seconds into the game on a break away by my brother-in-law who was brought in as a pure ringer and it showed early, as he was untouchable. By the middle of the second period the other team was legless and we skated to an easy 5-0 win. I came out of the contest with two goals and two assists, and a plus five rating. Once back in the locker room, we found a nice present of two cases of beer sitting in the middle of the room, turns out the winning team gets two cases of beer after each win. (This is on top of the 29 we had already. This was not a good thing as some of our gents usually forget that we can stop drinking even if we still have beer left) After the game we decided to head back to the hotel order up a couple of hundred hot wings and consume our winning beer, deciding to take it easy, seeing that game two was at 9:15 Saturday morning. Well taking it easy meant that we went to bed by 2:00 am this had no correlation to the amount of beer we drank, as if you don't have a beer in your hand with this team somebody is likely to make you shot gun one (HINT: when playing with the Jack's keep a can in your hand even when passing out). By the time 2 am rolled around I was about ten beers deep and had consumed what felt like fifty wings. Earlier in the evening we had concocted our room heater/AC as to where all our gear was being air dried, the stench that came from that room when we opened the door stained the walls in the hallway, it was a cross between a deer that had been lying on I-95 for two weeks in August and baby puke. I thought for sure my wings where going to come up. After about thirty minutes I finally got used to the stench, not to mention I think I passed out (beer or smell being the cause is yet to be determined) but none the less when I packed my gear for the game Saturday morning it was dry! We packed our bags and headed for the lobby to do some damage to the continental breakfast. I pounded a couple of cinnamon buns and two giant glasses of apple juice (mistake one and two) and headed to the rink for game two. Game two was more entertaining that game one, as we where all hung over (some of us still drunk, others actually puking prior to taking the ice, I myself wanted to puke or at least take a dump but could not do either, in fear of doing both at the same time.) when all was said and done we had skated circles around this team and laughed, puked and pissed (one guy left between periods to piss and was gone for fifteen minutes, that was either a shit or a puke, either way it was funny, and definitely not a piss) our way to a 9-0 victory. I came out of that one still drunk, with two goals and four assists and was a plus 7. After the game we once again found those two mysterious cases of beer begging us to drink them so of course we did and then headed to the hotel to once again stain the walls with stench and take a quick nap and be back at the rink for a 5:15 game. The afternoon game was the talk of the tournament, as it was two of the three undefeated teams playing each other and it was billed as young and fast vs. old and skilled (we where the latter, as our team age average was 34 and we had two guys under 26) The game started off fast and the young bastards got off to a two – zip lead at the end of the first. We battled back in the second and trailed 2-1 starting to carry the play as the young guns could not keep rolling with the three lines we had coming at them. (They had 9 guys total and we showed them that three plus lines is the way to go in a men’s league tournament.) The third period started off bad as we let up two soft goals in the first minute and a half, and found ourselves trailing 4-1, things where not looking good for the Jack’s streak of ten straight appearances in tournament finals. About halfway through the period the young guns where spent they could not catch our first line and the other lines just kept the pressure on in the offensive zone. When all was said and done we had mounted the most incredible comeback in Jack’s history and we tallied seven goals in the third period to win 8-6. I ended that game with a goal and three assists and was a plus 5. The Jack’s had done the impossible we beat the young guns and where now the talk of the parking lot beer drinking, the word was out about our first line being able to fly and scoring the majority of our goals, and the long bench pounding guys into submission in the third period. The best part was the other teams thought we where all from Virginia and not until Saturday night did the word get out that 16 of our 18 guys grew up in Boston playing real hockey, everything from my NCAA Div-III background to one guy who played at Harvard. We had kid on the hook for playing who was actually drafted and played in the AHL, but the rules prohibit professional players or so it says (home town teams are given a waiver, or so it seemed). Saturday night consisted of the consumption of our two winning cases of beer and the remaining 18 or so cases, with three guys passing out and needing assistance to their rooms and the rest of us banging off the hallway walls on the way to our rooms. Which was not a real issue as our championship game was not until 11am (we finally went to bed sometime between 3 and 4 am.) We woke up around 9:30 and headed to the lobby to destroy the buffet once again and then off to the championship to claim our trophy. The finals started off really bad, we let up two goals in the first period and found ourselves facing a team that was made up of the ten players who where on the teams roster for the tournament and five players from the team we beat the night before… Hmmmmm… something stunk, other than our gear. Not to mention the two guys who showed up with ECHL stickers on their helmets and San Jose Sharks pants, and gloves, NHL logo and all, meaning they likely played in the San Jose organization at some point. These two guys where fast as hell and had rockets for shots. Turns out the team we beat Saturday night and the team we where playing where both local teams that had purposely been put in the two separate division so that they could cake walk through and play each other in the finals. What they did not expect was this team from Virginia to come in and dominate one of the divisions. By the end of the second period we had netted two goals and let in three, it was now 5-2 and not looking good. We then found out that the refs where also hometown favorites, we had five or six non calls that where blatant penalties, ( a punch, two cross checks in front of the net and a trip on a break away) so by the time the third period rolled around we where ready to take matters into our own hands. We began to play the body, one guy who shoots the puck in the high double digit range drilled the ref on what looked like an accidental dump, but was later to determined to be a missed head shot that hit the guy in the ribs. (my guess is at least one broken rib the way the bitch went down.) With a two minutes left and the Jack’s letting in another goal to go down 8-2 we called a time out, put the four guys we had over six feet on the ice and myself (only because in our regular league I have been known to mix it up every now and then, and have had some sucess, plus I don't care if I get beat up, as long as I get a couple of good shots in I'm happy.) When the puck dropped it looked like something out of slap shot and the gloves came off. I grabbed the center and hit him three times before he knew what was coming dropping him to the ice, and pinning him down while the rest of the boys squared up. Even the goalies met at center ice, removed there helmets, blockers and gloves and began to dance, it was great! We even had someone yell “ENGLEWOOD JACK” (watch the link for that one) making me laugh, which is when I asked the guy I was laying on if he had enough, he said yeah and actually tapped me on the shoulder and said you got me good with that first one. (I though it was the second one that actual buckled his knee’s) So as it ended (refs ran out the rest of the clock) the Jack’s lost the game but won the fight which is almost as good, we had one guy cut they had three, two requiring stitches and one looking like he had his nose moved to the side of his eye. We left the ice to cheers from the stands and from the other teams who had come out to watch what they thought was going to be a Jack’s easy win, they all said they liked the fight better than the game. I ended up with one goal and was even as I was only on the ice for one of their goals. Moral of the story is that if the Jacks’ don’t win the game they WILL win the fight! What a weekend, my body is begging for a tub full of ice right now but it was definitely worth it and I can not wait for our next run. I ended the four game weekend, with 6 goals and 9 assists and a whopping plus 17, not to mention a victory in the ring.