Thin Ice

Bullshit; That Totally Counts!

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Excuse the mistakes

dedicated to alwaysfeelhappy for making the picture on the side

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By the grace of God, we’d made it.

Don’t ask me how, because I can’t explain the math, but my team had made it to the championship game. I think there had been an upset with the teams ahead of us, which somehow gave us the highest points in our division. Now, we were being pitted against the winners of the other division, who hadn’t lost a game during the tournament. To say the game had gotten off to a rough start would be an understatement.

The other team, the Peterson Panthers, had gotten their first goal about fifteen seconds into the game, and they’d nabbed one more before the first period ended. They’d skated circles around all of us, and I’m ashamed to say that for the first period, we’d hung Tony out to dry.

However, between the first and second period, in an attempt to get us riled up, Dane had recited the speech from “Miracle”, which he’d apparently had committed to memory since a month after he’d seen it in theaters. During the second period, because we’d been having fun, we managed to keep up with the Panthers, and even get two goals ourselves. They’d scored once, which left us down by one.

That is, until the third period. Six minutes in, Alec had taken a give-and-go down the almost complete length of the ice, and with a beautiful slap shot, he’d scored in the top right corner. We were tied, and now the tension was high. Both teams were playing their hearts out, and if we won, it would be by the skin of our teeth. We only had five minutes left, and it seemed like the seconds were ticking off the clock faster than normal.

“Get it out!” I yelled, banging my fist against the outside of the boards, “Get it out, guys!” We had been in our zone for far too long, and this team knew how to skillfully cycle the puck. It was making me nervous, and the puck was always better off being in the other team’s zone.

As my eyes flickered around the ice, I realized what play was about to unfold. The other team’s center had the puck behind the net, keeping it away from our defensemen. I would bet a hundred dollars that he was going to pass it up to the wing, who was at the hash marks on the circle. Then, that wing would send it up to the defensemen, and a d-to-d pass would ensue. Either, the defenseman would take a slap-shot, or he would pass it down to the center, who would take a shot from close range.

Sure enough, the exact play I’d mapped out began to play out.

“Watch the point!”

The words didn’t come from me, but from Dane. He was standing at the door to the offense end of the bench, ready to go out, and his eyes were glued to ice. Like me, he’d seen what the other team was up to.

Thankfully, our wingers heard Dane, and both of them glued themselves to their respective defenseman. With those outlets blocked, the opponent’s wing had no choice and he sent a weak shot towards the ice, which Tony easily deflected. One of our defensemen picked it up, and seconds later, we were heading down the ice to our opponent’s zone.

“Hey Rogers!”

Reluctantly, I tore my eyes away from the ice, and I glanced towards the back of the bench where Coach Hannover was standing. He looked at me for a moment before gesturing towards the play in the opponent’s zone. Then, Coach Hannover walked the length of the bench and bent down to talk to me.

“The team seems to be back together today,” he said with an arched eyebrow.

“Yeah,” I said slowly, wondering where he was going with this.