Thursdays Are Goal Days

40 seconds.  That is how quickly into the game the scoring started.  Dan Keays was sitting in the slot, pretty much pushing teammate Chris Stickings out of position so he could be there, and Allan Beaton agreed that he should be there, fed him the pass from behind the net and Keays’ shot trickled through the pads of Phil Sprague and in.

It was just the second shot of the game for the Tigers.

Shots were coming quickly on Sprague but he was dialing it in.  Darren Ells had a great chance at the other end, but Josh McCarther stopped the open chance.

A giveaway on the breakout by the Tigers right to Landon Miron gave him some space and after dekeing 2 Tigers he deked McCarther who stayed square and kept his team up by a goal.  The teams traded chances for a while and after 8 minutes of play, they had 10 shots apiece.  Shot 11 though, that was the one you need to worry about.  Allan Beaton won the draw to the boards where brother Ron sent it to Corey Crewe at the point.  Crewe’s shot went off the foot of Robin Gareau in front and into the net to make it 2-0 Tigers.

The Norsemen responded.  Landon Miron took the puck up ice and tried dekeing everyone but lost it at the end and Darren Ells banged it past McCarther to make it 2-1 Tigers on the Norsemen’s 11th shot of the game.

Big Gally went for a rip and got his pocket picked, but then the Norsemen sent it right back to him and he skated up through the middle of the ice before he baked a muffin and sent it to Sprague.

Miron nearly tied the game as he deked McCarther to the faceoff dot but then lost the puck to James Harrison who shot it off the base of the post.  Landon got another shot 15 seconds later but this time on a breakaway and he went low blocker side to tie it up.

The Tigers had a perfect breakout and a cherry picking Brandon Crowell went right off the back bar to make it 3-2 Tigers with 3:45 left in the first.  12 seconds later, Blake Isenor picked up an assist when he skated in front of his own net and had Ron Beaton rob him and then shoot it past Sprague.

Darren Ells got that one back as he took a shot through a Gallant screen and into the top corner.  That was 3 goals in 29 seconds as this shit was getting out of hand!  With the fans getting restless after 45 seconds without a goal, Thomas Saunders decided to step aside and let Dan Keays have a straight lane to the net.  Keays took it, roofed the puck, said thank you, and changed.  Eric Blanchard just missed a back door tap in shortly after and Phil Sprague was feeling like laundry in a Newfoundland tourism ad.

With a handful of second left in the first, Brandon Crowell saw Landon covering on D and thought he’d have an easy time dangling him.  False.  Landon stopped him, fed a pass up to Jeff Miles who found Zack Harrison busting his ass up the ice, fuelled by Fireball.  Zack took the pass and went bar down to bring the Norsemen within a goal at the end of 1.  The Norsemen were outshooting the Tigers 21 to 17 but the tigers had more scoring chances and more goals.

The Tigers got another goal 3 minutes in the second and Sprague was up half the night thinking about how that one got through from so far away.  The Norsemen were letting this game slip away and they knew it.  Blake Isenor knew he needed to turn this game around.  He made some dry humour joke on the bench probably that half the boys didn’t even realize was a joke, and wanting to not have to endure that again, the Norsemen rallied.  James Harrison with the great back door pass to Jeff Miles for the easy tap in at 10:31, followed by a nice passing play that Nick Marshall buried at 10:14 and the game was tied.

All these talented fuckers scored zero goals for the next 8 minutes though the had plenty of chances.  Then a misplay at the Tigers line saw the puck get turned over to Landon Miron and he got past McCarther’s poke check and slid the puck in for his 5th point of the game, enough to give him a league leading 14 points, but more importantly, that was the game winner as the Norsemen won a barn burner 7-6 which put them into 2nd place after 4 games.