Howie Chills Out at Last...
2004-01-05: Mighty Pirates 2 vs. YTV 3

It was a big week for the Pirates. They had come off a huge win the previous Monday against YTV. They knew they were in a position to possibly climb out of the cellar of the TNHC Monday Canadian Division. They had made their New Year's Resolutions to stick to Pirate Brand Hockey®. But even with all that, perhaps their minds were more on the fate of their beloved captain, Vito Mola, who was scheduled for surgery on his knee later in the week, or they just had not recovered from the excesses of the holiday season. All in all, when the final buzzer sounded, Howie was not a happy puppy. A gritty effort by a few noble Pirates was wasted by the anemic play of the Pirates as a team. Watching a crucial point in the race to climb out of the cellar of the TNHC Monday Canadian Division slip away with 16 seconds left in the game was hard enough, seeing Klein (who at his advanced age might have been expected to learn not to throw the puck to the middle of the ice in the Pirates' own zone) make mistake after mistake on the ice, and watching the puck sit on the ice untouched by Pirates as though it were infected with a highly contagious strain of virus, all contributed to a real funk at the traditional Pirate post-game Howie's press conference and beer-and-wing-fest. Howie's normally glib journalistic turns of phrase were struck dumb by the poor performance.

Let's start at the beginning. As the Pirates gathered in the locker room before the 8:00 p.m. game, it was apparent to all that this was to be a critical contest. The second of a pair of back-to-back games against perennial Pirate rivals, YTV, the boys donned their yellow jerseys knowing that the Yoots were going to be gunning for revenge after the previous week's 4-1 drubbing at the hands of a short bench of veteran buccaneers. The Pirates were ready with Matthew Lella in net, and 13 skaters. Clearly they missed Captain Mola's line-setting insight, and they missed the committed and gritty play of veterans Peter Toth, Brian Vandenberg and Auby Mandell. But The three full forward lines were set with John Mutch centering Kapil Khatter and Les Klein, Rob Kwinter anchoring Mark Sager and Shaun Legett and Jim Jezioranski teamed up with Nick Perri and Dave Turner. On defense were Richard Bingham, Michael Levine, Blair Dimock and Jonathan Gallivan.

The game did not start well for the hometown heroes, as YTV managed to pop two goals within 2 minutes and three seconds of each other in the first period. The second goal was particularly shameful, as Klein was heard asking the referees if he could get an assist on the point, having set up YTV's high scoring #11 with a stunningly stupid pass into the slot instead of clearing the puck out along the boards. To their credit, the Pirates did regroup, and focus on defense for much of the rest of the game. Indeed, the YTV attack was thereafter somewhat blunted, and held scoreless for virtually the rest of the contest. In the meantime, the Pirates offensive displayed moments of brilliance, as they cycled the puck in the YTV end for extended periods of time and moved well down the ice when they controlled the puck. But they could not take advantage of their opportunities or the fact that the YTV goalie was handicapped by a sore groin and unable to move as quickly as he usually does. And all too often, the forwards cleared the zone too early, leaving the defense helpless, and all too often did not drop back to cover a rushing defenseman, leaving the way clear for breakaways and two on one rushes against the goalie. It was only due to Lella's stamina and clarity of mission that these YTV scoring opportunities did not come back to haunt the Pirates later.

In the meantime, with 5:16 remaining in the second, Dimock took one of his patented end-to-end rushes and tucked the puck past the YTV goalie, coming around on the net from behind off the far corner, with the YTV defense distracted by action in front. That brought the Pirates to within one. And with just over four minutes left in the third period, Mutch carried a lovely feed from Dave Turner (noted by some observers as a bright light among duller bulbs that evening) and converted the game-tying goal. Alas, as the final seconds of the game ticked down, YTV managed yet another attack into the Pirate end, and with "guys with monsters on their jerseys" pretty much everywhere, the Pirates again experienced inability-to-get-the-puck-the-fuck-out-of-our-zone-itis. With Matthew Lella sprawled on the ice in a desperate effort to save the game single-handedly, a lone YTV player took his sweet time and lifted the puck up and out of the goalie's reach. In classic cinematographic slo-mo style, the black marker lifted high off the ice and tumbled end-over-end into the net, seeming to gloat in the face of the Pirates' inability to execute, and relishing the loss of another desperately needed point in this brain-cramp plagued season.

Veteran Pirate webmaster and statistician assured Howie that there have been only three games this season which the Pirates have given away in the last two minutes:

1) Zig Zags (5-6)
    - winning goal with 1:02 to play
2) Slowetry in Motion (3-3)
    - tying goal with 0:59 to play
3) YTV (2-3)
    - winning goal with 0:16 to play

But Howie is haunted by so many games which seem to be characterized by momentary lapses in concentration, sudden and inexplicable abandonment — as individuals and as a team — of strong defensive play, the inability to execute Wednesday Night Pirate Skate™ brand passing and teamwork. There is no question that the competition this season is of a very high quality, but the Pirates can do better than the end results are showing. The leadership is there, the individual skills are there, the team chemistry is there — what is required is a commitment to playing with full concentration for 32 full minutes. It was Howie who said much earlier this season:

"It appears that such will be the nature of the rest of the season, which will put the necessary pressure on the Mighty Pirates to play at their best every game, every period, every shift and every second. Let-downs will be punished and extra efforts will be rewarded!"

So let's do this thing the way we know how. Next Monday, we play Venom at 10:00 p.m. in RINX 2, and we earned a tie against them seven weeks ago. And do not forget the Wednesday Night Skate, this and every week at 10:00 p.m.

In the meantime,

GO PIRATES!!! VIVA LOS PIRATAS!!!

Howie