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After extensive contract negotiations, the Mighty Pirates organization is extremely pleased to welcome back Howie for another season of insightful, amusing, and extremely addictive commentary! Yes, Howie tells it like it is!

You'll find links to each and every Howie Report right here after each game.

Come back, oh, web man - we're dying out here!
2010-10-04: Mighty Pirates 7 at Cyclones 1

Wow, is it possible that Howie has sent out a second Report already this season, even if there is no website to post it on? Miracle of miracles — he's alive! Or maybe he's just excited that the Mighty Pirates (1-0-2) have finally put a W on the board after three games, the first two having been perfect ties. With this first victory, moreover, the Pirates vault into first place in a tight race in the TNHC Monday Night Gilmour Division — and dreams of perfect parity have flown out the window. On Monday night, the Pirates suddenly turned on the jets after having been scored on in the very first shift by the feisty Cyclones (0-3-0). From that moment on, the Pirates dominated play in classic Pirate Brand Hockey® fashion, with solid defence, backchecking, forechecking and opportunistic scoring — but with the added bonus of beautifully completed passes, puck control and eminent calm on the ice.

Captain Mola had a full bench to work with that night, dressing 15 skaters in all. The Grind Line (Sager, Turner and Phillips) was once again outstanding, and were matched by the second (Mutch, Mola and Gallivan) and third (Jezioranski, Kwinter and L. Klein) lines. Defensively, he played J. Klein, Hine, Sousa, Kitchen, Butler and Besant. The Sturgeon-ator was once again between the pipes. Though it was clear that the Cyclones were not going to lie down and die, the Pirates played a powerful and well-balanced game, with excellent offence and defence equally displayed.

Without the game sheet or team statistics, it is hard for this correspondent to remember what actually happened, but we do recall that the Captain (2G/2A), Hine (2G), Gallivan (1G/2A) and Mutch (2G/3A) all had stellar scoring nights, and that there were goals and assists aplenty. For those really hungry for the gory details, we suggest you go out and buy a lot of David Usher band CDs so that our webmaster can finally get back to his day job of feeding our addiction to reading about ourselves. Let's not forget that all of the other teams in our division (heck, in all of True North-land!) depend on the Mighty Pirates website for the real dope about what is happening in the world of hockey — not only for news about the Monday Night Gilmour Division, but also for those insightful analyses that have always been the hallmark of this storied franchise. Come back, oh, web man — we're dying out here!

If there was any fly in the ointment, it had to be the mathematically-challenged Pirates being called for too many men on the ice, and then in the middle of serving that penalty, being called again for the very same infraction (though the stat keeper failed to record it!). In response to that Olympic-class blunder, Team Rep L. Klein declared Dr. Seuss's "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" required reading for all Pirates before the next game (lucky for the Pirates, they have next week off for Thanksgiving, so they should be able to finish the book just in time!).

On the positive side, there was a huge jump in attendance and gate receipts, with at least three fans in the stands, not the least of which were Jim Butler's platoon-mate, Giovanni Tassone, and the SuperFan herself! You can just feel the excitement grow in the Pirate fan base as we get further into the preseason and the real battles begin to shape up. The next big questions of course will be who — if anyone — will get moved up or down and how the drive for parity will work out after the preseason. Looking at early results, the Nordiques are falling behind fast in the Ellis Division just one above the Gilmour with a 1-2 record, and the Condors are dominating the Jackson Division below with a 3-0 record. While so far it seems doubtful that the Pirates could be moved up, it is very possible that the Cyclones could be replaced by the Condors come the regular season, bringing an old Pirate rival back for some repeat action.

Stay tuned as the season unfolds with Game 4 on Monday, October 18, at 11:00 pm on RINX 3, with the Mighty Pirates facing another new foe in the Smell the Glove (1-1-1), possibly the strangest named team in all of sportsdom! In the meantime,

GO PIRATES!!! VIVA LOS PIRATAS!!!
Howie