We had to get up pretty early for our Semi Final game (6am) -- the winner plays for the Gold, the loser plays for the Bronze. Although it was early and we were tired (and some hurt), we did our best to try to win the semi's, but unfortunately, we just got beat by a better team. Basically, they played our game against us and won. Our goalie held us in there but you won't win many games only having scored 1 goal....Final score: East Van Centurians 4 CTO 1. That meant we had to play Calgary Pitbulls (the team we lost 5-3 to in our opening game) for the Bronze @ 1:30pm.
In between games we were able to catch the last period of the Team MB/Mississauga game via broadband -- we were amped to watch Team MB win the Bronze 6-1 -- the BEST finish for Team MB at the Nationals in the past 20 years or so. Way to go boyz -- JEFF: I'd luv to see that game on your big HDTV.
After a quick regroup session and an even quicker meal, we returned to Planet Ice to play the Bronze Medal game. The feeling in the room was electric -- beyond that -- EXPLOSIVE really. Shout out to the Cereal Killers for coming out and cheering us on -- their banter and "commentary" helped us win the game. And each and every one of them high-fived us on the way out of the rink -- it was an AWESOME feeling!!!
It was tight at first but we exploded w/ offense and capitalized on Calgary's undisciplined play -- it really wasn't a contest, and as expected, the Calgary team got frustrated and tried to take it out on us physically (and cheaply) however, the refereeing was FANTASTIC...we ended up scoring at least 3 times on the powerplay. Again, Lodgey held the fort -- Final Score: CTO 9 Calgary 3.
They also handed out the individual awards after the game: James Zyloway won for best Forward and Darren Lodge won for best goaltender.
And although Gold was the our objective all along, I've learnt that winning Bronze DEFINITELY feels better than losing Gold or finishing fourth.
It was an awesome tournament -- thanks to our CTO Fans (Jess, Tiff, & Kaylee on the left -- it was THEIR idea to get the tops -- both home and away) , Meaghan our trainer/medic, our coaches Allan & Bernie, our advisor (Leon), all the Team MB guys for inspiration and support, every member of the Cereal Killers for their support, J.Jericho for being an AWESOME ref (and party guy), friends and family and supporters back home.......and now we get to party!!!
Thanks for all your text messages, emails, Facebook posts, etc. from all the fans in MB!!!
Catch you all when we get back to Winnipeg -- WITH SOME HARDWARE!!!
