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April 29, 2006
OK,
let's play you be the convenor. I am sorta-kinda-like-acting novice
convener for house league lacrosse. So, after the teams were put
together we warned all the coaches that we/I would rebalance if the
teams were wildly out of whack. You know -- move a stronger kid from a
strong team to a weaker team for a weaker kid. Picture day is this week,
so, we have to lock the teams down in the next couple of days.
So, in
Week 1, last week, the scores were 4-4, 8-1 and 6-1, which to even the
uninitiated might suggest there's a couple of strong teams and a couple
of weak ones.
This
week, Week 2, the team that won 8-1 last week lost 10-2 to one of the
teams that tied 4-4 last week. More stunning, the team that lost 8-1
last week won 6-2 -- over the team that won 6-1 a week ago. The team
that lost 6-1 last week tied its game this week, 4-4.
The
wild card in all of this is that there are still rep hockey tryouts
going on, so some rep hockey players were missing today. What would you
do, bearing in mind that the complex evaluations done for house league
hockey don't exist for lacrosse.
The
lines are open.
April 28, 2006
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Week 2 of house league lacrosse tomorrow. I was out in the driveway
last night with Pad and Chris throwing the ball around for 45
minutes. Chris is actually improving.
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Rep
hockey tryouts continue -- most of the AAA and AA Ranger selections
are done. This weekend will sort out most of the places on the A and
AE teams. It can be tough for coaches, parents and players in equal
doses.
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Tampa Bay Lightning coach John Tortorella eviscerated his goalie,
John Grahame, after losing game four to the Sens the other night.
Tampa, of course, won the cup the last time there was playoff hockey
thanks in no small measure to the work of Nikolai Khabibulin. And
when he left, Tampa never adequately replaced him -- including
sitting on their hands at the trade deadline -- and NOW Tortorella
calls out Graham? Graham is what he is, and sadly for Tampa he's
been pulled in two straight games. The Lightning look like a team
with no confidence in their goalie (the way the Leafs played most of
the season until J.S. Aubin showed up.) I'm betting Grahame
never plays for the Lightning again. I'm betting the Sens win game
five. Click here to
read all about it. It's not pretty.
April 27, 2006
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A
couple of NHL notes: first, now that the Avs lead the Stars 3-0, the
emails deriding my prediction of a Colorado win have abated.
(Sometimes, you get lucky.) The other 3-0 series has the Devils
kicking the Rangers all over the tri-state area much to the
amusement of those who suggested all along that the Rangers were a
little top heavy on European talent and a little thin on grit.
(Sometimes, it's painfully obvious.)
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Came home from work last night to find young Chris blissfully
enjoying what looks like the latest drain on my ability to retire
someday. They are called Pirates, and they are little plastic and
cardboard pirate ships that the kids build and then use in some kind
of strategy game. He offered to teach me how to play, but, um, I had
. . . email to answer! Yeah. That's the ticket! Email to answer.
Maybe later . . . Anyway, the Pirates Constructible
Strategy Game got me to thinking about all the other
junky things that seem to bloom every spring, pock marking my bank
account, cluttering the family room floor and in short order
occupying a dusty shoe box under a bed. Like Pokemon cards and then
Yu-Gi-Oh cards. And then there were Crazy Bones. And Mighty Beanz. I
was never actually able to figure out the point of those. Anyway,
there are others I'm sure I've forgotten. When I was kid (yeah,
yeah, here we go) the springtime brought the same novelty every year
-- yo-yos. Pretty much everyone got one for Easter and we'd spend
endless hours trying to do tricks but usually we'd just wallop each
other in the head with the things. The coolest yo-yos were white
with gold lettering. The other semi trendy spring fad I recall were
the infamous clacker balls -- two heavy plastic balls, one on each
end of a piece of thin cord about 18 inches long. You'd hold the
rope in the middle and move your arm up and down and try to get the
balls to repeatedly hit each other above and below your hand as you
moved it. Anyway, the clacker balls were short lived because
sometimes, when you really got going fast, the balls would
disintegrate on impact, spraying all and sundry with hard plastic
shrapnel, taking out eyes, causing flesh wounds, etc. Or, the balls
would come off the cord and fly off in an unfortunate direction,
hitting the player or a bystander, perhaps taking out an eye or
tooth. While the blood and mayhem was wildly entertaining for the
survivors back in my generally uneventful youth in then-bucolic
Windsor Junction, N.S., it generally proved inconvenient for parents
to rush off in the middle of the day for an emergency room that was
45 minutes away. Ah, the good old days.
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Last winter I provided loyal readers with a link to Brokeback
Mountain, as performed by animated bunnies in 30 seconds. Well,
they're back. Click
here to see Sly Stallone's directorial debut, Rocky, yes,
performed by those same animated bunnies and again, in only 30
seconds. Adrianne!!!
April 26, 2006
I was
watching some of the Oilers and Red Wings last night and it's looking
more and more like someone forgot to tell Edmonton the script says "roll
over." The Wings have a core of champions and they're far from done, but
Edmonton deserves a lot of credit for playing these guys tough.
Last
summer -- basically the day or two after the lockout was settled -- I
was at Pearson airport getting ready to fly east and the massive, good
looking, blond guy in a suit that costs more than I make in a month came
striding toward my direction with a coffee and a bottle of water.
Chris
Pronger is a really, really big guy. He handed the water bottle to a
much smaller guy dressed in baggy shorts, a Nike golf hat with
sunglasses perched on top, an orange polo shirt (not tucked in) and very
cool sneakers. Mike Peca was mutt to Pronger's Jeff. They were joined by
Oakville hockey dad and NHL agent Pat Morris who was accompanying them
to Edmonton to be introduced to the team and media.
Pronger
has been a giant for the Oilers all season. Peca had a miserable year
and by February was a fourth line centre relegated to checking duty.
He's really picked up his game in the last month and not a moment too
soon for the folks in northern Alberta.
PS:
Patrick was born in Edmonton and would not be unhappy to see the Oilers
run deep into the playoffs, although that's only because the Leafs are
out.
Chris
was born in Ottawa and, like the rest of us in our house, would prefer
to see the Sens playing golf soon.
April 25, 2006
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Is
anyone surprised by the continuing implosion of the Rangers? What a
disappointment this bunch is. In fairness, they have injury
problems. But they just don't look even close to competitive.
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Montreal, on the other hand, is the story of the playoffs so far.
They came close to letting one get away last night, but they didn't.
Carolina is in trouble, but they have too much fire power to be
considered out.
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When I predicted Colorado would beat Dallas I got email deriding
that call. The Stars may yet come back, but it's pretty stunning
that they're down 2-0.
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The
Flyers are an embarrassment. 8-2? Bobby (Bob) Clarke's playoff
goaltending issue rises again for what, the 15th straight year? The
Sabres look very good. They're just so darn fast. If the refs keep
calling the penalties there could be a lot of hockey in Buffalo this
spring.
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The
other series all look pretty entertaining to me. Calgary and Ottawa
should advance, the Oilers got a split at the Joe, and San
Jose-Nashville is shaping up as a long one. Hand me the remote.
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With the Leafs gone, Christopher has become a Flames fan. Good pick.
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Patrick, addressing who he wants to win the cup: "Anyone but the
Senators. I know they're a Canadian team, but there's something
about those guys." Agreed.
April 23, 2006
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The
hockey moms' dance last night was smaller than last year, but just
as much, if not more fun. There were about 150 people out and things
reached the requisite stage of silliness at about 10:30p. I didn't
buy anything in the auction, though I tried. In the end all I did
was make it more expensive for someone else to buy what I wanted.
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A
guy we know with a son in hockey and lacrosse etc etc came up to me
and Laura last night as we were selling tickets on some fundraising
thing and said thank you. (And then he spent $40 on tickets.) Lots
of people do more volunteer stuff for the kids in this town than me,
but not many do more than Laura. I was glad for her every time last
night someone told her that, and many did. You have no idea how hard
she works for your kids.
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Side note: Laura is finished on the executive of the MOMS. She says
she will still help out at the big things like awards week and the
skate sale, but now she will be a worker bee.
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A
scary moment at the opening day of house league lacrosse yesterday.
A hit near the boards sent a novice player tumbling head first into
the boards and he stayed down a long time. There was a sore back and
some numbness in his hands. An ambulance was called and the player
was removed on a backboard. The good news is that he's OK. But for
all of us who coach hockey and lacrosse and any other contact sport
it is a sobering reminder of the importance of drilling home the "NO
HITTING FROM BEHIND" rule. The hit was not violent or malicious in
any way -- it was just one of those things. But we're all mightily
glad it turned out the way it did. Interesting side note to all of
this: last year, the OMLA decided to hire senior paramedical
students from Sheridan College to attend all house league game as a
safety measure. The young lady on the scene yesterday did a first
class job assessing the injury, recognizing she might be in over her
head, and dispatching me to get an ambulance. We were all glad she
was there.
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Otherwise, opening day was uneventful, if long for me. Pad was doing
timekeeping and then I was convening and assistant coaching so I was
at chilly Maplegrove from about 9:45a till 2:30p. Other than the
scary incident, it was fun and what else are you going to do on a
rainy Saturday in Oakville? Wait, don't answer that . . .
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I
have seen almost zero playoff hockey so far, not by choice. I hope
to change that this week.
April 21, 2006
One of
the more interesting aspects of Pad's recovery from a broken leg is the
little science project on the bottom of his foot. If you stick a foot in
a cast for a month, it turns all kinds of interesting colours. The
bottom of his foot is particularly disgusting. In addition to the physio
and exercises, we have to soak the foot each night for a while. We have
a foot spa (don't ask -- it's something I bought for Laura in a moment
of weirdness years ago when I must have thought we were running low on
future garage-sale fodder) and it's been a God-send these last few days
since the cast came off. But it's good to see him returning to his old
self. He still can't run or skate, but he's throwing a lacrosse ball
around, annoying his brother and leaving his junk all over the house.
NHL
playoffs start tonight. Chris told me he's excited about that, but not
as much as he would be if the Leafs were playing. I'm kinda glad I don't
have to watch them play Ottawa.
House
league lacrosse games start tomorrow, so I'll be spending a lot of my
day at Maplegrove Arena. Pad is timekeeping three games starting at 10a,
and I'm convening three games starting at 11a, so I hope the canteen is
open. Tomorrow night is the annual hockey moms dance, where the hockey
moms get dressed up and look even better than usual and the hockey dads
lean against the wall, drink beer, complain about the Leafs and watch
the moms dance with each other. It's actually more fun than it sounds.
Former CFL star Orlando Bowen will be handling the live auction.
April 20, 2006
The Pat
Quinn era is over in Toronto. As a guy who started suggesting months
ago that the team wasn't responding to Quinn, I can't say I'm surprised.
I think he had to go.
But
Quinn is a very good coach -- he took the Leafs to the conference finals
twice and won an Olympic gold medal and World Cup. Regardless of
whatever level the game is played, there are two things true about
coaches. First, a great coach makes a big difference by teaching,
leading, inspiring and bringing a confident, winning attitude. Second,
the coach can't score goals. The players have to play and it's easier to
replace the coach than it is to replace 20 players.
Quinn
will be in the Hall of Fame someday. Few coaches have a record like his.
Who do
they hire to replace him? Paul Maurice, or someone else?
April 19, 2006
It's
one thing to have people think you are a fool -- it's quite another to
open your mouth and prove it. With that in mind, I bring you my fearless
predictions for round one of the Stanley Cup playoffs. You will be well
advised to do exactly the opposite of what I predict.
EAST
Ottawa
(1) vs. Tampa (8): Tampa needs a goalie. Sens are in a mini-slump,
hurting a bit, and without Hasek. But still too good for Tampa, their
perennial playoff brain cramps not withstanding -- I'm sure they are
secretly relieved they don't have to play the Leafs. Sens in five.
Carolina (2) vs. Montreal (7): I respect how well Montreal played down
the stretch. I also kept waiting for the roof to fall in. I think
they're playing above their heads and Carolina is for real. The 'Canes
also beat Montreal handily in all four regular season games. Carolina in
six.
New
Jersey (3) vs. Rangers (6): Can you say Prague Spring? The Rangers will
be a test of how real the new NHL really is. I'm betting Jaromir will be
home in time to enjoy springtime -- playoff crosschecks make for cross
Czechs. Sorry. Anyway, Devils in six.
Buffalo
(4) vs. Philadelphia (5): I think this is the toughest call in the east.
The Sabres beat the Flyers three times in four season games. I also like
Buffalo -- I think they could do what Calgary did two years ago and run
deep into the playoffs. The Flyers seem very inconsistent to me. So,
Sabres in seven.
WEST
Detroit
(1) vs. Edmonton (8): It truly sucks that a team in Michigan is in the
western conference, but that's Detroit's fate. Their biggest opponent in
the playoffs may be jet lag -- I don't think it will be the Oilers.
Edmonton is, however, healthy and rested and they split four games with
the Red Wings during the season. But Detroit is a team with a higher
gear for playoff hockey and Stevie Y is on a mission. Wings in five.
Dallas
(2) vs. Colorado (7): Everything on paper says the Stars should win. But
I have to think that Jose Theodore has something to prove and now's the
time. Goaltending matters in the playoffs. Avs in seven.
Calgary
(3) vs. Anaheim (6): Another tough one -- they spilt the season series
and only five points separated them in the standings. Calgary was very
tough at home and has home ice advantage, so we'll say the Flames in
six.
Nashville (4) vs. San Jose (5): San Jose became a different team after
Joe Thornton arrived and he dragged them into the playoffs. I think
they're capable of more, and Nashville has some injury issues to deal
with. I pick San Jose in six.
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Musical interlude: I've been listening a lot lately to the band
Death Cab for Cutie. Don't let the name throw you off. If you like
Coldplay, you'll like these guys. Melodically, they're pretty close.
The lyrics are more down to earth and home spun. And I think
interesting. Anyway, everyone back to TSN.
April 18, 2006
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I'll soon -- maybe before the day is over -- have a site up here for
the Oakville Hawks bantam 3 lacrosse team. Actual games are still a
few weeks away, but with John Maguire as coach I expect to have an
endless supply of things to write about.
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Chris' house league team has its first practice tonight. He was so
excited he wore his team jersey to school, over his Oakville
lacrosse hoodie.
April 17, 2006
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Well it's hard to believe the Leafs could look so great one night,
so awful the next. But given that they really had nothing to play
for, so let down was to be expected. I also think the defence don't
trust Tellqvist and everyone plans differently in front of him They
tighten up, etc. Anyway, it's all so much kicking the body around
the room now.
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There's a good chance Sydney Crosby will be looking to go over the
100 point mark in his game with the Leafs tomorrow. I hope he makes
it.
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Spent three hours on Friday and Saturday throwing the lacrosse ball
around with broken-leg boy. He's ready to get the cast off in the
next day or so, but he's being told NO SPORTS for two more weeks.
It's going to be a challenge holding him back.
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Rep
hockey tryouts start this week. Always a fun evening.
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Chris finally learned to ride his bike on the weekend. A very big
deal to him and now there's no holding him back. He's already asked
for a new bike.
April 14, 2006
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We
put a bullet through hockey season last night with the Wings team
party. It exceeded expectations, if that's possible. It started a
little after 6p, and we got home around midnight and we were not the
last to leave. I think we've set the standard against which future
hockey parties for nine year olds may be measured. Lots of
highlights, including my sons jamming with the bass player from
Glass Tiger, the Leafs winning in overtime, and being presented with
the game puck from with Wings win on April 1. The food was fabulous,
the kids had a blast, the parents -- as they have been all year --
were engaging and fun to be around. Time to turn to the corner
toward lacrosse.
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Speaking of which, I helped out Wednesday night at the novice
evaluation and team draft. The coolest thing about the lacrosse
association is the genuinely organic way the organization runs.
There's a structure, but it's a constant work in progress. At a
hockey draft, for example, it's VERY formal and structured (for good
reason.) Everyone is assigned an order to pick, you can only protect
two kids, etc. etc. In lacrosse, kids are encouraged to list, when
they register, if there's a friend they want to play with. Some kids
name two or three. No one abuses the privilege. So the draft starts
with the coaching staffs blocking out their own kids. Then you add
any kids who asked to play with those kids. And then you start
picking kids based on the evaluation you just finished. And as you
pick kids, you have to inherit the kids they asked to play with. The
funny thing is, the system works. There's no set order to the draft
because one coach might end up with nine kids after protecting his
own children, his assistant coaches' kids, and making one or two
picks. So another guy might get to take two or three or four kids in
a row to catch up. Anyway, lacrosse season is only nine weeks and
everyone is less intense about it than hockey. The evaluation was
fun. The draft was fun. And the season will be fun.
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How
about those Leafs? I still don't think they have a chance, but
they've at least made the run to the end of the season entertaining.
Out in Vancouver, people will be tossing themselves off the Lion's
Gate with the realization that a team that should have contended for
first is going to miss the playoffs. I bet they wish Brian Burke was
still there. Funny thing, eh? Anaheim is in the playoffs.
April 12, 2006
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The
Wings season-ending hockey party/street hockey festival/jam session
goes tomorrow night. It's pot luck, the only stipulation being NO
NUTS. Allergy issues. So one funny parent asks if that means the
coaching staff will have to stay away, because, you know. No nuts.
Can you feel the love?
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The
jam session should be a highlight. Both my sons play guitar. One of
the parents is the bass player with Glass Tiger. Another mom is a
well known Canadian recording artist. Two dads play drums. I know we
have at least one other guitar player and a keyboard player on the
team. I'll be blowing across the top of an empty beer bottle, making
the fog-horn noise -- to the beat, of course.
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What a performance Sundin put on last night. Imagine what the Leafs
might have done if, somewhere along the way, they'd done whatever it
took and found a couple of guys worthy of playing on a line with
him. But they didn't and the Leafs are going to miss the playoffs.
April 10, 2006
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A
weekend without blogging. Sorry.
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Saturday was a lost cause. Was over at Twin Rinks helping out at the
Sabatino tournament. If you are from Oakville, it was fun. Oakville
house league swept all eight semi-final positions in the two
divisions. House league here is still strong, I gather. The games I
saw were entertaining.
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After that, we went to a friend's birthday party around the corner
and that went on very, very, very late into the morning. We had the
good sense to behave like old people and leave early.
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Sunday was Masters Sunday. But before settling in on the couch to
the point of risking bed sores, we went to Pad's Rangers wrap up.
Floor hockey followed by a lunch etc at Twin Rinks. Pad played floor
hockey, even with the broken leg. Actually, what he did was stand in
one place and others occasionally passed him the ball for a
one-timer, sort of like Bryan McCabe. Naturally, after the game I
told him he looked very slow and his lateral movement sucked and
that he'd better get to work on that. He just rolled his eyes.
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Phil Mickelson is the 2006 Masters champ, and he deserved it. Two
majors in a row for the big guy now and three of the last nine. At
only 35, he's likely got a few more majors in him yet.
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Mike Weir and Stephen Ames of Canada did well too, tying for 11th
and each winning a six-figure payday. Ames is 7th on the PGA money
list with about $1.8 million, and Weir is 22nd, with about half that
much.
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Lots of lacrosse this week -- it's house league evaluation time.
Call someone and volunteer to help out. Details of evaluations can
be found
here.
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The
Leafs aren't dead yet. Their season creeps on to its inevitable
conclusion, in much the way the hair grows on a dead guy. First time
in Leaf history that they beat the Flyers in Philly twice in one
year. I'm sure that will comfort them all on the golf course very
soon.
April 7, 2006
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More hockey this weekend -- of sorts. I will be one among many
helping out Saturday during the skills competition at the Frank
Sabatino tournament at Twin Rinks. I hope not to humiliate myself.
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Pad's hockey team closes out the season with their party and floor
hockey session on Sunday.
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Have you ever noticed how TV networks manipulate the leaderboard
during golf tournaments to move the biggest names up higher than the
lesser mortals? Here's the deal: if two players have the same score
on any given day, the one who has played more holes is supposed to
have his name listed first. For example, yesterday both Mike Weir
and Ernie Els were -1. Ernie is a top five in the world guy. Mike
isn't. So even though Mike had played 16 holes and Ernie had played
only six or something, Ernie's name was listed first on TV.
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Still with the Masters, what's the deal with Phil Mickelson's hair?
He's got a hockey mullet happening. If he's drunk at the legion
tonight, he'll be eligible for beer-league hockey in Timmins.
Seriously, the guy needs a fashion adviser or something. Heck of a
golfer, but the hair . . . You'd think someone earning $25 million a
year in earnings and endorsements could afford a decent doo.
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The
Leaf death watch is fully engaged and I'm getting gleeful emails
from friends in Montreal. The Leafs' magic number -- or tragic
number in this case -- is six. Any combination of six Leaf losses or
win by teams in front on them and it's FORE!!!!
April 6, 2006
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Pad
got the word this week that his broken leg means no sports till the
middle of May presuming all goes well. The good news is that so far
it is going well. He started with a walking cast yesterday and today
is (hopefully) going to put in a full day at school for the first
time in a long time. He even went to jazz band practice at 7:30a.
Laura mucked out the family room which was cluttered with DVDs and
PS2 games, and the evil PlayStation has been returned to the
basement rec room. I have my TV back at last.
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And
not a minute too soon because -- THE MASTERS STARTS TODAY. Yes, I'm
excited.
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Look at those Leafs go! Man, have you ever seen a bigger bunch of
world beaters when there's nothing on the line?
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The
Frank Sabatino Memorial Tournament goes this weekend at Twin Rinks
for major atom and major peewee, for those of you who still need
more minor hockey. Full details
here.
April 5, 2006
The
minor atom white Wings will be having their season-ending party next
week. I'm betting very few house league team parties are scheduled to
run over two days and are being promoted as The Lost Weekend.
Street
hockey, a jam session with two professional musicians from the parental
pool plus a sound engineer, plus other stuff. It's going to be a blast.
April 5, 2006
Go to
www.google.com
Type in
the word failure.
Don't
click the "Google search" button. Instead, click "I'm feeling lucky."
Enjoy.
April 4, 2006
It's
Masters Week.
Do you
hear that music playing as Jim Nantz whispers reverentially from Butler
Cabin about tradition and prestige and sportsmanship and honour? So many
things in professional sports are overblown noise and the folks in my
business can take a bow for making it that way.
But the
Masters is different. It actually means something -- not just to the
people who compete for the green jacket, but to pretty much anyone who
ever swung a club. I know lots of people who would no sooner watch golf
on TV than toss their cat under a GO train, but they down tools on
Masters Sunday.
I used
to play a lot of golf as a kid, but not any more. However I still enjoy
seeing it played right on the game's grandest stage.
Laura
knows that nothing comes between me and the Masters. Nothing personal.
The Masters was here first; everything else will have to wait.
The
Champions Dinner is tonight. The only way to get an invitation is to
have won the tournament. Tough ticket. Imagine what that evening must be
like.
The par
three tournament is tomorrow. No one has ever won the par three title
and the green jacket in the same year, and guys have been known to
deliberately tank on the final holes of the par 3 track to keep their
chances alive for the big prize.
I love
that.
When we
lived in Ottawa before kids, we had a Masters party on the final Sunday
each year. People wore green jackets. There were putting contests.
Merriment. But when the tournament came on TV, everyone shut up.
Laura
asked me last night for my favourite Masters moment -- and there have
been a lot. Mike Weir winning in 2003. Greg Norman's collapse in 1996.
Ben Crenshaw's emotional win for Harvey Pennick in 1995. Larry Mize's
dramatic pitch in for victory in 1987. Almost any time Tiger wins, but
especially 1997. And even Fred Couples, who I admire, in 1992. Every
year is another chapter in the story.
But my
favourite is still Jack Nicklaus in 1986, the Golden Bear stalking out
of his cave to grab history one last time. It was 20 years ago and I was
living in a one-bedroom flat in Halifax. I remember the phone rang and
it was a buddy of mine.
"ARE
YOU WATCHING THIS!?" he yelled across the line. It was pure drama.
Expect
more of the same this weekend.
April 3, 2006
Sunday
was a bit of zoo on the home front. The Pad's AE Rangers played their
last game of the year in a tournament in St. Georges, ON. They won the
consolation final and everyone went home happy.
Chris
ran (literally) from the post-game celebration Saturday night to a
sleepover at a friend and teammate's house. He finally turned up at home
around mid-afternoon, bleary eyed and not well rested. I think he had a
good time.
Last
night Laura and I attended the annual MOHA convenors' dinner. She was
invited as head of the hockey moms and I was her date. It was a fun
evening with a dinner theatre murder-mystery thing happening. It was
funny how quickly the actors zeroed in on the quirks of the association
and some of the associated personalities. That's all I'll say there!
A
couple of footnotes from the championship game. First, there were
several kids on this team that were with me three years ago when we were
the Wranglers, and we were awful. We played in a tournament in
Burlington and got killed by double digits three games in a row. This
championship was for all of them, and their parents.
Weeks
and weeks ago I wrote about hockey superstitions and how anyone who ever
played the game has them. I said I had a secret one that I had made an
adjustment on and I was going to keep it secret till after the playoffs.
When
novice white house league convener Gary White was ill last winter,
supporters sold thousands of white rubber wrist bands to raise money for
a trust fund for his kids. I wore mine for two weeks, taking it off only
after Gary passed away.
We lost
that week to the Eagles, a loss that meant we would finish 2nd in the
standings.
That
Monday morning I was shaving and saw the wristband in my shaving drawer.
I put two and two together. When I wore it, we won twice. I took it off,
we lost.
My
mother raised no idiots, so I put the bracelet back on and kept it on
the for the duration of the season and playoffs.
We
never lost again, going on a 7-0-1 run that culminated in the game
Saturday. Laura knew, but I never said a word to anyone else. I retired
the bracelet last night. Do I believe wearing that rubber wrist band
played a role in our season? You bet I do.
About
the game itself: there were 16 heroes on my team Saturday but I'm going
to single out two guys in particular: Brendan Dickie (who scored all
three goals) and Cameron Poirier, our goalie who is the smallest player
physically and the kid who stood tallest through three periods of
regulation and almost 15 minutes of OT.
This
was Brendan's first year of minor hockey. If he lives to be 125, he will
never forget Saturday. Hat trick plus the double OT game winning goal?
It's like a movie. Cameron did what he did all season long: he made big,
tough saves look routine. To do it in the pressure cooker that was Twin
Rinks on Saturday, I'm stunned and awed by his composure.
Those
two kids were joined at centre ice in accepting the championship trophy
by Scott Cece, who to me was the symbol of minor atom white and why I
coach. He always worked hard, came to practices, he never talked back,
he loves to play and learn.
And
since it's my damn blog I'm going to say this about my son Chris: he
played the best hockey game he's ever played on Saturday. His best game
is different than other people's, Chris is still maturing as an athlete.
But the fact that he summoned up his best game in the most important
venue he's ever had says something
April 1, 2006
Incredibly, my Wings today won the Minor Oaks Hockey Association minor
atom white championship with a 3-2 double overtime win over the
Lumberjacks. All of my kids played great, and the Lumberjacks were
outstanding. It was a very entertaining hockey game. I'll write more
later, probably tomorrow because I'm baked, but I really wanted to share
the news.
In the words of Chris, "It's the best day ever!"
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