roadhockey.net

Hard work pays off, almost

With his team down 17-10 and reeling after conceding four straight goals to their speedy and slippery opponents, Smith offered a simple proposal to his mates to get them back in Sunday's Shirmp Ring showdown: work hard. It paid off, almost.

The rambunctious rookie battled the boards to spring the ball back to Unabomber, whose long bombs into the pads of shell-shocked shotstopper Billy Idol yielded juicy rebounds for Cowboy Bill and the Living Legend. Seven goals brought them to within two, 19-17; the rout had become a nailbiter. And while the comeback fell short, 20-17, when the speedsters scored the gamewinner on a wild scramble in front of a flailing Gump, the vanquished claimed at least a moral victory.

"It would have been a half-hour shorter game if we hadn't worked as hard as we did," said Smith. "I think we worked our butts off to play a sound defensive game. We knew we had to play disciplined and we scored our goals from really hard work."

"We worked really hard to get ourselves back into the game," said Cowboy Bill, who scored four times to lead his side's late-game resurgence. "We knew if we kept putting shots on goal and be there for the rebounds, cleaning up the garbage, we'd be able to get ourselves back into the game."

But while the heavily-favored speedsters sputtered, they didn't quit.

"At that point you've just got to buckle down and think one goal at a time," said Billy Idol, who was determined to secure his first win of the season as a goaltender. "You know your guys have got it. You're just waiting for them to put it in the net. They may have had a good run at the end, but we still had more skill and speed."

With most of that skill and speed concentrated on one side for the second straight week, the opening faceoff had barely been contested when some of the players were already planning for the consolation mini-game. The fancy footwork and nifty stickhandling of Kid, Lak Attack and Doo seemed unstoppable; for two-thirds of the game, it was.

"The stick pull was tough," said Smith. "But you have to adjust, you have to play tight defense, get the rebounds, get the ugly goals."

Even as the margin grew to seven, the underdogs' confidence seemed unflappable.

"We were pretty positive the whole time we could keep up," said Cowboy Bill.

"They started to turn it on at the end," said Billy Idol. "I just tried to focus on staying up, watching the ball. I really wanted my first win of the year."

Posted by jaysuburb at January 9, 2007 07:41 PM