Wildcats Win!

It was the most unsettling feeling I’ve had in a while. I almost hoped he was dead at this point; that was the only excuse I would have accepted. There’s 3 minutes until the championship game and no one had heard from our goalie, Dana. The puck drops and we got a complete stranger in net. I don’t know if this is an inside job by Dager Systems or what, but I don’t like it. My nerves we’re quickly eased when we pounced on them early off a Cuci goal (assists: Balsamo, WildSteve). The beacon of hope shined brighter as from the bench I saw Dana hurry to the locker room, gear in hand. We had our goalie back.

Goal Wildcats! (Balsamo)

With an early 2-0 lead in the first I can feel the Wildcats on the verge of history. A winless team in the regular season taking the playoffs by storm and clawing their way to a championship! But after the first period it all went astray.

A few mis-queues on defense and it’s a 2-2 game with 5 minutes left in the 3rd. Fuckin crunch time at this point. Legs are tired, tempers are flaring on the bench, and a piss poor penalty called on Cuci with 1:28 left had me wondering how could the hockey gods dick us like this again? In the biggest game of all. Our testament was to dig down as deep as we could to kill the penalty and take it to overtime. Half minute into the sudden death we were back at full strength, only to get scored on minutes later. It’s over. The grind of the 13 game spring season came to a screeching halt with one shot.

With my head down in disgust I see black and white stripes hot dogging toward the goal waving his arms. Could it be? Yes! NO GOAL! Asshole was in the crease and they waved it off! Now, this was probably a make-up call for the times Balsamo and PJ got tripped on their way to the net, doug got a 4 minute double minor for getting cross-checked in the helmet, or a number of other shitty calls. But this was it; theres no way we lose now!


With the Wildcats’ faithful looking on from the cheap seats, we out-hustled our opponents to create opportunities. Sacrificing the body, skating like you don’t know what tired feels like. That’s how Wildcats play, and that’s how wildcats win! Balsamo’s 2nd goal of the night couldn’t have come at a better time, or in more dramatic fashion. A 3-2 overtime championship victory for the Wildcats, followed shortly by drinking the champagne (of beers: High Life) from the trophy, jump high-fives, planking, and a free round of shots from the manager of Dooley’s. Not to mention it was Wildcat Jerry’s birthday at midnight. The celebration went long and it went hard, much like it should when you win a championship. Now I didn’t get DeShawn Stevenson drunk (yet) but it did make for a rough Thursday morning. Hence the fact that its 10:45 and I’ve spent the whole day composing this post.

The moral of the story is that the Wildcats are champions. Again. Goonie’s never say die, well Wildcats say “fuck the regular season.” We had em right where we wanted them and flew in under the radar. And in a few weeks, the quest for glory begins again with the Summer season. Well done, Wildcats. Keep that D hard and lets get after it one more time! Meeeeeooooww!!