THE BLOW OF THE WHISTLE AND THE TELEPHONE RING THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING
/The 2017-2018 season will have been a great one in our fifth year of operation with our participation in the centennial celebrations of the National Hockey League in partnership with the Pointe-à-Callières Museum, the Museum of Canadian History and the Montreal Canadians.
Each season despite obvious similarities are always different. They are all marked by the personalities and lives of the people who take part in it, without forgetting the social-political context in which we live. Regular as well as substitute players mark in their own ways the story we write together week after week year after year. Leaving aside my personal point of view on how I lived last season, force to admit that we will have done well in the creation of the teams despite several pitfalls that we will have to cross by replacing players without unbalancing the formations throughout the year. At the end of the year, each team will have remained competitive with a close ranking to finish our calendar. Proof; for the first time in our history we have not had any trades of requests by our teams or deemed necessary by the administration of the LFA. I guess after all thease years of "brewing the sauce", we seem to have found the recipe!
This season we have seen once again yet another expansion but this time with the creation of a new division on Sundays. With its own mode of operation, the Satellite division was created in September and will continue its operations on Thursdays during the summer season. We hope in the near future to be able to move to four teams with the creation of the LFA Select but the ice time being rare, we will have to be patient as the creation of the league itself which will have taken 5 years before finally getting two consecutive ice times and as the Chinese say, "the rest is history".
Once the regular season over, which has had its share of dramatic and zany stories, good times and great games, we brought back the clock to zero with the start of the real season, the time of the year when everyone wants to be fit, the series! This is where everything is played out where generally teams that have forged a true team spirit stand out because welded together by friendship and stronger in the face of adversity. But sometimes team spirit, talent and strength of character are not enough to derail the plans of fate (if it really exists) and that seems to have happened to two of our formations that were hit hard by the plans of chance, fate or whatever...., you choose.
the rhinos pumped up after scoring a big goal during a playoff game (photo lisette nepveu)
In the case of the Rhinos everything started well before the decisive game of April 28th, the date of the semi-finals’ games where the story will have changed. In a Machiavellian plan that was unveiled to me by members of the team afterwards, knowing that their goalie was going to be absent for that date, they decided to wait until after the deadline on Thursday to warn me that he could not take part in the semi-final. They thought they were going to force my hand by imposing on me an unknown netminder to replace their goalie. You would think they would know me and I find it surprising that after all these years veterans of the group believed that this little trick would pass. It actually wasted a lot of my time on Friday morning to find a keeper of the same caliber as theirs but the story does not stop there. As a robber who gets caught in his own game, life had another plan for the Rhinos gang and in turn was going to wait at the last minute to share it.
On that Saturday, if I remember correctly, the sky was clear when I was driving towards the arena, taking my favorite path through the mountain. Upon my arrival everything seemed to roll on wheels and I settled behind my microphone and my tablets after taking out and placing all the paraphernalia of the day near my office. That day, we had two extremely good matches, both of which ended in overtime for the first time in our young history. It was during the first game between the Meteors and the Torpedoes that I learned the news from the mouth of Arnaud and Mimi if I'm not mistaken. The substitute goalkeeper whom I gave the number of the Rhinos captain Patrick Blais so that they could talk before the big game had contacted the latter a few minutes beforehand to tell him he could not take part in the big game because his grandfather had just died at the hospital where he was with his family. Coup de theater, thunder and hammer, because the two goalkeepers taking part in the game that unfolded before our eyes could not stay to help out, so it was Eric Champagne who had to strap on the pads and keep goals for the most important game of the season of his team. Luckily, Laurent Quesnel, who had come to watch the games, was able to return home quickly enough to find his equipment and take Eric's place up front. Despite not having kept goals for several months, Eric managed well and we were treated to a come from behind from the Rhinos to tie the game. They almost succeeded their incredible comeback to eventually lose in overtime against the Barbarians who eventually won the championship at our Grand Finale.
The moral of this story is that in wanting to control their destiny, it is destiny that controlled them. Once again, if destiny there is. I will not say anything about why they did it, but if you have a chance to talk to their goalie Nicholas Chagnon next time you cross paths, ask him why they did it.
Refs, not an easy job Photo michale wees)
If for a team it was a phone call that changed their trajectory, it is the blow of a whistle that will have changed that of the Meteors during their semi-finals against the Torpedoes. Indeed, just like the Rhinos they came back from behind to equalize the score and force overtime but luck did not turn in their favor when the whistle of one of the officials saw denied the winning goal only to be scored against a few seconds later. Like Vegas, what happens on the ice stays on the ice and despite my position I cannot interfere with the judgment of the officials who just as we are entitled to error.
In short, it is these two turn of events that will have changed the deal and the face of the participants of the 5th Grand Finale of our history which without being a great game was nevertheless a cool event that will also have supported the community with the money raised for the Sun Youth Food Bank.
Hardly the season ended, that only a few days later our summer season began. The seasons follow each other but do not resemble themselves, they all have moments that mark the time and tattoo our lives because hockey is way more than a sport, its’ a lifestyle.
Later
JFD
