Grizzly Game Recap - Championship Game

It has been a long road for the Grizz, there have been ups and there have been downs. The downs seem to have been kept to a minimum this season. Strong and at times scrappy play have seen the Grizz prevail more times that not but it ultimately comes down to one game in a league such as this. One game for the whole season. The Grizz faced off against the top seeded Dekes of Hazzard, the team that slipped by them at the end of the regular season. Only a point separated these two squads heading into the revolver playoff rounds. The Grizz had success during the regular season and even in the opening round of the playoffs versus the Dekes but like the Oliver Stone film, Any Given Sunday, starring Cameron Diaz, Al Pacino and Jamie Foxx, anything can happen over the course of one game.

Anything that could happen in this one did. The Dekes weathered a strong shift from Admiral Bonesaw and the Beer Guy to start the game and took advantage of them taking a break by tallying the first marker of the game. That didn't sit well with the Beer Guy so he pounced on an opportunity and evened the score on the very next shift. The goals came fast and furious after that with the Dekes taking further advantage of what was clearly a weaker second unit for the Grizz. They really missed the steady play of Rek in this one. The game was back and forth for the most past but when the horn sounded after the second stanza the score stood at 4 for the Dekes and just the one for the Grizz. The third was going to be a big mountain for the Grizz to climb.

Luckily, the Grizzly bear makes it's home in the mountains and like its animal namesake, the Grizz are very comfortable climbing mountains. The goals started to slip in and the floor seemed to be tilted in that third period. A Grizz d-man notched one to narrow the gap to two goals. The Dekes could taste blood though and kept the pressure on. The Grizz captain circled around his own goal and unexpectedly lost possession in tight with a Deke forechecker hot on his trail and in a bang-bang play the puck was in the Grizz goal and the Dekes had restored their three goal cushion. But the Grizz should never be counted out. The Beer Guy chipped in his second to narrow the margin. A fierce shot from a Grizz d-man made it a one goal game and suddenly the Grizz were rolling on a tide of momentum. The play was mostly in the offensive zone and the Grizz were knocking on the door. This is when the unthinkable started to unfold. One of the guys on the second line took a vicious elbow to the guts and had to sit out for a period. This imbalance of the lines gave more time on the floor to the dynamic duo. The Beer Guy flung a pass in front to the Admiral who knocked it down and shoveled it toward the goal, the defender chasing the Admiral shoved him from behind in a last ditch effort. The added momentum carried the Admiral into the net, knocking it off its moorings just after the ball had gone in. The inexperienced and delirious official deemed that the net had been knocked off beforehand. This is the kind of cheap call that is made indiscriminately in a game of road hockey, not in the dying minutes of a championship game on the potential comeback, tying goal of the season. It was ludicrous also in that the net coming off in no way helped nor hindered the ball entering the goal. The call in short was erroneous and ridiculous, but the goal was disallowed all the same.

Not to be deterred though, the Grizz still had several minutes to work with. Beer Guy and Admiral Bonesaw continued to pressure the Dekes and were able to earn a penalty shot. There was question of who would take this critical attempt. The Beer Guy's record was abysmal all year so it was decided to give the veteran Admiral Bonesaw a chance at redemption after that terrible call by the awful, underage, inexperienced official. The Admiral made no mistake and it was 5-5 with under three minutes to play in the third. It should be no surprise that these two thoroughbred racehorse teams would be so evenly matched so late in the game. And the game would have likely ended in a tie if not for the complete and utter ineptitude of the shameful officiating. With only 45 seconds on the clock the Dekes were deep in Grizz territory. The ball was in the corner and it seemed to be a harmless situation. The Deke forward desperately flipped the ball high to the front of the net hoping to incite a scramble play in front of the net. The Grizz captain batted the ball away with his hand rather than use his stick. The ball was out a ways from the crease and ended up rolling harmless to the other end. The bumbling, no concept for real life official blew the game down and called a hand on the puck in the crease violation. None of which had happened. The penalty for this? A penalty shot of course! The situation played out as you would expect, the captain lost his mind on the ref, deservedly so. Johnny screamed at the ref until he was ejected from the game and overall pandemonium ensued. How or why you would make such a questionable call at such a pivotal moment is beyond comprehension. The expression "let them play" must not be familiar to this official. The fact that such a young, inexperienced official was in charge of the fate of a season is also something that should be questioned. The Dekes scored on their penalty shot. The Grizz didn't go quietly, Beer Guy had a final chance to tie the game in the last few seconds on a tremendous one-timer chance. The goalie made a remarkable save and off the rebound of that shot the Dekes marched down and scored an insurance marker on the deflated Grizz keeper. That was it, a season squandered. Final score 7-5 for the Dekes with a massive pair of assists to the idiot in stripes. It is the most disappointing way for a season to end, when the game is taken from your control. I hope there were fans there to be impressed with how important that moron ref thinks he is. I don't know what else to say other than more libelous comments about the atrocious calamity of officiating that was the deciding factor in a great and well played game by two solid and competitive teams. I hope that kid never dons the stripes again, for the sake of fans and players the world over. It is a huge let down.