May 18-19

Lunch with Jenny and her mother in Quarryville on Saturday morning, from there we were headed north to Reading for a momentous weekend of hockey at the Sovereign Center (in case you were wondering: the Royals' arena and the ballpark in York are indeed named for the same financial institution). The Stockton Thunder visited the SC for the first time ever in game #1 of the 2013 Kelly Cup Championship Series. If you enjoy roller-coaster rides in amusement parks this night was for you, there was a season's worth of anxiety in just one game. The Royals held four separate one-goal leads and were caught each time, the Thunder led once and that didn't hold either. Early on the Royals struck first on a goal by Ethan Cox but Stockton answered to tie it at 1-1. In the second period T.J. Syner scored to make it 2-1 but again the Thunder knotted maters at two apiece. In the third period all hell broke loose. Stockton took a 3-2 lead but Yannick Tifu replied to make it 3-3. Moments later Nikita Kashirsky gave the Royals the lead again but Stockton retaliated in kind to square things at 4-4. With two minutes left in regulation the Royals were awarded a power-play opportunity, Alex Berry lit the lamp with forty-eight seconds left on the clock for a 5-4 Royals lead. The Thunder simply refused to go away, they showed their championship mettle by netting the tying goal just twenty-six seconds later to force overtime. In the OT the Royals had the better of the play, in the tenth minute Kashirsky's second goal of the night nailed down sweet victory as the Royals finally prevailed 6-5. Had this been a major-league game it would be talked about for years, it will certainly be remembered around Reading for a long time to come. After the myriad of emotion on Saturday night one had to wonder what would happen for an encore in game #2 on Sunday afternoon. On this day all suspense was removed early as the Royals scored three goals in the first period and cruised to a 4-0 win. Alex Berry, Brett Flemming and T.J. Syner led the barrage in the opening period, Evan Barlow put the icing on the cake in the second period. From there Riley Gill and Company were in complete control as he picked up his third shutout of the playoff season. As the game wound down the crowd was absolutely deafening, I've never heard the building as loud as it was during the final minute and as the horn sounded. The Royals take a 2-0 series lead to California for the middle three games on Tuesday, Friday and Saturday if needed, a possible game #6 would be back in Reading on Tuesday the 28th. Take care, thanks for reading.