November 5-8

Week #7 of dek hockey was supposed to begin on Monday evening but you know what they say about "the best laid plans". I knew the forecast for Monday was not good but that was the main reason for doing the work at the rink the day before: if it rained at least it would fall on a bare rink as opposed to getting all those leaves soggy for a second time. The rain finally moved out on Tuesday afternoon, the games for that night went on without incident. Winners included the Express over the Hammerheads, the Pub Dawgs over Risky Business and the Owls over the Misfits. Jenny and I had our usual midweek lunch date on Wednesday, in the evening we were back at the Arena as the Royals hosted another of the league's newest entries. Portland, Maine hosted AHL hockey from 1977-1992 and again from '93-2016, the Flyers were the affiliate there during the first six years of the initial run. That club was known as the Maine Mariners, on this night the ECHL version of the Mariners made its first appearance at the Arena. The Royals played twice on the road over the weekend and won both but on this night the mojo wasn't there as the boys lost 4-2. Alex Krushelnyski and Charlie Vasaturo were the goal-scorers for the Good Guys, Angus Redmond got the start in net and took the loss. The Royals stand at 5-2-3 overall and 2-2-2 at home, the next home game is on Saturday the 10th. Thursday night wrapped up the week at Reservoir Park, winners on this occasion were Risky Business over the Express, the Pub Dawgs over the Hammerheads and the Misfits over the Riot. To say this has been a weird season is an understatement, five of twenty-one scheduled playing dates were lost to the weather. The schedule had a pattern when we started, the first three weeks were for playing every opponent once each with the second three weeks repeating the feat and week #7 being each team's two "third-time-around" games. The rainouts on September 25 and 27 ruined the scheme and the postponements on October 11 and 15 utterly destroyed it, as it stands there are still seven outstanding makeups on the docket for the 12th, 13th and 15th (and who knows what weather we might deal with). Take care, thanks for reading.