November 22-30

Not much going on over the last week of November with the Royals on the road, street hockey finished for the season and basketball at JPM still on the horizon. Jenny and her mother were invited to a relative's house for the holiday, after we had lunch on Wednesday I took them there and the relatives brought them home on Thursday night. The relatives live about fifteen miles east of Quarryville in Chester County so it's not a bad trip all things considered. For me Thursday was a lot like a Sunday with three pro football games on TV and little else. On Friday I took my car to the service center in New Holland, there were some issues specific to my make and model that required attention. The radio has been dead for some time and the inner bar on the drivers side door was broken, since I have a lot of down time right now I made an appointment to have the work done. The issues sound worse than they really are, the door opens and closes with no problems and I rarely use the radio when I'm driving by myself but it should be fixed and I finally had the time to get it done. They brought me home on the courtesy shuttle, on Saturday morning they called to say they needed to order parts. We scheduled another day to have the work completed and in the afternoon they drove the car back into my place. Since they had it there they did an oil change and tire rotation (which was due anyway) but the door and radio will have to wait for the parts to arrive. Take care, thanks for reading.

November 19-21

Friday afternoon on The Road North for the start of a busy weekend at the Arena. The Royals have five sets of back-to-back home dates plus five sets of three-in-three at home, this weekend was the first of those. The Newfoundland Growlers were in town from Atlantic Canada for games on Friday and Saturday. On Friday the visitors scored once in each period and carried a 3-0 lead into the final five minutes. Goals from Dominic Cormier and Thomas Ebbing made it interesting down the stretch but the Growlers held on for the 3-2 win. Saturday was Hockey Fights Cancer Night, the Royals wore special lavender-themed sweaters which were later auctioned for the cause. On this night the club fell 2-1 in overtime, Jacob Pritchard's third-period score was the lone tally for the Royals. Kirill Ustimenko (back from a stint with the AHL Phantoms) was goalie of record both nights and deserved a better fate. To illustrate how tight these games were: on both nights the game-winning goal scorer was #1 star with Usti and the opposing goalie alternating between #2 and #3. On Sunday we played our seventh home game and for the fifth time the Norfolk Admirals were the opponent. There was a good deal of hostility when the Ads visited the previous weekend but this day was tame by comparison, there were just eight minor penalties issued for sixteen total minutes evenly divided. Niagra University product Jared Brandt gave the Good Guys an early 1-0 lead, in the third period Jacob Pritchard upped the advantage to two. Norfolk got on the board with twelve minutes to go but the Royals were able to hold the fort and claim the tough 2-1 win, Three home games all decided by one goal with only eleven total goals scored. Recent acquistion Hayden Hawkey (third-year pro from Providence College) made his Royals debut and picked up the win in goal. The 1-1-1 weekend brings the home mark to 4-1-2, overall the club stands at 6-2-4. The boys play their next seven games on the road, the next home date is on December 11 versus Adirondack. As it stands right now that is the next major event on the calendar. Take care, thanks for reading. 

November 15-18

Went to the rink on Monday afternoon after lunch to get some cleanup work done ahead of the evening's scheduled game. I had also been there on Sunday after we were done in Rothsville, the place was absolutely buried thanks to a Thursday rain and high winds from the southeast. I got the bulk of the work done on Sunday before I simply ran out of gas (not the Billy-Goat, ME because I was just plain dog-tired), I finished the job as best I could on Monday. In the evening we played the losers bracket final, the Misfits defeated the Hustle in double overtime to earn their way into the championship round on Wednesday. Tuesday was a quiet day outside of the morning errand run, on Wednesday Jenny and her mother had separate medical appointments. Helen's appointment was just north of town, she was finished around 10:00 or so. From there we went south through the city to Willow Street, Jenny was discharged from her appointment shortly before 11:00 and we went to their place for lunch. In the evening at Reservoir Park the Fall 2021 season came to an end, LWG defeated the Misfits finishing the tournament undefeated at 3-0 and claiming the championship. The Misfits lost their first game but fought back through the losers bracket to finish as the runner-up at 2-2, the Hustle was 1-2 and the Hammerheads were the first team out at 0-2. There were six possible matchups in this tournament and five of them occurred, the only one that didn't was the Hustle vs the Hammerheads. I was in favor of this format as opposed to the traditional series format simply for the variety it offered and in my opinion it worked perfectly. Although it's good to have the season over before the start of the winter/ugly weather season we can all be proud that the league is back after its long and unwanted absence. Eighty-one players participated on the six teams and without them none of it would have been possible. Thursday was another uneventful day, in the evening rain moved into the area was was expected to stay around overnight into Friday. Take care, thanks for reading. 

November 12-14

Back at the Arena on Friday evening for game #2 of our three-game mini-series with Norfolk, on this night the visitors scored the first goal and the last goal with the Royals scoring five in-between. First-year pro Kenny Hausinger (from UMass-Lowell) evened the score midway through the first period, Joshua Winquist's marker two minutes later gave the Royals a 2-1 lead at the intermission. In the middle period Frank DiChiara found the net to make it 3-1, another lamp-lighter from second-year Dartmouth College product Cam Strong upped the advantage to 4-1. Brayden Low finished the home team's portion of the scoring in the third as the Royals avenged the Wednesday night OT loss with a convincing 5-2 victory. On Saturday Jenny and her mother were along for Military Appreciation Night, the Royals wore camouflage-themed sweaters with the club's 20th-anniversary logo front and center. The playoff-style "hate factor" was in evidence from the outset, there was a fight two minutes into the game and two more in the final seven seconds. The first period ended 0-0 but from there the scoring was all Royals, goals by Frank DiChiara and Kenny Hausinger two minutes apart gave the Good Guys a 2-0 lead at the intermission. In the final period DiChiara scored his second of the evening (and third of the weekend), Jacob Pritchard's empty-netter in the closing moments closed the door on a 4-0 win. Pat Nagle was the winning goaltender both nights, his Saturday shutout featured thirty-eight saves on as many Norfolk shots. The club improves to 5-1-3 (3-0-1 at home), the homestand continues with the Newfoundland Growlers in town on Friday the 19th with a return match on the 20th and a return visit from Norfolk on the 21st. On Sunday we were in Rothsville at Lions Park for the Sunday league's Grand Finale and an amazing story unfolded. Ephrata had only five players available (a goalie and four runners), they won their semifinal over Township in overtime. Hillside defeated Warwick in regulation time in the other semifinal, after a brief recess Ephrata met Hillside in the championship game. Ephrata rallied from deficits of 3-0 and 4-2 to pull even in the third, after Hillside went up 5-4 Ephrata tied it with four seconds left in regulation. The overtime period was over almost as quickly as it had started, Ephrata scored in the first minute to win the championship in one of the more incredible ways you may ever see. If something like that happened at the professional level it would be talked about for years (and around here it might be anyway). Take care, thanks for reading.

November 8-11

Monday night at Reservoir Park for the second night of the postseason tournament, on this night we played the losers bracket semifinal and the winners bracket final. The Misfits rallied from a two-goal deficit in the final minute of regulation to force overtime against the Hammerheads, in the extra session they completed the comeback to advance to the losers bracket final. One must give the Misfits credit for the literal last-minute comeback but at the same time you have to feel badly for the Hammerheads, that's one rough way to have your season be ended. LWG advanced to the championship final with a win over the Hustle who will meet the Misfits in the losers bracket final. Tuesday was a quiet day with only a morning errand run of consequence, Jenny and I had lunch together on Wednesday morning. In late afternoon I was on 222 North headed to the Arena on Penn Street for the first time in seventeen days. This was the first of six straight at home, the Norfolk Admirals were the opponent. By the time this homestand is over we will have played seven games at home, five of them will have been against Norfolk and we won't see them again until March (gotta love the ECHL schedule). On this night the Royals started quickly, Jacob Pritchard's score fifty seconds into the game made it 1-0 right out of the gate. Midway through the period Patrick Bajkov struck to extend the lead to 2-0 at the first intermission. In the second the visitors from Virginia got on the board but the Royals replied on a score from Dominic Cormier (second-year pro from the University Of Ottawa) to go back up by two. In the third the Ads scored early and at the period's midpoint to tie and force overtime, the extra session lasted all of seventeen seconds before Norfolk completed the comeback and won 4-3 (eerily similar to the game on Monday at Reservoir Park except that Norfolk's rally didn't all happen in the last forty-two seconds). Pat Nagle was goalie of record as the Royals drop to 1-0-1 at home and 3-1-3 overall, the club is at home on Friday and Saturday against (guess who?). There was no dek hockey in Lancaster on Wednesday night (both Don and I were absent), we had planned on playing on Thursday but fate intervened in the cruelest possible manner. When I got home after the Royals game on Wednesday there was a phone message from one of the competing captains, one of his players had lost his father on Tuesday evening and they were asking for a postponement. Don and I talked it over and agreed (under the circumstances how can you say no), we'll figure on Monday the 15th weather permitting. Take care, thanks for reading.

November 1-7

The first week of November had little to offer except for two nights of dek hockey in Lancaster and one morning/afternoon in Rothsville. On Monday night the regular season ended at Reservoir Park with LWG winning over the Misfits, Risky Business over the Hustle and the Hammerheads over HSC. For Risky Business and HSC it was the final game as the bottom two finishers were eliminated from playoff contention. On Wednesday the postseason double-elimination tournament began with the winners bracket semifinals, LWG beat the Hammerheads and the Hustle defeated the Misfits. That places LWG versus the Hustle in the winners bracket final and the Hammerheads versus the Misfits in the losers bracket semifinal (with the loser of that game eliminated) on Monday the 8th. Jenny and I had lunch on Tuesday thanks to a morning appointment she had in town, on Saturday we ran some errands together after lunch. On Sunday we were at Lions Park for the last week of the Sunday league, these were the makeup games rained out on October 31. No weather issues on this day, the skies were clear with brilliant sunshine. Ephrata beat Warwick via shootout, Hillside won over Township in regulation, That sets up the semifinals on the 14th with Ephrata versus Township and Hillside versus Warwick, after a brief intermission the winners meet for the championship. This is a one-day event thanks to the rainout on the 31st and my scheduled commitments elsewhere on November 21st, let us hope the weather cooperates. Take care, thanks for reading.