Announcement
The Viper’s weekend kicked off with a bang Friday evening as 17 boys and their dads (and one uncle) loaded up in a first class motorcoach and headed south down the QE 2 to watch the NHL’s Northwest division points leaders lay the smack down on the Nashville Predators. We had pizza and watched the movie Benchwarmers during the trip down. The Calgary Flames billed the game as a salute to Red Deer and there were over 1000 fans from Red Deer in attendance. When we arrived a couple of our parents and kids were surprised with some “extras”.
Soon after we were seated a Flames host asked Jordan Haraldson and his father if they would like to sit in Ken King’s (the Flames CEO) seats as he would not be using them. They quickly agreed and were moved a couple hundred feet closer to the ice surface. Sometimes you just do things, and it works out for you, and you don’t know why. On the bus ride down Jordy was sporting a fancy Ales Hemsky Edmonton Oilers jersey (especially brave given the 10-2 drubbing that the Oilers were handed a couple nights earlier) but for some reason he decided to take it off an leave it on the bus. I have to believe that had he been wearing that jersey, the flames representative may have chosen someone else to sit in the CEO’s seats.
Matt Michnik’s father Derek was chosen to participate in a game that took place on the Jumbotron. It was a PartyPoker stars competition and he had to guess whether Robyn Regeher was the only NHL player born in Brazil or not. Derek disagreed that he was even born in Brazil, and informed the 19000 people in attendance that he was born in Saskatchewan. The audience reaction, as well as the host asking him if he wanted to re-guess, eventually led to a correct response. Poor Derek took a ribbing from a great numbers of fans, some that he knew and a bunch that he didn’t. In the end Derek got the last laugh as he scored a couple of tickets to watch a Flames game in a suite and a Pokerstars prize pack.
You would think that those events combined with the Flames victory may have been enough for one evening but you would be wrong. Coach Al arranged for the Viper’s to meet Curtis Glencross and Jim Vandermeer after the game and the Flames players signed a bunch of things for our boys. During the bus ride home we ran in to freezing rain, sleet, and finally a blizzard that had winds reported up to 100 Km/h. We had cars and truck’s hit the ditch while driving beside us and had to slam on the brakes and avoid a car that had skidded to a stop, ending up sideways across the highway. Eventually we made it home safe and sound, happy and looking forward to our league game the next morning.
Saturday morning we hit the ice against the Fargey’s Paint Chiefs. In two previous meetings we had a loss and a tie against the Chief’s. Adding some importance to the game was the fact that Fargey’s was undefeated in league play to this point. The game got off to rocky start as the Chief’s jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first 16 minutes of the game. The coaches were at a loss, we weren’t skating and passing like we know how to. We were a little nervous that last weekend’s drubbing was having some carry over effect. With 3 minutes left in the period Carson Stuve scored to make it a 3-1 but the Chief’s quickly restored the 3 goal lead scoring 40 seconds later and taking a 4-1 lead into the second period. It wasn’t until about 1/2 way through the second periods that things started clicking and we began to play Viper’s hockey. With 6 minutes remaining Cody Miner scored a hard working goal and cut the lead in half and period 2 finished with the Chief’s up 4-2.
In the third period there was great scoring chances at both ends, Nolan MacGregor slammed the door shut on the Chiefs and the Viper’s wore down the defence of the Chief’s. With 7:06 remaining in the game, Brett Parada crashed the net and banged home the 4-3 goal. A minute a 30 seconds later Easton Leedahl and Carson Stuve jumped on a puck that had been shot through the Chief’s goalies legs and was sitting on the goal line, and knocked it into the net tying the game at 4. The game was capped off with 2 minutes left when Austin Price made a spectacular rush, crashed the opposing net and put the Viper’s up 5-4. The Chief’s pulled their goalie for the final 1:30 but strong defensive play held on to the victory for the Vipers.
At the end of the game Matt Michnik was singled out by the coach for his hard work and presented the Green hard hat.
Next week the Viper’s a league game vs MGM and play an exhibition game against Delburne.
