The excitement was palpable at Kinsmen last night as the world waited for the start of the 2015 LMLHL 2015 season. Would Team Juniors be able to defend their championship? Would Team Joe, decimated by retirements, under new ownership and rebranded as Team Bill be able to incorporate their new players into a coherent force? Would Team Russ be able to field a team when only 4 runners were in the dressing room 5 minutes to game time? Would Team Blair be able to rebound from their soul crushing last place finish (even though they did receive very nice Participant-Thank You For Attending! certificates) last year? The only way to find out would be on the battlefield/floor!

The first game – TEAM BILL vs. TEAM RUSS. Goalscoring looked to be hard to come by early on. Uncharacteristically, both goalies stopped the first few shots and the play was back and forth with lots of ball movement and lots of shots off the posts. First period ended with TEAM RUSS ahead 3-2. After some titanic faceoff struggles between the JKOW and Kyle Fairweather, TEAM RUSS was able to outscore TEAM BILL 4-2 in the 2nd, and the period ended with a 7-4 score. In the 3rd TEAM BILL  pressed hard but (surprisingly) strong goaltending at both ends kept the score low with time running out on a TEAM RUSS 8 – TEAM BILL 6 final score. Pretty sure that once the runners scrape the rust off of their games, scoring will return to normal levels.

In the 2nd game (TEAM JUNIORS vs. TEAM BLAIR) goals were few and far between as well.  Team Juniors, with a full bench and looking very strong and Team Blair with a short bench and missing a couple of their key players battled hard with the first period ending with the teams tied at 2. In the 2nd, TEAM JUNIORS were able to get 2 goals past Gord and Trevor was able to shut down Team Blair’s shooters completely. In the 3rd, Ian Gordon finally solved the Team Junior defense and forced a bunch of goals past Trevor. Final score Team Blair 9 – Team Juniors 6.

Good fast games, no penalties in the 1st game, only a couple in the 2nd. None of the teams look to be overwhelmingly strong but we will wait for a couple more weeks before considering any roster adjustments.

On to Week #2, Wednesday, May 6, 2015 Kinsmen Arena

TEAM JUNIORS  vs. TEAM BILL     8:00pm – 9:00pm

TEAM BLAIR  vs. TEAM RUSS     9:00pm – 10:00pm

London Senior Masters are in Midland for a tournament this weekend looking for their 2nd win of the 2015 season. See some of you on the weekend and the rest next Wednesday.

For the sizing and numbering of the new pinnies, I will try and post a list of what I have so far today or tomorrow – anyone not on the list please email me to pick an appropriate size (based on what other, similar size teammates have chosen) and favorite number. We are trying to finalize the order next week to get the pinnies before we get too far into the season.

G2