Nationals - Fort Collins, CO

We must've waited 3+ hours for those bastards to change the flat tire on our plane to Denver. Jake missed his $250 GRE exam, I got locked out of most of my courses, and Necker was pissing everyone on the plane off with his constant bantering. Will sat separate from us, since he bought his ticket late, and slept the entire time. He was completely unaware there even was a delay. Textbook Will. Ever since he got his ipod mini he's been on another planet before games, sometimes even during them. Keep rolling on people keep rolling on people.

Also before we got off the ground, we had the opportunity to witness chivalry's death embodied by Lewis' unwillingness to relinquish his seat so Deana could sit with her beloved. Sweet upbringing! (In an unrelated instance, I just got some email from Falce reiterating his theory that Jorge keeps everyone's money, that will be me next year as Gramps has appointed me team treasurer. I'll take care of y'all, you'll see.)



(Whoever grabs the pole highest is off the team)

VS Saint Louis University
"SLU! SLU! SLUUUUUUUUUUUUU!" is probably the last chant you wanna hear as you're gasping for what little oxygen is around. Our first game was an initiation of sorts, to the tournament, to the surface, and most of all to the elevation. I don't care what anybody says: nothing can prepare you for lighter air. You could see it play out on the court, gameplay slows down to almost retard caliber hockey. I wondered why some teams made it to Nationals in the first place, mistakenly believing they were playing at 100% speed. Saint Louis jumped out to a 2-0 lead fairly quickly, and the score was later 3-1, but we fought back with goals from Falce (PP, Even), Chili, and Longnecker to make it 4-3 UM. Some faggot named Marty Finn scored the equalizer at the end of the game, and our first Natty game ended in a gruesome tie. One thing I remember vividly from this game is Longnecker jumping off a little early and being called for too many men. I've NEVER seen Lance as pissed as he was at that moment. Even though the game was a tie, we thought the SLU goaltender really stood on his head, and that we really got the better of Saint Louis. We practically dominated the 2nd and 3rd periods.

VS Maine
Maine sounds like a team that is filthy at hockey. They're a top 5 DII team, they know their hockey up in Maine, and when we watched them faceoff against Reno the previous day, they were keeping up for a long time before getting spanked 6-1. We ended up outshooting them each period, but got behind them in the 2nd. Again, we had to play from behind, with 2 of our goals scored on the power play, and one notch by Falce which just could NOT have happened without such a gorgeous pass from a handsome bearded man wearing #18. Necker and Falce had good outputs (1-1-2, 2-2-4, respectively). I remember this game being physical, as Pringle and Falce were both given 2 minutes for "checking". I can never say that with a straight face...7-4 Black Bears.

VS University of Nevada-Reno
It felt like shit going into a game against Reno with an 0-2 tournament record, but nevertheless we did a pretty good job delaying the inevitable. - 6 minutes, 19 seconds to be exact. That was when Reno started their 11-2 victory with a power play goal (followed by two shorties!). Our shining moments were provided by Falce and Chili (PP). I felt horrible for Munter this game, since he faced 44 shots. I'm not sure if we give him 44 shots in practice. I can't speak for anyone else, but I have a couple of memories of this game that stand out in my mind. Reno has this Alaskan albino on their team named Devon Hume that played like absolute garbage. Aside from giving you toe-drags for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, he was easily the cheapest player in the tournament, hacking, slashing and grabbing anyone on the court who was raised in the contiguous 48 states. He came up the middle towards poor Munter so I hit him. For chrissake 44 shots is enough, you know? So the guy went down like the pussy he is, and sure enough, the great Steve Van Ness is up in my grill. For the uninitiated, our pal Steve is the only jabroni I've ever seen attempt 3 hot-dog, showoff maneuvers after scoring one goal (down on knees pump, on one leg bended knee pump, tiger woods pump, EXCLUDING: down-the-bench pounds from teammates). I asked him what he was going to do about the situation, knowing full well it'd be nothing, and he skated away. I'll hand it to Reno: they had crazy chemistry. You would think they sleep in their hotels with their unprotected cocks in each others asses. Of the big six, all are from Anchorage, 4 are brothers (Van Ness', Jones'), one's an albino, and one's almost named after a vitamin (Tony Luiten). What a group.

So here we are, 0-3 record, and we gotta go into some meeting and sell our souls for a legitimate tournament seed. Coach Lance asked us to pick a team representative, so naturally we lean towards our keystone, the glue that keeps this team bonded "Ten Minutes Later" Flader. Longnecker expressed huge interest in being our team rep, but Lance advised against it, saying Necker is simply too emotional to be put in a situation like that. So what do we do? We send him in. And Necker puts on a show, delaying the meeting's adjournment with his banterings. Fortunately, whatever council gave a shit actually caved under the pressure, giving us what I remember as a 5th seed. This allowed for a rematch with Maine. Maine was beatable. And we were ready for them.

VS Maine (tourney)
Munter put on a hell of a performance in this game, which started at 8AM and went back and forth with Maine getting out to a 2-0 lead before we did something about it in the 2nd period. Hartman and Necker provided some offensive firepower (2g each) and Ruble got in on the scoring with his goal. Munter grew accustomed to his 40 shot outing against Reno, and actually faced 47 shots in this one! One thing about these shots, however, were that they were long ones, which made a difference. Maine had tendencies to try and score from half court. Often attempting to shoot through the defenseman. I had tons of fun blocking those shots with Munter. This game saw the death of my CCM Vector stick that I had been using for most of the season, but more importantly, saw the death of our losing streak. Making the most of our 18(!) shots, Miami wins a nailbiter, 5-4. On to SLU!

VS Saint Louis University (tourney)
It felt great to win again, and to send a team from Maine, back to Maine...crying. We had good reason to think that we could beat SLU, since their goalie couldn't stand on his head again and steal yet another win from us...But instead of giving you an excrutiatingly detailed synopsis, I'll just cut to the chase. 9-3 SLU. The loss hurt enough, but the SLU chants were accompanied with relentless homosexual counting everytime a goal was scored. (ex. 9th goal: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9 SLU SLU SLUUUUUU). At least when we eliminated Maine we didn't rub it in their faces.

The rest of Nationals is a haze of memories. Wyoming excursions, Bennigans outings, drag racing, Chilis traditions, off roading, picture taking, and player hating. Special props go to our biggest fans: Whitney, Deana, and several family members who made the trip (Munter's Dad, Alex's fam, Flader's fam, Pringle's fam, etc.). When we left Denver, we were ranked 5th in the nation and concluded an amazing breakthrough season. With everyone coming back next year, including Lance, this team will have championship aspirations. I can't wait.