View From The Ice
by Brett Holmes
March 05 1997
Barn burners.
A fantastic game by both teams on Monday the 24.
It’s that time again. Playoffs. This year we were up against Chauvin/Edgerton.
Through the entire year both teams have won two out of the four games played. This game was held in Provost.
We knew this wasn’t going to be an easy one. Chauvin/Edgerton surprised us when they scored just half a minute into the game.
Provost had many chances then Holmes decided to take a slapshot from the blueline and put it in the bottom corner. It was then tied at one.
But Chauvin/Edgerton came on strong again, scoring two quick goals with about five minutes left.
But just as quick, Provost scored twice minutes later to tie up the game at three.
It was 3-3 after 20 minutes of play. Things were looking good for Provost because we were getting lots of chances.
About halfway through the period McMann rushed down after taking a pass from Ganser. He got hooked down, but still managed to put the puck in the net.
By the end of the second period we had a 6-5 lead after goals by Klein, McMann and Adams.
With approximately five minutes gone in the third, Chauvin/Edgerton scored to even things up.
Then Provost regained the lead when Holmes grabbed the pass from Klein, and shot it in between the goalie's legs.
It was then 7-6 for Provost with less then a minute left when Chauvin/Edgerton managed a comeback.
First they scored on a giveaway with 50 seconds left, and then again with 26 seconds left to take the lead in the first game of the two game series.
We were really depressed. We should have had the game in the bag. All we needed to do was clear the puck out a couple times and the game would be over.
Scoresheet was not available.
But we still had another game to play.
Our second of the two game series was played in Edgerton Wednesday night, and we were down by one goal.
This game might have been our last hope to keep us in the playoffs this season.
But the refs kept us from doing just that.
We had come back to take the lead when Klein scored two goals to make it 4-2. And things were looking good for the visitors that evening.
It wasn’t until Chauvin/Edgerton scored on a clear two line pass that they tied the game up.
With about six or seven minutes left in the game, all tied up, next goal basically wins the series, a man from the crowd who was hoping for Provost said “Well, five minutes left and it looks like the home team isn’t winning so the I think that the visitors will get two penalties pretty soon.”
And I bet you can guess what happened next. Stempfle and Angeltvedt both went off at the same time for roughing, but nobody from the other team went off with them.
This gave Chauvin/Edgerton a two man advantage and on the first rush into Provost’s zone they scored to take the lead in the series.
So, one of the two men got to come out of the box but that didn’t seem to help us because they scored a minute after that.
Right now I look at the score sheet and see that the visitors have six penalties in the third and the home team had not one penalty.
Man, were we unhappy. If the refs could’ve just let the players decide the outcome of the game . . .
“If they want it that bad they can have it.” Was one of the many comments coming from the Provost fans after the game. For another view of how we saw the refereeing in the last period, kindly turn this page 90 degrees to the right and see the next characters. : (
But we gave it all we could and it was too bad that we couldn’t have deleted the last five minutes of each game.
We had lost each of the two games by one goal, this one was a score of 5-4.
Provost scoring:
First Period- Stempfle (Holmes).
Second Period- Klein (Holmes); Angeltvedt (McMann); Klein (McMann, Holmes).
Big games coming from Klein, who had two goals, McMann, who had a goal and assist while Holmes had three assists.
Our next game was on the following Saturday.
This was our last game that counted for something, and it looked like it didn’t count for anything the way that we played. It was the second of the two games against Daysland/Forestburg.
This round was our ticket to provincials.
At first we didn’t look too bad, getting a few good shots on net, but the puck didn’t go into either net until just under ten minutes into the game, when Daysland/Forestburg scored from just outside the crease.
Going into this game we were five goals down, because this series was based on total goals. And the previous game we lost 9-4 in Forestburg. This game was played in Provost.
This team was big, but Ganser didn’t care. He had some nice hits, and not just hip-checks. He stood up to them and didn’t go down.
Later in the second period we lost two players on the same play.
First Stempfle got “The Big Boot”, after a hit from behind call in front of our net. And somehow during the scramble, Watchal fell and hurt his neck. So they both went off after the same play.
But we continued the game minutes later and McMann scored Provost’s first goal to make the score 5-1 with minutes remaining in the second period.
But things were still uphill. We had to score 9 to tie and 10 to win in the last period, against a team which plays against ‘AA’ teams.
It was almost impossible, but we managed to double our score to a big number two in the dying minutes when McMann got his second point of the night after drop passing it to Adams who just shot it on net and got it by the goalkeeper.
By the end of the game it was 7-2 for Daysland/Forestburg. They had also won the series by ten goals with a score of 16-6.
Provost scoring:
First Period — no scoring.
Second Period- McMann (unassisted).
Third Period- Adams (McMann).
We had lost in the third round, but that is the farthest most of us have ever been. We can’t be disappointed with our run in this zone playoffs. Altogether we had outscored our opponents in zone play by a score of 32-29. Two of the three series were blowouts but the one against Tofield was the funnest, closest, most evenly matched, and most exciting.
Well, our season with the league may have come to an end but we will still manage to find a few teams that wouldn’t mind to play. Now we don’t have to worry about making the playoffs, or surviving the playoffs. Right now we can stand on the golf course or (soon) sit in our lawn chairs, relax and say that we gave it our best shot.
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