Page 38 of Overtime Goal
The crowd was still crying for blood as we took our places on the bench. Under the noise, beneath my nerves, I sensed the game had shifted. The Barracudas had landed the first punch, but we’d hit back less than a minute later. The night was far from over.
During the first intermission, the locker room was quiet. We’d found our rhythm, and no one wanted to break it. After stripping off our jerseys, most of us stretched and then swigged water like it was medicine. Riley sat with a towel over his head, elbows on his knees, the way he often did when he needed to focus. When it was time to line up, he took off the towel, met my eyes, and grinned. My heart raced like we’d already won. I’d never known anyone else who could calm me down and fire me up at the same time.
Five minutes into the second, our line hit the ice against the Cudas’ top unit, and it was trench warfare: rush, recover, turnover, rush again. Holky charged the Barracudas’ zone with the puck, but Sakamoto, one of their wingers, picked his pocket and peeled out the other way. As we pivoted hard to chase him down, Cleever, one of their D-men, clipped Brody with a high stick. It was accidental, but the ref sent Cleever to the box. Power play for us.
The faceoff was in our zone. Holky snapped the puck to Packy, who held on long enough to bait the forwards before sliding it back to Riles. Riles faked, sent it to Holky, and the dance began. Somehow, their remaining men pinned us, so we were threading passes through sticks and legs, playing keep-away with a Barracuda penalty-kill unit that didn’t give an inch.
Our advantage finally paid off. When the pressure cracked enough to open a lane, I found space in the slot. Holky zipped the puck over, and I barely had time to catch it before Jensenwas all over me. Desperate to get rid of the puck, I glanced around. Riley was to my left, speeding up the ice. When he veered right toward the goal, I fed him a one-touch pass. He snapped it home, low and lethal. Bar down. The goal light flashed, and our bench erupted in celebration.
2–1, Warriors.
Riley pumped both fists and skated straight for the glass, then swiveled away from it with a whoop loud enough to rattle the boards. Packy caught up and nearly took him off his skates with a leaping hug. Holky was next, shouting in his face, and I got there last. I hooked an arm around Riley’s neck and tugged him close, yelling, “Hell of a shot.”
His eyes were bright, and he bumped my helmet with his. “We’ve got this,” he said, already turning to skate toward the bench for a shift change.
For the rest of the period, the teams jetted around the ice, desperate to grab an advantage. But both goalies stood on their heads, and no one could get a shot through. When the clock wound down to one minute before intermission, I was confident we’d go to the locker room with a one-point lead.
Seventeen seconds later, Nick Johnson struck. It was a textbook play. He stole the puck off a sloppy pass near our blue line, slipped between Brody and Packy like smoke, and snapped a wrister from the high slot. Gabe saw it too late, and the puck flew past his glove. The score was 2–2, and the arena detonated. Even as I cursed from the bench, part of me had to admire the bastard. He’d earned his golden reputation, and that goal was a perfect example of why he scared the shit out of netminders everywhere.
The third period was carnage. Every shift ended with someone struggling for breath, and every play came with a collision. Dog launched himself into Sakamoto like a wrecking ball and sent him sprawling. When we were up, Moore crunchedPacky into the glass so hard I felt it from twenty feet away. Six minutes in, Jensen caught me with a shoulder that had me airborne.
I landed with a hard thud. As far as I could tell, I wasn’t hurt. But the fall had knocked the breath out of me, and I couldn’t get up. As the arena grew silent, the grind of approaching skates seemed unnaturally loud.
“Logan?”
It was Riles. I couldn’t speak yet, and when I tried to open my eyes, they resisted.
“Logan! Look at me.”
Finally, I opened my eyes and saw he’d knelt beside me. He had one of his hands on my shoulder.
“Thank God,” he said, still sounding scared. “Are you okay?”
“Uh.” I tried to say more but still didn’t have the breath. When I looked at Riley, there were tears in his eyes.
“Fuck.” His voice was rough, and he swallowed hard. “Please say you’re not hurt.”
I tried to move, but Riley held my shoulder while someone else clamped down on my left side.
“Be still, big guy. The trainer’s almost here.”
I looked over in time to register Holky’s worried face. Then Randy, our head trainer, pushed him out of the way and knelt beside me. Riley didn’t move. When Randy was satisfied I wasn’t concussed and had no broken bones, he and Riles helped me up. As they guided me toward the bench, Randy said I needed to let the team doc take a look to be sure everything was fine. Doctor Levy was waiting at the entrance to the tunnel to take me back for an exam.
Riley held on to my arm and leaned close. “I was so scared, but you’ll be okay. Do what the doc says.”
In the medical room, I kept an eye on the TV in the corner while Levy examined me. The game had become a blur of linechanges, odd-man rushes, and desperation blocks. Bodies flew from super hard checks, but there were no penalties. It was clean, brutal hockey.
Fortunately, the doctor agreed with Randy that I wasn’t injured. He told me I was a lucky SOB and could go back out to the bench. Who knew if Criswell would let me play, but at least I could sit with the boys.
The Warriors went up 3–2 with nine minutes left. Harpy barreled down the middle with Dog trailing wide. Inside the blue line, Harpy snapped a saucer pass across, and Dog let it rip from the top of the circle. The puck sailed through the Cuda goalie’s five-hole.
With three minutes left, the second line was on the ice, with Danny Jackson filling in my spot. One of the Barracuda wingers caught a no-look pass from his center. The winger’s release was lightning, and Gabe barely moved before the puck screamed past his blocker. The crowd surged to its feet, and Cuda Arena shook with the roar. We were tied again. With the score 3–3, it looked like overtime was in our future.
Neither team scored in the remaining regulation time, and Criswell came in during the intermission to give us a few pointers. He seemed eerily calm, and I tried to “channel his chill” as Riles once said. After I scarfed down half a banana and guzzled a bottle of water, it was time to go back out.
We almost took it on the first shift. Our line was on the ice with Jackson still filling my spot, and we pinned the Cudas in their zone. Brody got the puck near the hash marks and ripped a wrister through traffic. Sadly, the puck hit the post, which rang like a funeral bell.
Two minutes later, both first lines were on the ice, trading hits and possession so fast it was hard to keep up. Johnson got the puck and took off on a breakaway. His shot hit the post, just as Brody’s had, but Jensen was in the perfect position to fire offthe rebound. The puck was going wide until it clipped Johnson’s skate and changed direction. Gabe was already sliding the other way, and the puck crossed the line before he could recover.
