Sep 16, 2012 | tbouy | 745 views
Atom AA Gold Players and Parents: Mississauga Early Bird Tournament.
Well,
our first real hockey get together has come and gone. The early bird
tournament was a great way to find out where we are as a team and where
we need to make the necessary improvements as coaches in order to make
us a competitive AA team. The weekend as a whole was very successful in
several different areas. It was great to see the parents bonding and
even better to see the “Team” chemistry between the players both in the
room and on the ice.
We entered our first game against a well respected Toronto Terriers team. The coaching staff was cautiously optimistic as the unknown was about to be revealed. The kids played hard ,supported each other and passed very well to pull off a very convincing 5-0 win. Game two against the West Mall Lightening, was not executed quite as proficiently as the first game as we ran out steam and mental focus in the third period and hung on for a 2-1 win. The encouraging thing about game number 3 was the way the team rallied around each other and worked hard to correct the mistakes both mentally and physically that were made in game 2 to take a 13-0 win over the Avalanche. The semi finals was our first true test in the sense that our backs were to the wall in a win or go home situation. The team worked very well together and skated to a very convincing 5-0 win over a surprised Brampton 45 team.
The championship was a much anticipated game by the coaching staff as it was a match up we have been looking forward to, for some time against last year’s # 3 ranked in Ontario Oakville Rangers. This would prove to be a test to measure ourselves against. We came out hard and had the Rangers 1-0. They fought back hard and tied it up. We pushed on even harder and went up with a 2-1 lead late in the third. Unfortunately for us the Rangers never gave up and managed to tie the game with minutes left. We gave all we had in the overtime period but unfortunately the Rangers got a lucky bounce and the puck deflected off a leg and found the back of the net to give them the championship.
The result in the O/T was not the one we wanted, but in the coaching staffs eyes we still came out as winner. The kids did an amazing job as a newly formed team with very little playing time together to pull off some big wins against some very good atom AA teams.
Great job by everyone !!!!!
See you at practice.
The coaches
Rob-Tom and Brock