It’s been a frustrating week as I consider the fate of my two teams for the spring season. Both so far have loosing records, with the Storm at 0-3 and the Ordinals at 1-2-0-1. Both seem to be suffering the same problem, at least from where I sit, and that’s the lack of desire to be the team that wins the game… or it could be that my teams just to hustle enough.
The Ordinals had one of our alumni players back last week. He hadn’t skated with the team in just over a year and the one thing he said to me after the game was done was that if the team as a whole would just move their legs some more, we’d be a winning team. I tend to agree. A lot of winning this game is about all the little battles that happen for the puck. The more you’ve got possession and control of the puck, the more likely you are to score goals and win games. It certainly makes it easier to do both if you do have possession.
The Storm in the last game too seemed to have the hustle problem. The first two looses were easier to deal with. One was a very close game and we’d never played together. The second we were simply out gunned by the opposing team. The third, however, was against the purple NYCGHA team, who’d played together just as long as we had. But, they were all over the place, hustling to get the puck if they didn’t have possession and really playing well when they did. You’d think they’d been practicing together and playing together longer by the way they looked on the ice.
The lack of hustling is troublesome. I’m looking at the way I captain to see if I can inspire some additional hustle too… since that is my job after all… to inspire while coaching the team to a victory. Hopefully I’ll find the magic formula soon.
So, you might be asking yourself how Avenue Q plays into a hockey post. Well, I’m happy to say that today I got word that they are coming back this year as a sponsor of the Chelsea Challenge. I was so psyched when I sold that sponsorship last year, and I’m equally thrilled that they are back this year. It’s very cool that they support the NYCGHA and the tournament!
