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With our league's gym unable to host our Finals last week, our much anticipated battle against our long-time rival Road Apples was postponed to this week --- unfortunately, with many guys thinking we were done last last week, we had 4 key regulars MIA for this contest --- stellar D-men Billy and Captain Patty (congrats again newlywed!), sniper Fwd Scatch and always-effective swing man Colin were all missed for this big game for the "A-" title -- champs of the bottom teams of the A Division....which isn't as bad as it sounds -- being the best against especially the Road Apples and Black Eagles was quite an accomplishment.....

And with only 1 of our 4 spares available, we only had 2 guys on our bench....so we hoped to get off to a great start......but the rotten Apples were all over us in the first 3-4 shifts -- luckily for us our masked man Yeates was up to the task as he made a few solid saves......then rearguard Fynn broke up a play near half and got the ball to Rich who wired a shot from the high slot past the Apples excellent goalie Chris Campbell......about 5 minutes later, Terry took a great shot that was saved, but the ball was sitting in the crease and Prevost hustled hard to beat their D-man to knock it home.....and 2 mins later, Terry and Prevs hooked up again with Prevost converting a nice give-and-go.....making the score 3-0 for our Flyers after 1 period.....

About 3 mins. into the 2nd period, Prevs notched the natural hat-trick as his shot/pass from the corner went in off an Apple leg......and 4-5 mins later, Richie scored on a sneaky wrap-around to give our Flyers a solid 5-0 lead.....but it was our overall team defence that was most impressive --- our 3 D-men Bernie, Fynn and spare Keith were absolutely awesome at eliminating second chances and making the simple plays to clear the ball from our zone....and when the talented Apples would break through, Yeates was there to slam the door time and time again......

On the first play of the 3rd period, the Apples main D-shooter fired a bomb from near his net, and it deflected off one of our D-men past Yeates who had no chance.....that goal gave the Apples a little life and a lot of momentum --- but, to a man, it seemed every one of our Flyers wanted to smother the Apples to preserve the win in possibly the last chapter of the epic novel between these two solid teams.....there would be no more scoring until the very last minute of play when Prevs got his 4th goal of the game on a fluky bounce that may well have been a basket too......making the final score 6-1 in a very impressive win for our Flyers over a very good team with a brilliant goalie --- definitely not an easy task to beat them 6-1, especially without 4 of our better players......great job boys!!!

Stats for the game: Prevost 4G......Rich 2G, 1A......Terry 2A......Fynn 1A....

Flyers 3 Stars as voted by our teammates:

---- #1 ---- obviously and fittingly goes to Prevost not only for his 4 goals, but because he always seems to come up clutch in the games that count the most --- that's why he was so missed in our narrow loss to the eventual Champion Godfathers --- Prevs was all over the floor as he always is, and he worked as hard as anyone --- another clutch game by one of the best spark-plug Flyers ever.....

--- #2 ---- also fittingly goes to our great goalie Yeates who as Fynn aptly put it: "Just 1 goal against any team in any game is amazing let alone a final game like this!!" ----- Yeates was simply stellar with several key saves against a team full of very talented shooters.....our big man wanted to have a big game in this final Flyers contest, and he did just that....he capped off a great stint in black and orange with one of his best games ever as a Flyer......

---- #3 ---- it was great to see this 3rd star get so many votes as converted D-man Fynn is admittedly not one of our flashiest or most talented players, but he definitely stood out in this game as he came through with a clutch performance in defending our zone.....sure, he had a couple more of his now patented bonehead passes up the middle, but that's just to piss off Yeates or make sure he's awake, but Fynn made dozens of great break-ups along with some more of his clever break-out passes.....

Honourable mention was a tie again as our other 2 D-men also get well-deserved accolades --- spare Keith re-arranged his work schedule to come help us out one more time --- and did he ever help out --- he also broke up countless plays and he showed great offensive instincts with his sharp outlet passes.....and Bernie played a ton and never really seemed out of position, and he had some glorious scoring chances with his famous canon shots, but Campbell stoned him several times......also getting star votes were, fittingly enough, the other 2 Flyers in this game ---- long-time teammate Rich who again lead our team in overall points this season, along with a Flyer rookie this season, Terry, who didn't score in this game (I think for the first time), but he did lead our whole team in goals this year and he was a fantastic addition to our team......

There is no "next week" to write about this time, in fact, there's not even a "next year" as, sadly, your humble servant Craig simply can no longer run our Flyers in this incredibly talented and ridiculously intense A Division.....like my very well-respected former Flyer and good friends Perry, Mike and Jay before me, I just don't feel I belong in this top division the way it is now......what I won't miss is the far too many goons in this division who take cheap shots that could (and have!) affected the health of some of their opponents --- my now bad back to go along with my robot-plastic legs can't afford to be blindsided anymore, and I truly hope none of you gets hurt by any of those clowns who shouldn't even be allowed to step foot in that gym for recreational adult ball hockey.....

What I will miss though is the respected adversaries who I've faced for many of the 18 seasons I've run this team......I will miss the thrill of high-level competition even though the talent level has probably past me by fo