Written by It was 10 years ago this month that I wrote my first ever post to this blog. More than 1,350 posts later, hundreds of thousands of views, millions of words, and at least 10,000 pictures, I arrive at this page. At this time. This is only my second time writing a post over the last 6 months. By far the largest gap of writing in the last 10 years. I cannot begin to quantify the totality of the weight that life this year has pressed on my family and I. Yet, thankfully, humbly, I can honestly that say that God is good, and things could be much, much worse.
So, when the sunny Friday afternoon that still felt very much like summer wound down toward evening and led me into the JFK Memorial Coliseum, I smiled. Ahhh yes, familiarity. The lights. The ice. The flag on display. The instant, refreshing coolness of the rink. I found my way to one of my favorite perches in NH to take a few pictures of the kids, playing a game, as kids do. And a little bit of this year’s weight seemed to fall away.
The 2010 Flames, a development team, as I have called it, has taken chances on kids that might have otherwise been left out of the sport at an early age because they didn’t fit this agenda, or that acquaintance, or maybe the skill to play ‘travel hockey’. I thank the coaching staff for that approach with this group. This team has developed, in fact, kids from each subsequent season have developed enough to be recruited to play on a team considered a level higher than where they were. Despite getting to know some awesome kids, with tremendous families, and knowing that the change in team means a total change in schedule and all of those built in times we were able to spend together have gone away, I get it. Parents, kids, families look to raise the level of their player’s game. I also value deeply, the friendships along the way.
So with several kids turned over from the roster over the past two seasons, hockey life goes on, and new kids, new families, join the club and the schedule waits for no one. I trust it will be another awesome season of watching the kids be kids, having the times of their lives while we all gather, visit, and get to know each other better and better. It’s going to be a lot of fun.
To the action:
Friday 5pm at JFK: 2010 Flames (2) played the Flames (3) team and won, 13-1. (There are 3 different Flames teams in this age group. Teams (2) and (3) play in the same league. The (3) team is mostly new to this level, but I hope they all hang in there.)
Saturday 350pm at JFK: 2010 Flames beat the North Shore Shamrocks, 6-4.
Sunday high noon at Allied Veterans Memorial Rink: 2010 Flames beat the North Shore Shamrocks, 6-4.
Friday night the game was one-sided, no doubt. I will say that as I heard a lot from the Flames 3 team’s bench, I was impressed with the calm, teaching approach from the coaching staff. They coached, and taught, and reinforced positive behaviors all game long. I really do hope they just keep working, and getting better and better as they go. I believe they will.
Saturday and Sunday the 2010 Flames took an early lead in each game. There was ebb and flow, and fatigue, and all of the things that come with inner game adversity as not everything goes your way all the time. Both days the Shamrocks battled back and made things close. It was very competitive. Great start to the season, and the play will only get better.
I did take some pictures on Friday and again for Sunday’s game. I have shared them below. Please enjoy. I usually get into photo captions and a bit more game action as we progress through the season.
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- These two goaltenders really did an amazing job for their team.
