After a season full of uncertainty, anxiety, and a literal, almost daily, lesson that in life there are no guarantees, the Goffstown Hockey team was able to have it’s senior night ceremony. The Grizzlies were the home team, oddly, on the home rink of their opponent, the Manchester Central-West Little Green Knights.
Hockey: Goffstown 6 vs. Manchester Central-West 4 (Senior Night)
The mild temperatures last night made it feel like spring in New Hampshire. It felt to me like some sort of a fresh start, or at least a welcome transition. Then, some of the air was let out of that feeling when I realized that earlier games at Conway Arena in Nashua were running well behind. Eventually the rematch between Goffstown and Hollis-Brookline Derryfield School would get underway more than an hour after the scheduled start time.
With a mix of snow and rain falling from the February sky on a Nashua ice arena parking lot players from opposing schools gathered with their teams out in the weather. There was not a school bus anywhere in sight. High school student drivers got out of their vehicles and unloaded their gear not unlike middle aged men and women showing up for another day of work. The word drudgery came to my mind.
When I got home and walked through the door last night, mentioning that I had information about the Goffstown Grizzlies hockey game at Alvirne-Milford as I entered, I was greeted with excitement and questions. Hockey: Goffstown 8 at Alvirne-Milford 1
On a snowy, freezing rain type of afternoon over at Tri-Town Ice Arena the Grizzlies played a home game at their third different home venue this season. They hosted the Bow Falcons in their second game in three days, both home games, both at different rinks. After falling behind, 1-0, and then 2-1 going into the final period, the Grizzlies erupted for five third period goals.
It had been a few weeks since the Grizzlies had played any competitive hockey when they pulled into one of their many ‘home’ rinks for this season, yesterday afternoon. Goffstown hosted John Stark-Hopkinton at JFK Coliseum, of all places, for their return to the ice.
The trip over to West Side Arena didn’t take very long for the Goffstown hockey team to make, but getting through the afternoon affair seemed like it took several hours. And that didn’t even have anything to do with the pregame ceremony to recognize Merrimack’s senior players.
The Grizzlies traveled to Nashua to play in the home opener for Hollis-Brookline-Derryfield School (HBDS) last night, looking for their first win of the season. It didn’t turn out the way that they would have liked it to, in a tough 5-4 loss to the HBDS Warriors.
From Sullivan Arena, St. Anselm College, Goffstown, NH – Monday, January 25, 2021
Trinity scored later than earlier but quite often en route to their first win of the season at Goffstown. At least I think it’s their first win because getting accurate information on anything that is NH high school hockey this season is not easy. The Grizzlies kept coming at the Pioneers, but the combination of Anthony Dizillo and Quinn Booth in the 3rd period alone, was too much to overcome.