No drama, lots of shots
Decidedly less drama tonight at women's league, which I was grateful
for, to be honest. Though I do think the incident last week finally kind
of gelled the team, and gave us a solid "us against them" mentality that's scrappy and fun to be around.
It took me a while, but I adore this team. A great mix of personalities, but overall, everyone is lively and funny and fierce. It's all about tone at the top though, and our captain sets it well. I love playing for and with her, and I love being in her locker room.
It's so nice to be in love with the game again. And I look back over the year and look at where I went off the tracks and the only thing I can really pin down is when goalie clinics started up at the beginning of the summer, through Camp Brusty.
My uncoachability is well documented, but to me, this just cements it. Coaching suffocates my game. Not because it's poor quality coaching but because it buries my instincts, which are decent but they're a bit fragile, for lack of a better word. It doesn't take much to undermine my confidence in a way that takes me a long time to get it back.
When I'm going through periods where I'm being coached or critiqued, whoooooooosh, it all goes out the window. All I hear are voices in my head. All I see are goalies who are light years better than me. All I feel is my confidence, however undeserved, draining out the vent holes in my skates.
So, no more thinking. No more coaching. Stop the next puck.
That said, we lost again tonight, 4-2. But I got hammered. 34 shots in a 39 minute game. I did math (okay, I'm lying, I found a web site that did the math for me) and it would have been roughly 52 shots in a regular 60 minute game.
Letting in 4 on 34 doesn't feel too awful to me. Two were screens, one I literally have no idea how it went in, and the other was a terrible goal. Soft shot, didn't have my stick on the ice, and just wasn't set for the shot. Went right through me. Awful.
But it's a game I can't feel badly about at all. I worked hard and so did my girls, so we deemed it a moral victory. :)
That's it for me this week, hockey-wise. After working hard at the new house all the long weekend, things are very light on that front until next week when a bunch of shit happens bang bang bang. New windows installed Tuesday (YAY!), phone/internet going in on Wednesday, and DTV on Thursday. Phew! Very excited and it's really starting to feel like ours.
Now if someone would please just buy our current house, that would be super terrific.
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2 comments:
The nice thing about playing D is that even though I'm one of those people who takes in constructive criticism and hyperfixates on it when mileage is the main issue to acquiring a skill, my position is more learned than instinctive (which is good, seeing as I have the hockey sense of a foam rock). At least you're getting a sense of your own styles well enough to *make* educated decisions about how to improve (even if it might be a little unorthodox compared to most of the playing community).
Also, that's a lot of shots! You don't see totals that high in the women's leagues nearly all that often, unless things are a bit lopsided when it comes to mid-ice talent. Speaking of, what's the talent/experience level like in your women's league? I've been meaning to ask/read through old entries, but I've also started grad school apps, which has somewhat undercut my free time (again - I know, I don't sit still well).
Regardless, glad to see you're getting your groove back on!
Thanks! It's funny, some goalies take very well to the coaching side and really get into it and get a lot out of it. I just fall into a sinkhole of horribleness.
I'm just happier and more successful in "git 'er done" mode. Not sure I improve much, but I'm too old to spend month after month hating playing. I want to enjoy every minute of it possible.
Yeah, that's the highest shot count I've had, I think. I might have had 36 once? Can't remember, but I know I had one really high game once last season, maybe. Normally this league is more in the 15 shot area.
As far as skill level in this league, it's a WIDE range. We have usually one or two gals per team who can play with B level guys and fit right in. Definitely heavy on the C-D level players though. Lots who have been playing for a long time but have sort of maxed out their skills at the C level but have that wisdom of having played a long time.
It's a good mix and this league is, for me, more about the team experience than the game itself, if that makes sense. I don't really get that playing with men because we don't share a locker room, so that's the "enriched part of this that I get a lot out of personally.
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