SUNDAYS #3 vs. ZOMBIES:

(vol. 8S, no. 3; newsletter by h.s.)
After last week's unfortunate outing, The Coastal Pirates regrouped with new lines which sent both Dave Matthews and Russ to forward positions in an effort to shake things up a bit.

Here's the recap:
The Zombies came out gunning and controlled the puck on the first few runs down ice. They had a couple of close calls, including some point blank rebounds in the opening minutes. Once we got past that initial surge, however, it was all Pirates: the lines of Russ-Wildman-Tim and Dave-Scott-Glenn were owning the offensive boards and the Zombies were having a tough time getting to the puck. When they did, it was usually a haphazard clearing attempt that was snagged by Scooby or Dan P. or Rog at the blueline. Within a few minutes, Scooby had picked-up the puck at center ice and moved in and fired a rocket:; his shot was just wide, but it pulled goalie John Arena down and gave Dave Matthews a chance to pick up the rebound off the back boards and bounce it off Arena's back and into the net for the 1-0 Pirate lead. Just about a shift later, Wildman pegged Russ with a pass, who then clanked it off the post and in for the 2-0 lead just inside the 11:00 mark. We still controlled much of the action after that, but the only other score of the period came within the last minute when a Zombie broke to center and got off a shot of a rolling puck on edge that squirmed through my pads to make it 2-1 at the first break.

The 2nd period had good end-to-end action, but a few loose pucks in front of Arena couldn't find their way into the net and the Zombie powerplay wasn't up to the test of tying-up the game. The 2nd period ended with the score still 2-1 Pirates.

We maintained steady pressure during the 3rd, and Tim and Scott L. were doing a great job of covering for some of the defensivemen who were pressing up to make offensive plays. After we had a close call at the Zombie net, we capitalized on the next offensive face-off when Glenn drew the puck to Roger who got off a quick shot that squirted by Arena for the 3-1 lead. Soonafter, Ralz saw an opportunistic play when Arena made an initial save and then seemed to momentarily lose sight of the puck which was laying at the goal line -- Ralz banged in the puck for the score. All-in-all, a solid 45:00 performance by the defending champs.

WON 3-1

THE
SILVER
SKULLS

1) DAVE MATTHEWS
For coming up big with his switch to forward and (in the words of a teammate) "he worked his ass off."

2) ROGER WEISS
“He shoots, he scores!”

3) TIM HAND
For major league hustle throughout (and, of course, scoring too).