Never a dull moment on the island
No matter what teams are playing, there is NEVER a dull moment at Rapid Fire Arena. I have been coming here for years now and I can honestly say that I have more stories from this rink than I have from any other rink in the country. The personalities here are truly unique!!!! The people of New York are truly one of a kind and that's a good thing.
I'm here in Long Island with Charli and Joe. We had a free day Friday so we decided to spend a day in the city (Manhattan). It's got to be one of my favorite places (outside of Disney World) and it set up for a great weekend. It truly is the city that never sleeps.
Saturday morning would be the start to a long day. Shootouts, tight games, stories from Jason and Vio would provide for more entertainment than we could have expected. What made the moment truly remarkable was when Denis Jelcic walked in the door. He came with his 16u team and we hope to see him at nationals as well. Bill Coon is here with his New York Terror team. His 14s are currently resting up for the peewee championship game and his 16u team was done yesterday afternoon as most of the bantam division had prior commitments. We wanted to get all the teams playing a chance to make sure their full roster would be good to go for all games, so we made it work for everyone involved.
Games moved with a swift pace yesterday and we finished the night ahead, as we are currently. Angel Cortes brought his NY Phantoms team out for the adult division, but the Roadrunners enter the semi finals as the number one seed. The bantam division was taken by Tour Roadrunners Green, while the Mite division is complete with the Tour Roadrunners 03/04 defeating Mission Black Ice 9-7. In the peewee division, the Tour Roadrunner 2000s played well all weekend, even beating the 99s in round robin play, but couldn't get by them in the semi final game as the 99s would take it in overtime 6-5. Later on, the squirt division will be an all-Black Ice battle and the adult division is yet to be decided.
I have to be honest though. The BIGGEST surprise of the weekend has been Charli. She is one of our tournament directors and also has a degree in graphic design. Joe has her working on the magazine this year for our national event and I am ridiculously surprised as to how it looks. It's going to be an amazing work of art and it will be something you will want to make sure you get your hands on. She's pretty darn talented.
All in all it has been a great weekend at Rapid Fire with no lack of intensity and excitement. I've got to get ready for these championship games so I'm gonna sign off for now as the squirt championship is heating up at 2-all with under five minutes remaining.
From the house that Jay and Vio built....I'm George Brown!