Bounce Back 'Jacks

The Angelwood Jacks showed up to Adie Knox arena last night with revenge on their mind and they got it. After losing 4-1 to WWGRD not even two weeks ago, the Jacks exacted their revenge last night. Despite the continuous pressure by WWGRD at the end of the game, the Jacks were able to hold on for the 3-2 win.

The Jacks jumped ahead early on a shot from the slot that beat the blocker hand of Jonny Tracey. WWGRD showed early resilience and responded with a goal of their own, when a pass from Trevor Crevatin deflected off a Jacks defender's stick and trickled passed the sliding goaltender into his own net. Crevatin, a call up from WWGRD's farm club, What Wouldn't Gary Roberts Do (WW'TGRD) was filling in for one of the many WWGRD players missing from action last night. The Jacks restored their lead on a two on one that was finished in the back of the net. Although WWGRD was out-playing their opponents, they found themselves in a 2-1 hole.

The game continued to get worse for WWGRD as all-star shutdown defenceman Sheldon Tracey took a stick to the face that left him bleeding on the ice. Tracey was down to block a shot when the opposing player’s stick caught his face just under his nose on the follow-through of the shot. Tracey was down but managed to get to the bench under his own power covering his face, which was quickly covered with a towel once he reached the bench. Once he stopped applying pressure and looked at the towel, Tracey was greeted by a deep rain stain looking back at him. The stud defenceman has a deep gash that would require stitches from nearby Hotel-Dieu hospital after the game, and WWGRD was forced to go forward with 3 defencemen to finish the game.

WWGRD's player of the game was Trevor Crevatin
who lead the team with 2 points: one goal and one assist.

The Jacks extended their lead to 3-1 when the trailer on a 2 on 1 was able to pounce on a rebound off two huge initial saves by JT. Down by 2, WWGRD knew they had to keep working if they wanted to tie this up. Crevatin recorded his second point of the night when he set up Ryan Boutette on a nice pass before Boutette pumped it home to bring WWGRD back to within one. They could feel the tie in their fingertips and continued the pressure. Numerous loose pucks in front of the net barely avoided WWGRD players' sticks and pucks crossed the crease but couldn’t find the back of the net due to the three horseshoes lodged in the pants of the Jacks' goaltender.

Time eventually ran out on WWGRD and they were forced to take their second loss in as many outings. The boys will have a long time to let these losses sink in and think about what needs to be done to get the winning ways back before they hit the ice next on Thursday, February 16th at 9pm. WWGRD will be looking for a bounce-back win against the Broken Rubbers, the team WWGRD opened the season off against with a 3-2 win back in October.

Unbeaten Streak Over

WWGRD players (from left to right) M. Berthiaume, S. Micelli and Chinstrap Djordjevski, watch last night's action at Adie Knox arena from the bench

WWGRD's string of unbeaten games came to a halt late last night at Adie Knox arena. The boys were triumphed in a chippy affair by The Warriors 5-1. Falling down 3-0 early, WWGRD was forced to try to play catch up. Lack of positioning in the defensive zone left Warrior players open for 3 goals in the first half. With a disallowed goal in first off the foot of Dylan "Pele" Schenteg, WWGRD knew they needed more offense in the second half, and they got their opportunity with a powerplay to start the half. WWGRD hemmed the Warriors in thanks to some hard work down low along the boards by the forwards, and a Ryan Ellis-like keep in at the blueline by Douggie Lambier. The puck found its way back to Lambier at the point off a feed from Sean Micelli, and he let a shot go at the net, where a scrum ensued before Alex "chinstrap" Djordjevski was finally able to jam it in. WWGRD came close to scoring a second goal when Micelli banked a shot off the goalie's back from behind the net, only to have the puck pulled off the line while Micelli and Chinstrap celley'd to try to sway the refs call. Unfortunately WWGRD would not come close to mustering anymore offense while the Warriors added two more tallies.
The game's aggressive nature escalated and reached its peak during a scrum when Dylan "D-Bert" Berthiaume got in a scuffle with a Warrior player in front of the WWGRD bench. D-Bert had his bell rung and his bucket knocked up by the opposing player and shoving lead to the Warrior player dropping his mitts. Knowing he wouldn't stand much of a chance if fists began to be thrown, D-Bert tried his best to tie up the players shoulders to limit his reach. After some dancing the players went down to the ice, with D-Bert's bucket slipping off. The opposing player cocked to punch him on the ground before holding up, only to throw a punch at the back of his head seconds later. The player was escorted off the ice, away from an infuriated WWGRD bench. League sources say the player is expected to be fined for his actions. The game was called after this scuffle as there was only about 1:00 left in the game, and the refs saw no positives coming from finishing the game.
The players were disappointed with their effort after the game, but not totally distraught, knowing they could beat this team with a better showing next time. WWGRD shutdown d-man Sheldon Tracey was overheard by some members of the media talking to a few teammates after the game, "We play them 10 times we might lose 1, but that was tonight... thanks for the beer n' burgers, we'll see those *explicit* in the ship."
When asked about the scuffle at the end of the game, D-Bert said, "Well you know when you get two teams like that who want to win that badly, sometimes emotions boil over and I think that's what we saw last night." He then went to add, "I think our back checking wasn't at the level it could have been and it cost us. JT played well back there and we couldn't help him out enough. Gotta love how the boys kept digging out there though, and we'll be ready for those guys in the future, I can promise you that."
WWGRD hits the ice again on Monday, January 30th for a rematch against the Anglewood Jacks. The Jacks will be seeking revenge after WWGRD defeated them 4-1 last week. Puck drop is at 10pm once again, tickets are available at the box office.

Takin' Down the Jacks

WWGRD put their six game unbeaten streak on the line last Wednesday when they faced the Anglewood Jacks. Going into the game they were behind the eight-ball already, with many players not being able to make it to the game. Even with speedster Brandon Pancerny dressing as Mark Micelli, WWGRD would have to play with 9 players, only two of which were defencemen. Being the great captain that I am, I volunteered to drop back and play defence so we could roll two forward lines and rotate through 3 defencemen. They knew they were gunna need a big game from their stud goaltender Jonny Tracey and they got it on this night.

WWGRD was forced to kill an early penalty when perennial penalty box-goer Eric Bauer threw a booming hit on an unexpecting opponent. After a tough PK, WWGRD finally broke the scoring on a goal scored by Brandon Pancerny, or as the score sheet refers to him, "Mark Micelli." "Micelli" was given a nice feed in by Alex "No Finish" Djordjevski, and was stopped on his original attempt, but was able to bank the rebound off the back of the goaltender. Pancerny... I mean "Micelli," then added to his total by scoring another goal that barely slid by the opposing goaltender. Goals were added by Dylan Schentag, who turned 19 at midnight after the game, and the hard working grinder Michael Nantau. Aside from one goal that snuck passed his glove, JT was perfect between the pipes for the boys, and held them in when the game was close in the early going.

The boys celebrated hard in the dressing room after the game, cracking open some beers and hitting an unnamed Windsor bar to celebrate newly-19 year old Schentag's birthday. When asked for a comment on the night as a whole, assistant captain Sean Micelli said', "Well uh, the boys battled hard, we had a short bench and uh, i think the fact we pulled out the W solidified that we had to go out and celley after, especially since it was lil' schenner's b-day." He then went on to add, "Schenner couldn't shed the smile from his face after hitting the 'bar' with the boys." Brandon Pancerny, who was named first star of the game (by me, right now) also added some insight on the game, saying "it was a hard fought game by the boys, the whole team played well, especially our goalie who made some key saves."

 The boys know they can’t sit back and enjoy this win too much though, as they have a huge match up against The Warriors, who have the same record as WWGRD. This match up will determine an outright 2nd place team and potential catapult the winning team into first. The clash of the tier 2 titans takes place on Wednesday, January 25th at Adie Knox arena. Puck drop is at 10:10pm, doors open at 9pm.

The Team

Intramural hockey at the University of Windsor has a new contender for its tier 2 championship this year: What Would Gary Roberts Do, or simply known as WWGRD. My name is Marc Berthiaume, captain of WWGRD, and this blog is here to keep all of our fans up to date with the progress of their favourite intramural hockey team. This team is named after the legendary Gary Roberts, former NHLer known for his grit and playing the game hard. Gary played over 1200 games in the NHL, registering 438 goals and 472 assists for a total 910 career points. It was Gary's four year stint with the beloved Toronto Maple Leafs from 2000-2004 that made the majority of my teammates and I fall in love with him.

The team is made up of players with similar attitudes, ones that very much reflect that of our idol Gary Roberts. We have a never give up attitude, we work hard for our goals, and play hard until the whistle is blown. This team is made up of both friends and family, as there are a few brother combinations on this team. My brother Dyaln and I are hard working forwards, the Tracey brothers, Sheldon and Jon, are our shutdown defenseman and standout goaltender respectively, and the Micelli brothers, Sean and Mark are our team's two leading scorers at this point with 9 points each. Ryan Wilson, Eric Bauer, Dan DiCarlo and Douggie Lambier join Sheldon to round out our team's strong defensive core, which does a stellar job or not only shutting down opponents but moving the puck and getting involved in the rush to create offense as well. Mike Nantau, Ryan Bouttete, Dylan Schenteg, Stefan Branov, Dean Silvaggi and Alex Djordjevski join the already mentioned Berthiaume and Micelli brothers up front on WWGRD. This group of forwards works hard in all three zones to control play for the boys.

Through 8 games, the team is off to a 6-1-1 start, good enough for a three way tie in second in the tier 2 standings. As mentioned earlier, the Micelli brothers are tied for the team lead in points with 9 each, with Sean being the leader goal scorer with 5. One of the major reasons for the team’s success has been the consistent play of the teams tender, Jon Tracey. Jonny has started all 8 games for WWGRD so far this season and is posting a flashy Goals Against Average (GAA) of 2.88 to go along with his 6 wins this season.

This season is only 8 games old but there have already been a few memorable moments so far. It would be impossible to not have Sheldon Traceys beauty dangle in the first game on the list, with his Highlight of the Night candidate pushing the boys to a 3-2 win in their season debut. Another highpoint was the hard fought tie that WWGRD got before heading off on the Christmas Break. Down 3-1 late in the game, the boys scored a hardworking goal before Dylan Berthiaume's hustle created a fluke goal off the stick of the opposing teams' defenseman’s stick. A final underlying theme that has occurred this season is defenseman Eric Bauer's constant presence in scuffles. Early in the season he was issued a penalty for lighting up an opposing player into the boards (this is a non contact league), and last week he was the focus of a scrap at the end of the game, where he superman-punched an opposing player with his mitt still on. We can't say for sure what the rest of the season will bring, but one thing we do know is that it will be one hell of a ride.

Eric Bauer, 93, proudly displays his jersey after a hard fought W.