After a scheduling snafu that meant no sticktime on Friday night, I went back out after calling the rink beforehand to make sure sticktime was happening Saturday night. 8:30-10:00pm, and I really needed it after not being on the ice for 9 days and having my soul slowly eaten up by moving to a new house.
I felt awkward on my skates at first, but that feeling dissipated quickly. I still have problems with my left skate because of the size discrepancy, but ever since I started putting my toes up toward the front of the boot, I've seen a marked improvement in my skating comfort and slightly higher proficiency in my skating ability. Hockey skating is starting to become a much more automatic endeavor, a huge improvement over my days where I had to think about every movement that wasn't straight forward and back skating. My crossovers backward and forward in both directions are improving, and my heel transitions are so much smoother than at the start of the summer. Skating at Sabby's clinics have really helped my skating skills even though they weren't the primary focus of going to the clinics.
For about the first fifteen minutes, there was only one goalie because the other goalie was still getting dressed. I spent most of my time in the goalie-less end while everyone else was skating in and shooting on the goalie. More ice for me. I practiced taking slap shots against the boards, and I'm actually getting legitimate slap shots off. Without taking video and slowing the whole motion down, I don't know if my stick actually flexes at all on the shot (I'm trying to get used to an 85 flex rating and work my strength up toward it), but the shots coming off my stick tonight were legitimate slap shots instead of just slap attempts at the puck that barely slide across the ice. Of course, those pitiful slap attempts also happened, so consistency is the new issue with my slap shots, but now that I have more confidence that I can actually pull it off, maybe it'll actually become a weapon in my shot arsenal.
Once the second goalie showed up on the ice, we skated around and shot pucks while I did some mild skating drills. One of the guys brought the net to the other end of the ice, and we had a 3-on-3 scrimmage using the space of the offensive zone.
The best player on the ice was on the other team. Pretty much no one could stop him, and even three of us had a rough time actually getting the puck off him. Thankfully, he tried to get his teammates involved, and whenever that happened, it generally turned out in our favor. They scored some goals, of course, because that's just what happens when you allow a ton of shots like that. But my teammates were awesome, even if they were pretty happy to jump up in the play and miss the guy waiting in front of our net for a pass and an easy goal.
I don't know where this jump in my play came from, but even though the other guy pretty much walked over us for most of the night, I played my best stretch of hockey . . . literally ever. I had some pretty tough turnovers and missed passes, but I caught 90% of passes given to me (compared to about 20% before), I broke up a lot more plays that I usually do (though that's pretty easy to do when you can just anticipate that the other two players are just going to pass to the best player on their team), and I put a bunch of shots on net. I scored only two or three goals (compared to the other guy's 12 or 13), but I set up my teammates for lots of good shots, and my skating wasn't a hindrance. I still need to learn how to play along the boards, and I still need to remember to keep focus on the man in front of me and keeping his upper body in front of me, and I need to cut down on the dumb turnovers, but compared to the rest of the times I've played hockey before? I was lights out tonight.
I do have one major concern health-wise, looking forward. I've been drinking a lot of water this summer. It's pretty necessary considering lots of Los Angeles days this summer have reached the upper 90s and even 100+ degrees Fahrenheit. But even when I drink plenty of water beforehand, I still reach a point when I'm playing where my head feels tight in my helmet, and I start feeling like I need water. Badly. Thankfully, I've never needed to get off the ice or receive medical attention because of dehydration, but I wonder what else I can do during hockey sessions to improve my hydration. I've considered just simply drinking more water in the middle of playing, but there are two problems I run into almost all the time: 1) it gets really uncomfortable to get back on the ice quickly if I drink too much water, so I essentially take myself out of the game to focus on rehydrating and 2) for sticktimes, and even during Sabby's clinic, I don't really get a chance to sit on the bench for an extended period of time. Of course, I'm not looking to stay on the bench because I love playing, but I definitely need to improve my conditioning and somehow improve my hydration during hockey.
This is almost certainly going to be the last sticktime I go to until December when I return home for Christmas. Unless I can find something in Providence that's easy to go to by bus or by foot (with all my equipment in tow without my own car), it'll be a lot of off-ice work until the intramural season starts in November. I might be able to go to Sabby's clinic one last time on Thursday before I fly out the next Wednesday, but that remains to be seen. I just really hope I can maintain the gains I've made this summer and improve on what was a fun but stellarly lackluster first season of hockey.
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