hockey@dartmouth, part II

I held the whiteboard up to everyone sitting around the table. Faint marks from a nearly-inkless pen indicated the basic layout of a hockey rink while little abstract X's and O's occupied the space, guarding an asymmetrical goal. I began again in my explanation of the offsides rule -- I had been trying to explain the game for twenty minutes now, a continuous deluge of terminology, tips, and try-not-to's, but all I'd been met with so far were blank faces. My best friend put his hand on my knee to keep me from continuing. "Slow down," he said. "It's too much information, they're overwhelmed. They just want to have a good time out there." He was right. I set down the whiteboard and faced the team.

"You know what, guys? All of that stuff I just talked about," I gestured to the discarded whiteboard, "is all just technicality. All you need to remember is keep your stick on the ice and protect the net. And have a great time, God! We'll be fine." I smiled reassuringly, and they, sweet team that they are, mustered the courage to smile back.

Our dressing process seemed utterly suited to our team: everything was old, used, mismatched, occasionally broken, but still, with a bit of tape in the right places, essentially useful. I wore two right-legged shinpads that had long since lost their velcro, taped to my bare calves, their thin foam dating back to, without exaggeration, the 1970s. The rest of the team was in similar garb, most of them equipped with left-handed sticks, despite the fact that everyone was right-handed; our goalie, having never skated or been in the net before in any sport, struggled with his unwieldy, ill-fitting pads -- he fell to his knees and his teammate knelt gingerly beside him, meticulously fastening all of the old, weary buckles around his nervous legs.

The moment we stepped onto the ice, the absurdity of our habit was forgotten -- or, rather, embraced to such a degree that it became defining of our team. As the other team raced in tight circles around the net, warming up, our team tumbled and tripped its way to the bench, thoroughly intimidated by the opposition. We set up at the face-off circle. The puck dropped. The clock started. We played.

Within the first two minutes, the other team had scored -- within another two, they did it again. The game unfolded almost entirely in our zone, our goalie falling and diving, a thrilling, valiant attempt to salvage the game. Our players threw themselves before the net, or sent the puck hurtling out of the zone just to arrest the play for a few seconds, or skated with all their strength until they could do nothing but return to the bench, spent.

As the final buzzer sounded, I looked up at the scoreboard. 13-0. I looked at my team. A great yell rose up from the bench, sticks clattered against boards -- I watched as the our players skated towards one another and into a great, absurd embrace, laughing and whooping. We had done it! We played our first game! We lost, but we tried! Fast-flowing adrenaline kept us from exhaustion.

Our goalie slowly made his way from the net. I tried to wipe the worried look from my face before he raised his eyes to mine: "You did a great job, buddy," I offered. He looked up at me and grinned. "Let's do it again!"