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| June 9, 2008
By Doug Jones
Buffalo wrap up!
|  Great hockey, good times and great people top off an action packed weekend
It's such a small world in the hockey business. After another delay today with US Air (over two hours), I am walking through the Charlotte, North Carolina Terminal and hear "Doug, are you just coming back from NARCh?", I look over my shoulder and it's George Brown from the Tour Excitement who is waiting for his connection to Buffalo.
We exchange pleasantries, talk about the business and talk about the NARCh finals in San Jose. George will be there twelve straight days with Tour Excitement teams that qualified at both Dumars and Buffalo. Great to see and catch up with George. George won his first NARCh championship in Estero last year and I always enjoy the chance to talk with him about the sport, our dislike for AAU and it's watering down of good markets and tournaments and other parts of the sport.(See Pic under photos and videos for Buffalo)
The Pepsi center is a great facility. So many amenities and opportunities to check things out. The Johnstown Jets were running their Junior "A" tryouts over the weekend, so I got to sneak in and watch a little of that. Some great hockey there. I sometimes forget how fast this game is.
Daryn wrote a great article about the roster police I was hoping more people would read. The article focused on us doing everything possible to ensure that players were legitimate both on the roster and on the floor. It was mildly disturbing to find that a few teams in the tournament not only didn't know Randy and I were counting and checking rosters, but also just put players on the floor who weren't even on the roster during their playoffs. NARCh respects the rules and abides by them. We only have integrity if we maintain the rules. I am sorry that players who traveled to play at a qualifier had to be told to leave the floor and it upset their parents, but again, please take a minute and re -read Daryn's article on "roster police".
That said, let's go over the events and scores and review a great weekend.
Squirt/Peewee had the Tour Excitement and BIHG Razors meet up in the finals. BIHG was all over the Excitement, but just couldn't put the game away. Chance after chance after chance, the goalie for the Excitement came up huge. Finally, the Excitement buried an empty net goal and took the final score 4 - 1.
In the bantam division we had the Brampton Radicals over the Buffalo Wings 6 - 3 and then the Colorado Misconduct defeating the Tour Bandits 5 - 2. In the finals it was the Radicals and Misconduct in a game which went down to the wire. The Misconduct had a two man advantage with 1:34 to play in the game and were down by a goal, until the Radicals again scored an empty netter to finalize the game 4 - 2.
In the midget division we broke into gold and platinum seedings. In our gold semifinal, the Buffalo Storm rolled over the New York Knights 9 - 1 and the Tour Oakville Coyotes were awarded their game 1 - 0 with Off in the Showers. The Storm and the Coyotes met in the Gold final and the Storm showed they were no match for the quick Coyotes as the Coyotes handily out worked them 6 - 1.
In the Midget platinum division, it was the Tour Excitement 4, the Buffalo Wings 2 in the opening round of the playoffs. Our Platinum final match up was set with the Burlington Wolves and the Tour Excitement. The Excitement absolutely outworked and played the Wolves in a 10 - 2 championship game. It was fast paced and quick action for the Excitement who took off and never looked back.
As we approached our men's division, we again had both gold and platinum playoffs. In the gold division, number eight seed Team Markler (who by the way have four sets of brothers on the team) worked their way to the finals against Team Mission Buffalo. As we began the championship game, Team Mission Buffalo jumped out to a 8 - 2 lead. Team Markler scored seven unanswered goals and beat Team Mission Buffalo 9 - 8 to a captive and applauding crowd. What a game and a way to finish the night.
Our platinum men's game saw the RBK Revision Buffalo Wings beat the Detroit Mission Stars 5 - 4 with four seconds left on a breakaway goal. The Wings had tied the game 4 - 4 on a powerplay goal and then took the lead for good to the excitement of the home crowd. Congratulations to the Wings for a great game and keeping all of us on the edge of our seats!
NOTES********************************
The Tour Oakville Coyotes are a quick and fast team. After getting over their border issues Saturday, they showed a lot of desire and effort playing with six men the entire tournament. Congrats to them.
Jason Flowers played a superb game against the Detroit Mission Stars in the championship congrats to him for his effort and his team's huge win.
Great to hear the Wings, Coyotes, Excitement, Stars and other teams are making it to San Jose. We look forward to seeing them there!
Pat Weissinger doesn't realize I proof read my blogs even after they get posted. Look for Pat to get hooked on Phonics so he can write blogs too!
Have a great week and remember REGISTER today for the NARCh finals in San Jose, July 11th - 27th!!!
SIGN UP TODAY!! the deadline is soon approaching!
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