The Shot

      It was Saturday night, and it was the finals of the Minnesota State 12U Hockey Tournament.  Alex, the right wing, was excited. His team, the Southfield Pucks, were going to be playing the undefeated Northboro Rattlers. Alex had been waiting for this day for a whole week now and it finally arrived.

     The night before, Alex and his friends on the team went to the frozen pond to practice. Alex made up a new trick. It was where he faked a shot, put the puck behind him and wrist shot it between his legs. It worked a couple of times, but he couldn't do it consistently. He was practicing tricks because the Northboro goalie had the reputation of being really good.

     The night of the big game, when Alex was in the locker room, he could feel the pre-game jitters. He always felt them before a game but tonight he felt like the butterflies were twice as strong because this game was so critical. Alex always listened to his iPod before the game to get pumped up and motivated and he was glad he had his iPod today. When his team stepped onto the ice for pre-game warm ups, the stadium was packed and the crowd lived up to its reputation with Minnesota hockey. Southfield started out by taking shots at their goalie, Kyle Gibson. Kyle was good and almost none of the shots went in the net.

     Southfield put only 2 shots on goal the whole 1st period. Kyle did awesome in goal and kept the score to 0-0. During the intermission, Coach Perkins was shouting because of the lack of offense. Northboro was better than Alex thought and he yelled, "We better step it up!".

     The 2nd period was pretty equal in talent between the two teams until 15 seconds remained and Southfield's right defenseman, B.J Fox came all the way up the ice on a breakaway. B.J deked the last defender and hit a slap shot into the 5-hole.  The crowd went wild.

     During the 3rd period, Northboro played tough and hard to try and tie the score. They were checking everyone every chance they got and with 3 minutes and 12 seconds to go in the game, Northboro's center came on a breakaway and tricked out Kyle for an easy shot on goal. The score was now 1-1. There were 43 seconds left when Alex got a pass and took off down the ice. He took a nice slap shot and scored. Southfield was called for offsides during the play and the goal did not count. 

     The game went into overtime. Neither team scored in overtime. The game then went into a shootout. If you ever watched hockey, you know that shootouts are one of the most exciting things you ever see in the entire game. Both goalies were tremendous on the first 3 shots. During sudden death. Northboro's 4th shooter missed wide right and Alex went out on the ice for Southfield. Alex was thinking of how to trick the goalie. He decided to fake the shot and see which way the goalie went. If the goalie went right, he would go left. If the goalie went left, he would go right. Simple as that. Alex skated up the ice, he faked a shot, but the goalie didn't move. He took the puck and shot it between his legs. The shot went in. Everyone was cheering. Kyle came from across the ice and tackled Alex and before he knew it there was a pile on top of him. Southfield had won the Championship!

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