Eldo uproots Rocky Mountain Trees in town league hockey

Scorekeepers needed!

By Than Acuff

The Eldo and Rocky Mountain Trees squared off in A/B town league hockey action at Big Mine Ice Arena on Thursday, January 9, just 840 miles north of the soon to be Gulf of America and 985 miles south of the border of our soon to be 51^st state and while not the closest of games, it was good to see some A/B hockey action. And it’s good to see our soon-to-be president focused on the things that matter. Or distracting us from the things that matter, like town league hockey.

One thing is for sure, while town league hockey has plenty of players and plenty of goalies, they need scorekeepers. Not only do you get paid $20 per game and games are just one hour long; but town league players have a two-hour volunteer requirement and if they can’t fulfill it, or don’t wish to, they can pay someone $50 to do two hours of scorekeeping. Kinda like carbon credits, I think. Not only that but the scorer’s booth is somewhat heated and once a week you get to sit next to me.

The Eldo set the tone early winning the opening faceoff to set up Ben Barocas for an immediate shot only to be denied by Rocky Mountain Trees goalie Lucas McMullen. Rocky Mountain Trees would respond the next two minutes with some inspired play by Erin Kelly to break up a two-on-one and the fraternal teamwork of Mitch and Zach Bever. Their efforts would soon reap the benefits of hard work as Ethan Johnson took a pass from Mitch and slipped the puck into the corner for a 1-0 Rocky Mountain Trees lead just two minutes into the game.

Both McMullen and Eldo goalie Eric DiMarco would trade off several great saves over the course of the next seven minutes until Barocas set up Don Turner for an Eldo goal to tie the game 1-1 by the end of the first period.

The Eldo then went to work in the second period. After McMullen came up with several early saves, Barocas set up Turner for his second goal of the game two minutes into the second period. Two minutes later, Danny Stoneberg’s hustle to keep the puck inside the blue line then led to Turner’s third goal of the game as he lifted the puck top shelf from the slot for a 3-1 Eldo lead.

Rocky Mountain Trees looked to keep the Eldo within striking distance turning up the heat and firing shots motivated by the efforts of Ashton Mabry and Ned Stitt, but DiMarco continued to deny all shots and when Stoneberg fed Matty Schmalz in the slot for him to lift the puck over McMullen, the Eldo was sitting on a 4-1 lead.

The icing on the cake for the Eldo’s explosive second period came with just 26 seconds left in the period as Thomas Mclean gathered the puck at the point and fired a knuckler that appeared destined to fly high only to dip just under the crossbar for a 5-1 Eldo lead.

Barocas finally found his scoring touch five minutes into the third period when he scored off an assist from Schmalz and then scored once again three minutes later off an assist from Turner to put the Eldo out front 7-1.

Rocky Mountain Trees did put in one last surge to set up Mitch for his second goal of the game, but Stoneberg decided to get on the scoring action in the final 30 seconds of the game for the Eldo to cap the 8-2 win.