on frozen pond

This past weekend, five of my teammates* and I drove the seven hours up to Minneapolis for the US Pond Hockey Championships on Lake Nokomis.



Since the tournament had only one open division, our opponents ranged from ex-pros to guys who "only" played college hockey. Yes, our rag-tag group of guys who (with two exceptions) have only been playing ice hockey for three years now played against guys who have been playing since they were three. In a completely unsurprising turn of events, we were routed mercilessly in all four of our games.

However, even though we didn't put up much of a fight, we did have a very good time. Heck, we even made the local news! Check out the WCCO spot on the tournament, featuring the Phantoms own Ross and AJ.

Another positive note came when my childhood friend and neighbor, Todd came out for our final game with his girlfriend Amanda. Our two biggest fans braved the cold to watch us get crushed 22-2 by a bunch of local Minneapolis boys, and even took a puck in the shins for their troubles. Good times.


Todd & Amanda grin through the pain of frostbite and wounded shins.

Evenkeel reassures his fans that he did not fire the damaging errant puck.

Ross brought his video camera and shot all kinds of fun off-ice footage, so we'll hopefully have that available for viewing soon.



We might go back next year if the tournament decides to offer a more balanced divisional structure, or we somehow enlist Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin and Ilya Kovalchuk. Hey, it could happen...

Click here to check out a Flickr slideshow of the whole weekend.


*"Peaches" unfortunately got extremely ill and missed all of Saturday's activities, thus his non-appearance in the team photo (taken after our last game).