Hawks get revenge

WASILLA -- "About 11 months," Houston head hockey coach Jamie Smith said.

That is how long the Hawks have been looking forward to a second date with the Monroe Catholic Rams.

Last February, the Rams upended the heavily favored Hawks in the 3A state hockey finals. Houston didn't exactly count its chickens before they were hatched, but no one outside of the Monroe camp thought the Rams had a snowball's chance in Honolulu of taking the gold prize back to Fairbanks.

Since that Saturday evening in February, where Monroe and its talented goaltender John Carlson stoned the Hawks chances of winning their third state crown in four years, Houston has had January 23, 2004 circled on its calendar.

Prior to Friday's rematch with the Rams, Houston had a not-so subtle reminder of that night in early February -- a little silver medal that read second place.

"We had a little motivation," Smith said as he was holding the 2003 3A hockey runners-up medal. "We had this hanging in the locker room, a motivational tool."

Smith tucked the dubious prize into a cabinet following Houston's loss 2-1 to Monroe last season.

"I couldn't bare to look at it," Smith said.

He brought it out for the first time Friday.

"It made me crazy," Houston junior Wade Williams said. "As soon as he pulled that out, I could not wait to get on the ice."

Not that the squad needed an extra spark, but the reminder of last season's loss lit a fire under the backsides of the Hawks, and they gained an emotional hard-fought 4-3 victory over the Rams to assume at least some revenge over their northern foes.

Despite missing two of its wingers on its top line for most of the third period, Houston scored three goals in the final frame en route to the win.

"It was an emotional game for us," Smith said.

"With the loss last year it is hard not to get emotional," Williams said.

With the deadly combination of emotion and inconsistent refereeing, Houston's chances of gaining the beloved revenge could have been scrapped. With the adrenaline flowing as fast as the raging waters of the Talkeetna River, Houston garnered 13 penalties and was handed a pair of misconducts.

Early in the second period senior winger Matt Bertling was nailed with a questionable spearing call, which also came with a free five-minute major and game misconduct.

As Bertling was hung up in the corner with Colin Taylor of Monroe, Taylor grabbed Bertling's stick as the Houston senior tried to skate toward the action. As he tried to wrestle away his stick from the flailing Taylor, Bertling inadvertently gave Taylor a poke in the chest and the referee gave Bertling a poke in his gameplan, handing out the penalties.

Late in the second period Rick Morlock, another skater on the top Houston line, was given a 10-minute misconduct for excessive chatter.

"The ref could not tell me what (Rick) said. Rick couldn't remember what he said," Smith said. "That kind of stuff can decide the outcome. The ref got emotional calling wild misconducts."

Despite missing both his cohorts from the Houston top line, Williams came through for Houston. The talented forward with phenomenal speed scored a pair of goals in the third period, including a shorthanded tally that gave Houston a temporary 3-2 lead.

Forty-one seconds into the third period, Williams casually picked up the puck, down in the Houston zone and skated toward the other end of the ice. As he hit the center line, on the left side of Carlson, Williams put it into another gear, speeding past the entire Monroe defense and put a wristshot into the net, just below the glove hand of Carlson to tie the score at 2-2.

Just more than two minutes later Williams struck again. Larry Kincaid slipped the puck to Williams at the blueline, and Williams accelerated again, slipping through a pair of Monroe blueliners and slipped the puck past the stick of Carlson to take the lead.

With 5:40 left in regulation, Ben Otis tied the score with a soft goal by Monroe.

Soft goal, a term coined by ESPN analyst and former NHL goaltender Darren "The Panger" Pang, is the way to describe the Otis goal. The puck slid over the Houston goalline at an exceptionally slow rate as Otis glanced the puck off his stick and drove Houston netminder Paul Sutton-Jones deep into the crease.

Morlock, who returned to the ice from his 10-minute time-out late in the third period gave Houston the game winner with just 63 seconds left in regulation. Houston outshot Monroe 19-4 in the third period and much of the last half of the third frame was spent by Houston peppering Carlson with shots.

"If we could have buried a quarter of those shots it would have been a six-or seven-goal game," Smith said.