One of Burton hockey�s ironmen, Bernie Koth-Kappus, submits the session wrap-up from Saturday�s action.

It was a beautiful Saturday morning, crisp cool air, blue sky, the sun beginning to rise overhead, and a half court session of roller hockey was about to begin in an unnamed lacrosse box in North Burnaby. This session, as largely defined by the playing environment, would see VRH go back to its roots of extremely long low scoring games, or in this case one game (which lasted a good two and half hours). A newbie to VRH, Bron Mach ("Razor") played net for the session and by SITM the teams turned out to be Joern and Stefan vs. Lorne and Bernie. Lorne and Bernie jumped out to a quick two goal lead with a couple of nice passing plays. After this initial spurt the face of the game began to change, as the LB team seemed to be tiring and the JS team got into the flow; however despite getting many glorious chances they could not put the puck in the net for quite some time. Eventually, however, they managed to tie the score; one of the goals being a really nice tic-tac-toe as well. Many time outs were needed as the game became quite grueling and seemed to go on forever; Stefan's foray into organized indoor roller hockey certainly paid off, as not only was his level of play better but his conditioning allowed him to have that extra step as well. The LB team regained the lead twice only to have the JS's tie it up again each time, eventually taking the game to a 4-4 sudden death stalemate. As the intensity bubbled over, numerous altercations, stick infractions and spills became apparent, especially between Joern and Bernie. After a lengthy stalemate, eventually Stefan scored with a floater that beat Bron to the five hole. Needless to say, Bron played extremely well and besides a couple of fluky ones, the only way to beat him was with perfect passes. After the game we held a couple of shootouts; everyone found it extremely hard to score and Bernie eventually won the first one with a nice backhand deke. The second one saw Lorne perfect two triple dekes only to hit the post twice, and it was eventually narrowed to Bernie and Stefan in sudden death, which Bernie won with a fake deke and 5-hole shot.
All in all a fun day. Despite only getting one game in, it turned out to be a pretty good one, and it was just nice to get out on the 'ice' again after such a long absence of VRH.

Great job, Bernman! Wow, this session just shows what a great goaltending performance can draw out a game. Just nine goals in 150 minutes of hockey, easily a record. The star here far and away was Bron in his debut session, stopping 69 of 78 shots (that�s an average of 34.5 saves-pre-team in just one game!) for a stellar .885, only behind mainstay Justin and Laird in sessions this year. Otherwise, this was a bare-minimum session (two-on-two, half-court). Joern was the only player to point-out in the game with four goals and an assist. Lorne was two-and-two and Klopp chipped in with a goal and three helpers. Bernie was last in session scoring with two goals and an assist; not that that means much with just one game in the books today.

Useless Stats: No big changes, obviously, on the scoring front. Lorne passes K.J. for sixth and is two behind Justin for fifth in points while Bernie moves into the top 10 with Stefan and Joern close behind. Lorne ties K.J. for third in goals. Bron�s performance ranks as the third-best outing by a goaltender all season at .885. On the all-time front, Lorne moves to within just five points of Oliver�s all-time lead while Bernie passes Seamus for fourth all-time. Joern is three points ahead of Stefan for eighth all-time in points. Bernie is sixteen assists ahead of Lorne for second in assists. Stefan is just four shots behind Seamus for fifth all-time. Bernie needs four games for 500. Bron�s amazing goaltending performance ranks as the sixth-best goaltending performance of all time and second-best all-time by a rookie. 69 saves in one game is also ridiculous in the extreme. Bernie�s consecutive session streak goes up to eight while Lorne�s extends to five. On the SDF, Lorne holds fort on top for a third session as values plummet due to the short sessions. As a result, Stefan and Jerod fall as Seamus and Justin rise. Dallas and Kyle fall hard as they lose more sessions. Over on the GDF, brother Laird is also still on top. Don�t forget those Records and Honours, and let�s hope for more hockey (and more games, and more players) next weekend.