At least fourteen players’ names were bandied about for this session. Now, you know as well as I do that not all of those players would show, which made it all the more interesting to see who would be sitting in the chairs when the music stopped. When it did, the lineup it produced made for a most intriguing session. Of extreme interest was the name that landed in net opposite Laird: Burton’s most legendary, enigmatic minder of the net, Lyle Detta. The questions abounded: how rusty would he be after four years away? Would his back hold up? Was he still rattled from the previous day’s river tubing accident? Could he make it through the whole session? Most importantly, was the Lyle of old still present?

You bet he was.

Bâtons au milieu produced the teams for the first series, with Mitch, Lee and Kyle backed by Lyle against K.J., Ben, Justin and the debuting Dane Olsen backed by Laird. Burton held it’s breath as K.J. fired the first shot on Lyle (still with beer in the net instead of a water bottle, still with smokes, still with no chest protector after all these years). Save. Then another shot. Save. Rebound. Save. Lyle stopped the first ten shots he faced. Laird was equally up to the challenge in the other net. The games were close and the workrate was high, but the tandem of Lee and Kyle came through to take both games 5-4. Justin was noticeably off, still feeling the effects of the farewell party for Dylan, and could not respond in the way he wanted, especially disappointing given his massive session on Thursday.

K.J. was traded for Lee, and the second series began. At first glance, the power of substitutes appeared to help as Laird, Lee, Dane, Justin and Ben won handily and quickly 5-1, featuring K.J.’s stick coming up on Laird and slashing him hard across the facemask. Lyle was finally brought to Earth here, letting in five goals on seven shots. He and his teammates would have their revenge, grinding out a 5-4 comeback win before giving their man a shutout in the deciding game. By now, all doubt was removed: Lyle was back. The same effortless saves, the same ability to bounce back from adversity. The series ended in the most frightening manner imaginable. On a rush toward the net, K.J. flew into the net headfirst; he managed to avoid nailing the crossbar with his face, but he nearly endoed. In the process, his flew into the air, the butt-end of his skate absolutely nailing the defender Lee right on the bridge of the nose, dropping him like a rock straight to the ground, following by a horrible, pained scream. Thankfully, it wasn’t broken, but there was a fair amount of blood. Unfortunately for Mitch, he and Lee both wore brought white T-shirts to the sessions, and while looking for shirt to use as a nose mop, Lee grabbed the wrong one off the bench!

Justin could not generate a feel for the session and opted to withdraw, leaving it 3-on-3 with no subs. The third and final series united Kyle and Lee with Dane (Lyle in net) against K.J., Ben and Mitch (Laird in net), and it started off with a lopsided victory for Team Laird, 5-1; Ben quietly making his presence felt with four points, and K.J. taking charge after a slow session start on the sub team. The Kyle-Lee tandem ground back next game to eke out a 5-4 win, but couldn’t pull off a second comeback in the final game, losing 5-3 and the series 2-1.

The battle for scoring supremacy was close all day, but Kyle had just an extra half-step all day, it seemed. Ultimately, he would prevail, taking first star with 13 goals and 14 assists on 58 shots. K.J. came on strong in the last series and led the session with 16 goals; he chipped in eight assists to finish second at 24 points on 69 shots. Lee was right there with the leaders all day and probably would have had at least a couple more points had he not been on the sub team for the second series, finishing 12-10-22-51. Ben just misses a star again, impressing with ten goals and nineteen points. The battle in goal was pretty much even all day. In the end, Laird edged out Lyle by two saves (128-126) and took the day ,810-.803. Laird seems to be disappointed with the session (his rationale was that he lost more than he won), but both goalies withstood a huge volume of shots in one of the better sessions of the year and still managed to keep it over .800. Nothing to be ashamed of here!

Here are the game scores:
Mitch Lee Kyle Lyle def. Laird K.J. Dane Justin Ben 5-4 5-4
Mitch K.J. Kyle Lyle def. Laird Lee Dane Justin Ben 1-5 5-4 5-0
Laird K.J. Ben Mitch def. Lyle Dane Kyle Lee 5-1 4-5 5-3

Season Stats: We have a tie! Kyle gained the five points necessary to tie Lee for the scoring lead at 143 points (Kyle has played five fewer games). Kyle is the fifth different player to lead the scoring race this year. Oliver is still right with them, six points behind at 137. Ailing Stefan falls behind a bit at 125, while Mitch becomes the fifth player this year to score 100 points. Lorne passes Troy and Ryan to move to sixth; K.J. also passes Ryan to move to eighth, and Pat enters the top ten. Kyle is at 90 goals, 15 ahead of second-place Lee. Lee jumps from fourth to second in goals while Stefan falls to fifth. Pat jumps up to eighth. Oliver holds onto the assist lead by just a point over Lee. Lee closes to within three shots of Stefan for the season lead, with Kyle just eleven shots behind him. Oliver needs eight for 300. Lorne and Pat’s shooting percentage go way up and they are now one-two; Mitch falls from the top five. Joern falls from fifth to seventh behind Shem and Laird in save percentage. Laird moves up to fifth in saves. Laird passed Lorne for fourth in games goaltended. Bron takes the season shutout lead with three, while Lyle become the fifth goalie to post a donut this season. Kyle moves into first in three-star points, five points ahead of Oliver and Lee. Amazingly, Lorne, Pat, Mitch and K.J. are all tied for fifth. Pat jumps from fifth to second in PPG behind Kyle. Pat narrowly passes Kyle for first in GPG. K.J. passes Lorne for third in GPG with Mitch falls to sixth behind Troy. Lee passes K.J. for first in APG; Pat moves up to fifth. Mitch falls behind Troy to sixth in shots-per-game. Lyle debuts fourth in saves-per-game, pushing Bron down to fifth. Pat’s 33 points are tops for sessions this year; Kyle’s 27 tie for fourth. Pat’s 23 goals are also first this year. Kyle’s 14 assists tie for the most in a session this year. K.J.’s 69 shots are fourth highest this year. Laird and Lyle’s 128 and 126 saves are second and third respectively for sessions this year.

On the all-time front: Oliver needs six points for 1,400. Lee becomes the third player to score 1,100 points. K.J. becomes the eighth player to score 600. Kyle needs three points for 300. K.J. is just one goal behind Bernie for seventh all-time. Bernie passes 500 assists, the second player to do so. Lee needs 17 assists for 500. Justin needs ten assists for 400. Kyle is two assists behind Robert for twelfth. Lee needs 78 shots for 3,000 may only a few sessions away from passing Lorne for first. Pat’s amazing session jumps him up to third in shooting percentage. Lyle passes Seamus for eighth in saves. Lorne becomes the third player to play 500 games. Lee plays his 400th games; Stefan needs four more to do so. Kyle plays his 100th game; Lyle needs four to do so. Laird is six games behind Chris for most games goaltended. Bron passes Justin for fifth and Lyle ties Lorne for seventh. Bron ties Justin and Joern for third in shutouts. Lorne and Lee keep each other in check three-star-points-wise, 660 to 650. Kyle passes Joe for tenth in three-star points. Pat enters the GPG all-time top five in second at 2.32. Pat debuts on the shots-per-game first all-time at 8.74. Pat’s 33 points and 23 goals both rank second all-time for a VRH session. Kyle has his tenth ten-goal session (and fifth straight), Ben his first. Pat becomes the ninth player to score 20 goals in a session, and has at least 15 points in each of his three sessions. He is the tenth player to score 30 points in a session. K.J. and Lee have their seventh straight 15-pointers (tied for the third longest streak ever), Kyle his fifth, and Mitch his fourth. Justin’s streak ends at four. Lee ties Stefan for third in 20-pointers at 18, one behind Seamus. Kyle ties Dallas’ record of five straight 20-pointers. K.J. has four straight. Kyle ties Stefan for fifth in 25-pointers with five. This session continues Lyle’s streak of 80-save sessions, now at five. Laird becomes the second goalie to record ten 100-save sessions. Laird ties Nathan for most 120-save sessions at seven. Oliver has played in 19 consecutive sessions,

SDF/GDF: Huge changes on this weekend’s ranking. The last session of 2008 has fallen off to be replaced with this weekend’s action, and Pat Elischer has assumed the top ranking, while former #1 Lorne plummets seven spots to eighth. K.J., Kyle, Oliver and Sam all move up one position as a result; Steve moves up two as Stefan slips to ninth. On the GDF, Nathan stays tops but Bron falls to fourth. Lyle returns in fifth and Joern falls from fifth to eighth.

Check out those Records and Honours on the links page before you leave. Time for a bit of rest after a busy week of five sessions in seven days. We should have more action for you next weekend; check back then! Look for some snazzier profile pics for some of the players, too.