No-Go Red

Sept. 23, 2020

The C3 Spiders made their first post-season appearance since March 29, 2014, and ended in the same standings column as six years ago: a big L.

The league is putting on a season-ending tournament of sorts for those teams still willing and/or able to play, which means 22 teams at C3 from the original 26 teams will participate. All remaining regular season games on the schedule that were postponed back in March, which includes game 20 for the Spiders and Nordeasters, are now canceled.

Each team is guaranteed at least two games, in a bracket-style seeding, with two pools, with winners making their way through to the Asterisk Cup, and loser-winners for a chance to play for the Toilet Bowl.

So the Spiders, the 9th seed in bracket 1 (17th overall in C3) were paired up with the 8th seed (16th overall in C3) Arctic Wolves at Richfield Wednesday night.

As expected, both teams had short benches, with the Spiders suiting up 11 skaters, and the Arctic Wolves with 10 (plus masked coach Rob Little for good measure).

Filling in Billy’s net was again Larry Curtis, who subbed in two games for the Spiders to finish out the regular season back in March. Bill was definitely there in spirit though — as well as in Sutton’s “gear.”

Following a very even first period, the obligatory Spider Second Period Snooze™ was still evident from March 2020, with the Arctic Wolves opening the flood gates on a power play goal on the game’s first penalty. Add another pair of goals, including one from Schuster’s Office™ (for the wrong team), and it was a very UNEVEN second.

The Spiders erased the donut on a power play goal, with Berman digging the puck out of a slot mess and firing it off the goalie’s jersey short side, to make it 3–1. Otherwise, the Arctic Wolves goalie (and his post) shut everything else down.

A short-handed empty netter with 1:46 to go sealed the deal, and the Spiders’ relegation to the C3 Toilet Bowl bracket.

Final score: 4–1.

The Arctic Wolves will proceed to face the nearly undefeated C3 Moose (18–1) and a very disappointed John Fleischhacker on Saturday morning for round 2, while the Spiders wait to find out the dance partner — either the #8 seed Bulls or #9 seed Knights — for Sunday’s consolation matchup at Super Rink.

Puck drop will be 3:45 on the Olympic rink 2 at the Super Rink.