Team MDHL 5 vs. Team ML All-Stars 2
Tuesday, March 19, 2002

The MDHL played their second ever exhibition game against foreign troops on their home turf at Trout Lake. It was a capacity crowd of about six as far as the eye could see, with the visitors' fans sorely outnumbering the home crowd. Facing the dreaded Team ML All-Stars (headed by who else? Mike and Long), the Mad Dogs put together a sampling of their league's best (and coincidentally, those having $10 and being fastest with e-mail confirmations to play).

Team MDHL's captain and resident mole, Jason Lai, with intimate knowledge of the enemy having played with them on occasion at their 8 Rinks outfit, predicted a close game with lots of "them fast skatin' Asians buzzin' around". True to his prediction, it was a fast moving game, with little time and space out there within the bathtub-like confines of Trout Lake.

Team ML drew first blood early on, pouncing on a quick turnover in the MDHL zone and jumping ahead 1-0 (just like that gold medal match a few weeks ago, eh?). However, while the MDHL offense struggled to find a rythm with their three newly formed forward lines, the stellar play of MDHL goalie Mike Smith kept his team alive in the early going. Finally it was the Mad Dogs' rearguard, and assistant captain Ian Melhado drawing even with a sweet seeing-eye point shot and his team never looked back. Pouring on some solid work ethic and rolling over the three lines with mucho effectiveness, the offense emerged with goals from Anthony Chang with two, and Kenny Chiu and Jason Lai with singles. Yes, Team ML goaltender and ex-MDHLer Samson Chow was bested on this night of goaltending duels.

And amidst the ensuing penalty parade (thanks to iron-fisted, guest ref, Gon Yip, making his second straight appearance), special teams and line changes became a challenging task and at one point, the MDHL found themselves down two men short. Turns out that guy that D Sean Oye cross-checked to the ice was none too pleased, but felt a bit better with a power-play to ease his sorrows. Team ML, however, couldn't capitalize on their opportunities and ended up giving up a short-handed marker as point man Anthony Pham trips over the blue line giving MDHLer Jason Lai a clear bee line down the wing to beat netminder Sam Chow with a slap shot! And as the game wore down, so did the effectiveness of Team ML. "Some disorganization at the bench, poor line changes, and no predefined lines were our undoing!", claimed Long, the ML captain.

And so it ended, with the same score that Team Canada claimed the gold medal with, and the MDHL remains undefeated in exhibition play! Team ML enjoyed their experience too and has issued a rematch challenge at the next available opportunity. Until then, the MDHL continues its tour with a second exhibition game against another team TBA.