Ashley’s Hopslam (3-3) suffered its second straight loss Tuesday night, falling to the Ice Dogs 3-4 in a game that was a tale of two periods.
“What the (bleep)!” yelled an exasperated Matt Schaefer to Shawn Lopez after missing several chances to bury the puck in a third period flurry.
It didn’t start out that way. Schaeffer scored two goals in the first period on passes from Lopez, and the team built a commanding 3-1 lead after the first.
The second period, however, was a different story, as the Dogs scored three unanswered goals to take the lead. A visibly frustrated Paul Sholtis banged his goal stick on the ice and nearly got into a scrap with Dogs forward Jim St. Jean.
The team settled down defensively in the third period, but was unable to mount an attack, despite a six-on-three advantage after pulling the goalie in the closing seconds of the game.
Lopez, who came under fire for missing last game, was unshaken. “My Twitter feed was blowing up,” he said, laughing.
As a result, team officials have decided to continue blaming Lopez for the losses. “Well, it’s either that, or blame ourselves,” said GM Mark Woods. “Who would be silly enough to do that?”
Woods later stated that the team plans to lay blame on the economy in general, the European Union crisis, “that whole thing going on with the bank on that island or whatever,” the Boston Marathon bomber, and anyone on Capitol Hill if need be.