Day 25: CHAMPIONS !!!!

Today is gonna be a crazy day...either we win our first game and go to the finals with possibility of bigger heartbreak or we lose our first game and have a possibility of winning 3rd place. Being on both sides of winning/losing championships before this is the mentality one might have on the day of the big game! Everyone woke up together pretty early and we all decided to go out for some breakfast (?) ....To make a long story short i got on someones nerves when i was bitching about the breakfast ( no friggin bacon LOL) ,he got pissed and i basically took off back to the arena....being in a bad mood sometimes helps me concentrate a bit better?

So yeah i freaked out my teammates abit by letting my emotions get the better of me , it is kinda something i do to get myself pumped sometimes, as i heard Jari Kurtti say on more than one occasion "I am a goalie". That is my excuse and i am sticking to it! So we caught some of the other semifinal between Squali & Falchi ( both Italian teams) , really close game when we went to the dressing room Squali was winning. See we thought even though we ended up in first that the other division was stronger than ours . Our game was against Auronzo Senators. Getting on the ice i could see that these guys were amazing , they had a couple former National team players ....but we had our game faces on . Now i don't mean to brag or anything but the first period is some of the finest hockey i have ever played . They threw everything they had at me , it was ridiculous i must have stopped 25 shots in the first period alone. We honestly had about 7 shots on their goalie scoring 4 times going into the second with a 4-0 lead. I went to the bench got my water refilled , caught my breathe and told my teammates to keep it up and watch it as they are gonna come harder . Second (final ) period the Senators really came at me hard ( crashing the net to score a goal & jamming at my glove on numerous occasions) , the refs were hopeless ! They came back and we were winning 5-4 when Petri fed Rainer the long pass cross ice up to the other teams blue line ( cherry picker) , Rainer finished them off with the nail in the coffin and we went on to the finals with a 7-4 victory !

Between games we went to the same restaurant that we went to on Thursday night . I had a spaghetti bolognese and we went for a stroll through the city center ( tried to find a gift for Kathleen, key word TRIED ) . Our next game was versus the home town Squali Cortina ....strolled back to the arena with Mario and we talked hockey and strategy the whole way , we were both pumped! Getting in the room Mario turned on his stereo to get even more jacked up ! Everyone entered the room and i went into my corner and began to concentrate .....now thinking i am not going to lose , we played them the night before and i knew we should have beaten them . Our ragtag hockey team was in a championship final , who coulda thought ?

The final was pretty amazing , all the guys from Milan and Feldkirch were cheering us on . I am pretty sure we had more fans than the home team did  . Rainman rained all over Squali right off the bat ! We were up 3-0 in the blink of an eye , but the refs seemed to be totally paid for ( No offense to anyone the one guy just seemed to be so ) . I am not saying that i think the organizers would do this as they are a solid group of people ! The game was not very eventful as we just played amazing defense and we went on to win 6-2 ...qeue the party :)

First stop was the free mojitos that the tournament had for everyone right after the game , so already being beer sprayed on the ice now it is time to get my drink on ( with my jersey on Melanie LOL ) . A couple mojitos and some beers and we stumble our way to our dressing room , where we have two MASSIVE plates of meat,cheese and pickled vegetables ( antipasta). The Feldkirch guys and Klagenfurt guys come by our room to congratulate us and enjoy some food and we find out that Feldkirch beat Klagenfurt in the 5th place game ! I liked the guys on both teams but was pretty happy to see that Feldkirch turned around to be the team they should have been in game 1 ( LOL).Off to the awards ceremony where we swept just about everything....Mario got something for most penalties ,Melanie for the only girl , Rudi for the oldest player, i got most valuable goalie and we got the championship trophy in style ! Petri on Rainers shoulders accepted the tower with our name on it , we will be all connected forever by this :)

The winners all received bottles of Prosecco and we shared ours with most everyone we came in contact with . My bottle never got drank and i could not fit that massive thing in my bag to come home so i gave mine to Super Mario , he kinda already stashed it in his car anyway LOL. Oh the night was young , we went into another room after eating a healthy meal and drinking plenty of free alcohol. In the other room was another bar with a band playing and we all did our dance with the trophy . Then someone said disco and next thing you know we are climbing a mountain to go to a disco , yeah no shit ! The disco was not exactly happening but we all partied our ass' off and were the absolute drunkest people there by far, also the last ones there ...once they got us outside they locked the doors HAHAHA! The sun was coming up and we were walking down a mountain in Italy back to our camper. I will never forget this night :)

When we got to the camper Rainer and myself dusted off a bottle of Crown Royal and we fell asleep at some time around 9 AM . Rainman Allstars 2nd Annual Cortina International Tournament CHAMPIONS !