Faithful LBS reader Denny was lucky enough to have been broadcasting Michigan Division 1 State High Championship game on Saturday. Marquette and Orchard Lake St. Mary’s (pictured together, above) dueled for 109 minutes on the ice, spanning eight overtimes, before the high school athletic association declared the two co-champions. The boos were abundant after the announcement was made, though some, including Denny, maintain the correct call was made.
One of the goalies in the game said both teams deserved to win. That’s great in terms of sportsmanship, but aren’t most athletic competitions supposed to have a resolution? I have to think that had it been my baseball team in the state finals playing an extra inning game, I wouldn’t care if it went 30 innings, so long as someone won it. I don’t think I could ever make that sort of concession in the spirit of competition. In poker for instance, sometimes they agree to chop a pot when they’re going back-and-forth, but that’s when different amounts of prize money are involved. When it’s a pure athletic competition like this, I would think the teams should play until one of them won the game. I’d be curious to hear what most of the players thought about the stoppage.
Also check out Christmas Ape’s take on the game at Deadspin.
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I’ve got to say the right call was made – there were reports that trainers were ready to keep some of the kids out of 9th OT due to severe dehydration (the told the coaches that some kids had stopped sweating).
If you saw the smiles and relief of everyone involved, you’d feel confident the right decision was made (from the student’s standpoint) – the play was real ugly over the last 3 OT’s – breakaways and 2 on 1’s were ending with 40 foot soft wristers or – worse yet – kids not able to keep the puck on their sticks after skating toward the crease. The kids were gassed.
Normal game is 45 minutes – they played 109 and the wosr almost came in last overtime when both goalies had near own goals …. a team would dump and run for a line change and BOTH goalies nearly misplayed pucks off the boards into their own nets.
The coaches were the ones who met w/ tournament officials and had a big say in the decision. It was the health of the players that made the decision very easy.
Keep in mind, high school hockey has no media time outs so there’’s very little room to rest other than the 10 minute intermissions to resurface the ice!
Those kids wouldn’t be running out of gas if they were allowed to use roids. Think about the children!
They made the right decision. Reader Denny mentioned the conditions. these are high schol kids, not pros. If a major injury (or worse) had resulted from the ninth or tenth overtime, then you would have seen seven or eight figure lawsuits against everyone involved. It would have been gross negligence for sure.
I’m surprised they went eight overtimes. Even though I dislike the concept, they could have gone to a shootout like NHL players or soccer players do.
I think both teams should be happy with the designation of co-champion. They left everything they had out there and neither side would give in.