College All-Star Elite Division at Narch

For college students, it was dreadfully early on Sunday, July 22 for the first games of the College All-Star Elite Division at Narch Finals.  ECRHA and GPCIHL opened up the tournament at 7:40am, RMCRHA and SECRHL at 8:20am, and WCRHL and MCRHL at 9:00am.  The teams would again return to the rink that evening to play their second set of round robin games.

 

NCRHA Staff was in the house to get the ball rolling on this event.  They made sure that all players got their jerseys and that the teams were ready to go.  The jerseys look great and many thanks to Ace Jerseys for designing and donating them for the event.  Each region has an original jersey with the colors of their regional logos incorporated into the jersey design.  Across the board, the jerseys are all similar enough to really make it look like an All-Star division.  The staff were very excited to be able to watch the first set of gamse.  NCRHA/Regional Staff in attendance were Rob Coggin(NCRHA RIC/DLO), Brennan Edwards(NCRHA Executive Director), Nanette Houser(NCRHA Director of Marketing), Chad Wallin(WCRHL), Tom Fussner(GPCIHL), Ed Luther(SECRHL), Antone Lawrence(ECRHA) and Kevin Murphy(ECRHA).  Those present also took part in a 2-day NCRHA Board of Directors meeting where several important topics were discussed relative to collegiate roller hockey.

 

Even though it was so early in the morning, all teams were ready to take the rink at game time.  Many players had arrived the night before, at 11:30pm or 12:30am.  Several players missed their first games due to missed connections or participation in other tournaments.  By the second set of games, the teams were fully manned.

 

The first game was GPCIHL vs. ECRHA.  GPCIHL came out with 5 skaters and 2 goalies, while ECRHA had a squad of 11 skaters and 2 goalies.  It turned out that team size did not matter.  It was the first game of the event, and many of these players (on all six teams) have not played together.  GPCIHL ended up winning the game by a score of 8 to 2.  The second game was RMCRHA vs. SECRHL.  It was a tight game, probably the tightest that we will see all tournament.  The score was 0-0 for a large chunk of the game, and then RMCRHA took a 1-0 lead.  RMCRHA was up 2-1 late in the game but a late SECRHL goal tied up the game at 2, ending in a tie.  The third game was WCRHL vs. MCRHL.  It was a similar feel to the GPCIHL/ECRHA game early.  WCRHL got up to a 5-0 lead at halftime, but MCRHL clawed back with a couple of goals, the game ending with a 6-2 WCRHL win.

 

The second set of games that evening saw GPCIHL defeat RMCRHA 8-0, WCRHL defeat ECRHA 2-0, and MCRHL defeat SECRHL 7-4.

 

The following morning, ECRHA beat RMCRHA 9-1 and GPCIHL beat SECRHL 7-1.  There are 4 more round robin games left in the event, 1 game each for the teams that played this morning, and 2 games left for MCRHL and WCRHL.

 

The teams have positioned themselves in the following order at this point in Round Robin:

 

1. GPCIHL - 3 wins, 0 losses, 23 GF, 3 GA

2. WCRHL - 2 wins, 0 losses, 8 GF, 2 GA

3t. ECRHA - 1 win, 2 losses, 11 GF, 11 GA

3t. MCRHL - 1 win, 1 loss, 9 GF, 10 GA

5t. SECRHL - 0 wins, 2 losses, 1 tie, 7 GF, 16 GA

5t. RMCRHA - 0 wins, 2 losses, 1 tie, 3 GF, 19 GA

 

These are only an estimate of where the teams fall.  NARCh tiebreakers will be used to determine the 4 teams go on to the semifinals, which start Tuesday July 24th.  Did you know that NARCh tiebreakers have teams return to the rink for a shootout if they are tied after several tiebreakers?  That could be very interesting!!! 

 

Stay tuned to www.ncrha.org and www.narch.com for more news!!!  For a direct link to the game score on www.ncrha.org, go to: http://ncrha.org/schedule.php?event_id=680.  Scores will be input once they are confirmed from the Narch website.  Scores for all Narch divisions and a running set of blog articles from Ian Mackie, Doug Jones and other guest bloggers can be found at: http://narch.com/Latest_News/roller_hockey_0715067637.html.