This weekend,

[Jenna Lancour]

was a very long one.
On Thursday night, I graduated from 8th grade and became a high schooler.
On Friday morning, I skated at Kick Ice for a little while, and then we headed for Haverhill, MA. for Hockey Night In Boston.
One of my friends, Meghan Turner, who plays for Bishop Guertin in NH, was on my team.
We have been on two New England Development Camp Teams together and we played together at Hockey Night in Boston last year.
Also one of our goalies was Caitlyn Re who plays for the NEWHL U17 team
In the first game, we played the Red team, and we won 2-1. I had an assist, and we played a girl named Katrina who was on my team the year before for Hockey Night In Boston. I watched the Penguins win the Stanley Cup that night, and my dad was very happy that they finally won for the first time since 1992. The next morning, we were playing the Teal team, and we tied them 5-5, and I had another assist. In between games, we drove to Wilmington, where my NEWHL team was practicing, and I watched their scrimmage against the Portland Pirates. It was good to see everyone on my team, but it felt kinda weird having to stand on the bench while the team was out on the ice, but it was kinda cool, too, because I could watch the game from the coach's point of view. My team ended up winning 3-2, but I didn't get to stay and watch the whole game, because I had to eat something for lunch and head back to the other rink for my second game, where we were playing the Black team. This game had a lot of goals scored, but they came out with the 7-5 victory. I had another assist this game, and a girl named Brittany on my team ended the day with 4 goals and 2 assists throughout the two games. My brother was there for the second game. My mom and dad said he was really good and was cheering my team on. After the game we took him out to dinner at the hotel we were staying at, and then my dad brought him back to Easter Seals, where he lives in Manchester, New Hampshire. I didn't know if we had made it into the finals the next day, Sunday, so I called our goalie's mother, Dottye, and found out we were playing in the 10 o'clock game against Red. Even though we had the same record as Teal, 1-1-1, they had a better +/- rating, so we were in the Consolation game. We were pumped to win this game though, and we did, 5-4. Our line scored the tying in the final minute of the game, and winning goal with :12 seconds left, Meghan scoring both of them, Melissa and I having the assists on both of them. We got gray HNIB t-shirts for winning third place, and I talked to the Tilton coach after the game, along with Kim Nanof, our Whtie team's coach, who also coaches at Kents Hill in Maine. The Black team ended up defeating the Teal team, going 4-0 for the Showcase, and our team having the second best record, 2-1-1, compared to the Teal team's, which ended up being 1-2-1. I got invtied by Dottye, my new friend Caitlyn's mom, to play in a NEWHL Spring League Game, and decided to go back to Wilmington.

A couple of things that I took from this is that my coach Kim showed great confidence in me.
She had me play center in a game for about 30 minutes.
Something I do not do very often and I was nervous but she kept telling me I was doing fine.
She let me take defensive zone faceoffs on two penalty kills and I did a good job doing it.
I was one of the youngest players there and I really had to step up and I feel that I did.
Hopefully I played well enough to make one of the Festival Teams in August. I made the Showcase last year, so we'll see what happens!
They will announce the teams on Wednesday


Getting back to Wilmington, I now know why Massachusetts girl's hockey is a step ahead of everyone else. Every Sunday, about 50 or so girls go to Ristuccia Arena, and play pick up games in the NEWHL Spring League. What was amazing to me though, was the fact that so many girls showed up. The director placed them on teams, and they have fun playing games. It runs from 12:00 to 4:00, so they can play four games. I had never seen something like that before, and it was so much fun, just being able to go out there and play. I ended up on the orange team, and yeah, we lost badly, but it was fun to be able to do something like that. I think the score ended up being 7-3, and I played defense, which I usually don't play, haha(: . After the game, I talked to the Boston Shamrocks director, and now, I have the option of playing there, too, next year.
It sounds like it would be exciting and very hard work. They play teams all over the U.S. and Canada.

After we headed back to Manchester.

We picked up my brother, brought him out to dinner at Ruby Tuesday's
Having real food for dinner was sooooo good!
After dinner we brought Justin back and headed home.
What an amazing weekend of hockey.

I have a tournament this weekend in Stowe, VT, so I will write again soon ! (:

Play hard with a smile,
Jenna (: