Regardless of the outcome of the
San Diego Collegiate Roller Hockey League's inaugural playoff tournament, the
turnaround performance of the Point Loma Nazarene squad in the fledgling
five-team circuit has to be considered the season's Cinderella story.The turnaround might not so much be evident in win-loss record or scores but was admirably displayed in the overall play of the team in the closing weeks of regular season play.
PLNU defeated a touring team of Marines, based in nearby Camp Pendleton, 9-5, to fill a bye week after starting the season with three losses (outscored 23-9) and culminated in an impressive 7-2 victory against fellow four-year university San Diego State in its second-to-last game of regular season play.
SDSU had downed PLNU, 3-1, in the second week of the season.
“We're the Cinderella story of the league,” said PLNU coach Kirk Mitchell,
Mitchell, whose son Garrett Mitchell plays on the 10-member strong squad, reflects the laid-back nature of the team. “I’m the coach only because I am over 21 and can get to all the games on time,” he said.
The elder Mitchell said the team has its priorities in the right place.
“We’re not out here to win a championship right now. Of course, we’d like to win more games but that isn’t a priority. Right now, the guys are out here to have some fun, win or lose. It gets them away from the books. It's fun," the PLNU coach said.
Part of the team’s lack of higher expectation is simple, according to the PLNU coach. Some team members had not skated for up to three years since last playing in high school.
That showed early on.
After opening the season with a 9-3 loss to eventual regular season champion San Diego City/Mesa, PLNU caught a break in its second game when preseason favorite Grossmont College was unable to field a full lineup to start the game. PLNU picked up a forfeit win even though the teams proceeded to play what amounted to a scrimmage game, with Grossmont (with just three field players) recording a 11-3 win on the strength of six goals and three assists by Jonathan Oberg.
PLNU returned to the court the next week to absorb an 11-5 loss against Southwestern College. The team’s turnaround began when second-round play commenced three weeks later. To fill a bye slot, PLNU defeated a touring USMC Marine team, 9-5, as Nathan Sutton racked up four goals.
The next week, PLNU faced off against San Diego City/Mesa —six-goal winners in the teams’ initial encounter. In the rematch, PLNU held an early 2-1 lead. The game was tied 2-2 at halftime before City/Mesa shut the door on the conference's drastically-improved cellar-dwellers with three second-half goals.
“Big difference,” said PLNU's Jordan Armitage about the team's renewed vigor. “It took four or five games to get the hang of each other. We also have a lot more players now.”
PLNU got its early lead on goals by Jake Gilbertson and Andrew Glendinning while goalie Beau Mora sparkled between the pipes despite allowing five goals.
Everything seemed to come together the following week against SDSU. Sutton scored three goals and Gilbertson scored twice to lead PLNU, which also received single goals from Cody Ziller and Garrett Mitchell as well as outstanding goaltending by Mora once more.
PLNU led 2-1 at halftime before taking control of the game by outscoring SDSU 5-1 in the second half of play.
For anyone who saw PLNU’s opening game, it was a case of night and day in terms of positional play, playing the puck off the boards to teammates, timing set-ups and goaltending skills.
“At the beginning of the season, our goal was to just win one game,” Artimage said.
The team did more than that — for the record, it won two (three, including a forfeit victory). But perhaps more importantly, it won a lot of respect on the court.
Regular season champions
San Diego City/Mesa and Southwestern tied with 5-2-1 records but City/Mesa earned the regular season championship based on the first tie-breaker: least goals allowed. City/Mesa allowed 22 goals while Southwestern allowed 30 in eight games.
Ironically, Southwestern failed to lose a game to the regular season championships — playing to a 4-4 overtime standoff in the teams’ opening matchup and then rallying to defeat City/Mesa 3-2 in overtime in the rematch.
Trailing by one goal in the second game, Southwestern pulled goaltender Louie Valentine with 54 seconds to play in regulation and netted the game-tying goal with 24 seconds to play. SWC then won the game in the ensuing five-minute sudden-victory period. In the memorable game, City/Mesa goaltender Adam Meehan had 35 saves while Valentine finished with 28 stops.
San Diego City/Mesa compiled nothing short of an amazing season, as some had picked the team to finish third behind Grossmont and Southwestern before the first puck was dropped in league play. However, City/Mesa took over sole possession of first place to jump-start second-round play with a 6-3 victory against SDSU as Joe Casillas scored three goals and Sean Sackrider added two goals and two assists. Brian Hamlin had a goal and two assists and Omid Arjomand scored once for the winners, who snapped a two-game SDSU winning streak.
Both regular season losses by City/Mesa came in overtime — one each to Grossmont and Southwestern.
Playoff tournament