Mustang Team Photos 2012

Andrew's hockey pictures have arrived. Here is his 2012 mug shot, along with the team photo.

Rock-N-Roll Cup in Cleveland

This past weekend Andrew and the Strongsville Mustangs team played in the Rock-N-Roll Cup tournament here in Cleveland. This was supposed to be a four team tournament against evenly matched opponents in a "round-robin" format where each team plays the other once and the top two teams play for the championship. Our first game was against MCYH (Rochester, NY). This was an extremely physical game and, despite outshooting the other team, the Mustangs lost short 0-3. In our second game we played Dayton and lost that one 0-10. In the end, Dayton was disqualified because they won all of their round-robin games by double-digits and were obviously a higher level team that was just "trophy-hunting." That left us in a game 3 match-up against Geauga (our nemesis) to determine which team would face MCYH in the championship game. The Mustangs exploded with a 7-2 victory that was led by Kanzig (#13) who had a hat-trick and an assist. Andrew (#97) was second on the team with three assists. Gaeschke (#81), Eisenaugle (#12), Beaver (#47) and Vandenbusche (#91) all chipped in goals as well with the assists coming from others on the team; and "the kid" Forsythe (#21) was spectacular in goal. The victory setup another physical rematch with MCYH on Sunday. Gower (#20) and Crossman (#87) led the Mustangs with solid "hits" in the game with 5 and 4, respectively. But despite both teams having around the same number of shots on goal, the MCYH goalie was simply too hot (he ended up MVP of tournament) and the Mustangs fell short again by a close score of 0-2. Overall, the kids played tough and earned themselves and extra game as well as the runner-up trophy and medals. Nice job Mustangs!

Petessence

Abby has been working on a fun project for her Sociology class the past few weeks. First she had to come up with an interesting new product idea (Petessence - perfume for pets) and target market (upper scale consumers); then she had to pitch it to investors (I helped her with that, including an ROI analysis that impressed everyone); and lastly, she she had to create a video commercial with testimonials. For this latter part of the assignment, she worked with her friends Paige (who was also part of the project) and Sarah to shoot and edit the following video. Overall, I think it turned out great (in a cheesy sort of way). I also think Abby could easily pursue a career in sketch comedy if she wanted with her different accents and personalities.

A Monster Exhibition Game

Last week Friday, the Strongsville Mustangs (B2) team played a rematch game against the Geauga Maple Leafs  - the same team we beat a couple weeks ago in our season opener.  This game, however, was an exhibition game played at "The Q Arena" before the Lake Erie Monsters versus Rockford Ice Hogs game. This was our second year playing at The Q and, once again, the facilities and hosts were awesome. We ended up with a great game too. Unfortunately, Coach Mike was not able to make the game, so Coach Tony made his first appearance on the bench of the season along side Coach Todd. He even gave the team a nice pep talk before the game. Will "the kid" played goalie for us and did a nice job saving over 86% of the shots he faced. The Mustangs got off to an early lead in the first period on Gower (#20) goal assisted by Treible (#1). The Maple Leafs scored a goal in the second period making it a 1-1 tie game up until the final 30 seconds of the game. However, six penalties - two within the final two minutes - left the Mustangs short-handed two skaters; and a bouncing puck deflected in for the Maple Leafs giving them the late victory. After the game, the team grabbed dinner at The Clevelander and then headed back to The Q for the Monsters game.

Final Oireachtas Highlights

The 2012 Mid-America Oireachtas in done. Here are some video highlights of the weekend (of course, video taping of the actual competition in never allowed). Overall, Abby and the O'Hare Irish dancers had a very good showing. On Friday, Abby danced one hard shoe and one soft shoe dance in competition with around 125 other dancers. The top 60 were "recalled" to dance a longer "set" dance for final placement. Abby was one of those top 60 finalists. In the end, she finished a very respectable 44th overall (her friend Anne finished 7th). On Saturday the Ceili team took the stage. There were 36 teams competing with the O'Hare O15 Ceili team. Once again, only the top half "recalled" for the awards ceremony that evening. The O'Hare team was one of the 18 teams that recalled. Once the final scores were in, they finished 7th place overall. That was the best showing for the O'Hare school, which had a number of other Ceili teams competing at various levels. In fact, the Ceili team did so well, there is some discussion about entering them into the 2013 World Irish Dancing Competition in Boston next Spring.

Oireachtas Dress Rehearsal

Building up to this weekend's 2012 Mid-America Oireachtas in Grand Rapids, MI, Abby and the the O'Hare Irish dancers continued to practice hard, including this dress-rehearsal Monday night.

Oireachtas Pep Rally

Today Abby attended a booster club pep rally for the O'Hare Irish dancers that will be competing in the upcoming 2012 Mid-America Oireachtas in Grand Rapids, MI over Thanksgiving weekend. This annual event (see 2011, 2010, 2009, and 2008) is a nice way to get the dancers pumped up for the big competition and celebrate all of their hard work leading up to it.