From hot to cold to hot, the Watchmen knew a thing or two about winning and losing. This helped them win!
Last season seemed to be a little bit unbelievable for the Bratislava Watchmen. To start off the season, the team was on fire. They had decent forward depth and a great goaltender between the pipes. While their defense wasn't anything too special, it was around or slightly above average and seemed to be getting the job done. Generally, as the saying goes, all good things come to and end an the Watchmen watched their winning record vanish into a losing one. As the games passed, the teams struggled to continue. Line changes were unable to spark new chemistry and old chemistry had already been lost. Things were not clicking for the Watchmen. The locker room started to express concern and frustration over the recent slump and wanted things to change. General Manager of the Watchmen, Blake Campbell, knew he had a team that was capable of winning and that if he went out to nab the right pieces, they could easily be crowned champions.
We had all the right pieces. A great goalie in Zhumby, solid forwards in Adultman, Podarok, Davidson, Tumack, Hackett, etc. Tumack, Hackett and such came from solid trading. We knew we had a solid core of guys and the way to make us stronger was to improve the areas which were needed. Our centers were stacked with Adultman and Davidson. Our wingers, while not insanely strong, got the job done and we managed to trade for some depth on the wings in Gribov, Boucher etc and managed to get some nice waiver claims as well. We knew defense was our biggest issue, so we went out and got the best defensive core in the VHLM that season. We added Voss, Tumack, Hackett, Pellerin, Klingberg and Anderson via Free agency. This gave us the best D in the league. We built from the back out. Great goalie, Great defense and good offense.
The Watchmen had a solid lead 3-0 lead against the Ottawa Lynx, but in game 4 the Lynx put on the pressure. Slowly but surely, the Lynx crawled their way back to tie the series and 3-3 and force a game 7. Firstly, an amazing triumph for them. Win or loss, to tie a series and force a final game when being down 3-0 is pretty great. Game 7 rolls around, some minor tweaks to the Watchmen's lineup and you can see them clicking early on. First period score was 1-0 Bratislava and they were outplaying them but only slightly with the shots being 8-6. After the second the period, the true champions showed as the Watchmen pumped the Lynx with shots 19-6, however, Atticus Von Braxton managed to turn away every shot. Earlier in the first, the Watchmen lit the lamp making it 2-0 and the time slowly approached the final buzzer of the season. As the buzzer went, the crowd roared and the Watchmen were crowned S47 Founders Cup Champions.
To win my first cup ever, to win our first cup under my management, it was such a great feeling. I've experienced the Finals once before, but never had experienced the emotions of winning a cup for your boys, the fans and representing any league as the champions. It was such a proud moment for myself and not just because we're the best, the strongest and we're able to hoist the cups over our heads. Not because we almost blew it and lost a 3-0 lead to play a game 7. There was a moment in the season where my boys were unhappy. Every post was "fuck" or "another loss" in the locker room. You could tell they weren't enjoying themselves. I had the choice to ship them off to winning, contending teams and rebuild. Our team was good, but it wasn't great at the time. I made the decision that these are my boys and together we're a team. More importantly, anyone who wears that jersey becomes apart of our family. I wouldn't give up on them and I surely hope they wouldn't on me. We made some big moves, we stuck together and went on some really huge, rare winning streaks. We managed to steal 1st place away and then hoist the cup. The best thing about the season was pulling through for the guys, for sure.
As most teams know who had just won a cup, the next season always seems to be the biggest as it's all eyes on you. Will they repeat and defend their title? Will they make playoffs? How will they perform? Or will they fall apart - be championship drunk - and lose control of the season? For the Watchmen, they had a nice group of players coming back. With that, the addition of Maximoff and return of Davidson and Anderson was very huge for the team. Podarok was the best he's ever been and the team looked fairly good. As they looked, they played. Without a starting goalie, the team started the season off in first place and continued at that pace. When the time came, GM Campbell knew he'd need a starting goalie for the time playoffs came. Then came Sven Wolf onto waivers, who just so happens to also be a player whose agent is Blake Campbell. While trying to snag him off waivers, he was taken by Brampton. Shortly after, a huge deal was made and the Watchmen overpaid to receive Sven Wolf. While being mocked for the over-payment, Campbell assured those doing the mocking that the deal would help the team and that the over payment was worth it. 28-6-3 with the Watchmen, 5 shut outs and great play, Wolf really stood tall for the Watchmen. Then came playoffs.
Everywhere in the media you seen Oslo's GM talking about how they were the team to beat for the Founders Cup. We really meant no offence by it, but we knew they weren't going to be our toughest match up and we knew confidently that we were going to make it passed them. Of course, you can always be wrong, but based off the depth of rosters and such, we weren't overly worried. We knew Ottawa was going to be our toughest competitors and we were obviously watching the series with them and Saskatoon very closely. Sure as shit, Ottawa would move on to face us after we beat Oslo in 6 games. It's the rematch everyone was waiting for. That I'm sure everyone deep down knew was coming. We in the locker room thought, "what better way to defend our title than to beat the same guys who tried to win it against us last year?". Game one we lost. I was like shit, I don't like being down in the series. Game two we lost and honestly, they had me on the ropes. We used up 50% of our life in a matter of 2 games. I was scrambling. I wasn't sure what to do. We went out on a ledge for game 3 and we pulled it off. Our first win. The next game, also a win. We managed to tie it up and give us some confidence and momentum. However, any series being tied or down is slightly nerve racking. Fortunately, Game 5 also went to use and just like the Lynx last season, we had won 3 straight, this time to take the lead rather than force a game 7.
Game 6 between the Ottawa Lynx and the Watchmen was going to be a big one. It's the 5th game in 2 seasons that the Lynx would face elimination versus the Watchmen. As we've seen before, they're 3 for 4 so far on winning those games, only losing game 7 last season. First period of play, the Lynx were heavily outplayed in the corners and in the neutral zone, losing a majority of puck battles and it showed both on the the score shoot and shot board and the shots were 15-2 and score was 2-0 Watchmen. No action in the second period, but the same style of play was seen. The Lynx received 3 penalties (hooking, cross-checking and slashing) and you could tell they were frustrated by being outplayed. The 3rd period was much closer, each team managing a goal but it was not enough for the Lynx. For the second season in a row, the buzzer sounded and the Watchmen rolled off the bench with sticks and gloves in the air as they swarmed their new goalie. The Watchmen defended their title.
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