My first rival

[hedgehog337 3,480]

When it comes to my rivals, there are some members or teams that make more sense in the current climate. However, I'd like to come back in time and make a brief rewind about my first ever personal rival. The first and perhaps the only team in the VHL I was used to dislike a lot. Most weird thing is that wasn't even about members that were used to play there at that time. It's just more about I hated losing even more than now and they were handing me couple of L's. Some of them were actually painful too. Though there were some revenge cases as well so it wasn't hopeless for me. But even aside from wins or losses; for some reason I was feeling negative towards that team right after I started to hang around the VHL more often. Although once again, it had nothing really to do with members. Just there was something that was throwing me off about that squad. Anyways, let's get into this and point out most focal points of this rivalry.

 

 

S47 - *feels coffee pepe emoji*

 

By that time I was already being a decent welfare player and Zep was a fairly decent second line option. Calgary was for sure glad when I decided to sign them in FA. Things were going fine. The team was securing the playoff spot way before 72 game mark and we were preparing for the good playoff run. All was good...until we met that team in the conference finals. 2-0, 3-2. We had more than one chance to close it out, but series still went to the decider. And even with that, we had a 2 goal lead with 4 minutes to go. All of that just to blow it all and be eliminated by a late seconds goal by Jorma fucking Ruutu. I guess now you can figure it out why feels coffee emoji was brought up here. Anyways, this is the moment I started to feel a real disdain against that team.

 

S49 - back to back baby

 

Sweet revenge came in shortly after. By that time however, I was already in other NA team named Toronto Legion. We were going in for the two peat, but Quebec had even more impressive regular season. So we had to go through the rival team before making to the big dance against Meute. Long story short, the conference was a Legion and Meute show and others weren't invited in it. Our opponents included. 5 game series reflected that perfectly. What's most important - I got my revenge on them. It wasn't the last chapter of this, however.

 

 

S52-53: Dead Bear

 

Back to back losses to them in same playoffs stage....ugh. I continued my NA tour with my new player Guntis Petenis. This time, with Seattle. The team was pretty good actually, but lack of depth kinda was hurting us at that moment. But my rival wasn't exactly the deepest team either. Also, with the worse goaltending in S52 (TPE wise). Nothing helped - 5 game loss in first time. And even less pleasant 7 game L season after. Being 2-0 up in game 7 just to lose in OT...almost a deja vu. Except they managed to come back in period 2 and then score a quick decider in OT. My dislike against that team grew up once again.

 

 

S54 - you stole our goalie!

 

Well, not exactly. And there was no clear idea about contending for Riga (I just became their GM), but I needed to make a half clickbait title. Ironically, the goalie in question is Jakab Holik - the player we shared the same Seattle locker in previous seasons. There was not much market for him and there was a decent chance I'd somehow grab him...before that team came in and made some moves to sign Bek. Needless to say, I was wishing nothing but curse on them.

 

 

S58 - OG Meta goes hard

 

Hard to believe, but this was the last time I met them in the playoffs. No matter if it was Riga or any other team my player was playing in. That team was decent, but there was just no match against the Locke meta that Riga was running at that moment. So once again, my win wasn't dramatic at all - it took 5 games to dispatch them. Nevertheless, I was pretty happy with this outcome.

 

 

Just like I metioned before, this was the last time I had an encounter against them in the playoffs or in any other situations. Sure, trades and such were happening between us, but with no evil thoughts between each other. As they entered the long and dark (and as of now, never ending) medicore period my dislike against them gradually disappeared. The only other time they had a chance to re ignite this feeling was S72, but it was Calgary that took the finalist spot from NA. It's safe to say my emotions toward that team are long gone.

 

Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you which exactly team I was talking about all this time.

 

 

Spoiler

 

 

Yeah I know, the Murricans are synonymous with the three cute letters named M.I.D. since STZ stepped down. But before that they were actually a force to be reckon with. Sounds crazy, isn't it? Well, not so crazy for league veterans and not so oldies like me. Like I said, I wasn't even sure why this team was the one that caught my eye in negative way. Logo? Maybe. Neither of old or current logo was exciting for me. Success? Unlikely, as at that moment I was still a bystander rather an active part of the league. Maybe I was just already feeling that this exact team is gonna make me mad lots of times? Pretty crazy theory, to be honest. So really, there wasn't much of a reason outside of logo. It just happened - something felt off about the team and they were proving it even further by simply winning. It felt really nice to beat them and thankfully there were some victorious moments for me.

 

As I'm in less crybaby mode since late 70's I don't think any team will ever make me feel some type of way. Like it was with NYA back then. So they are the first and only team I was considering as a rival.

 

That's it and I'm out.

[hedgehog337 3,480]

1000+ words with spoilers so w2 claim gonna be here