L. skipped her 4-H club's Christmas craft day to go to a Pirates game last night with me and Grandpa. She simply couldn't miss the chance to go see her favorite team play.

Before the game I roamed the stands taking photos for Seen's Fan of the Night and found a couple of youth hockey teams. It turned out that they were there to play an exhibition game between the first and second periods of the Pirates' game. They were really cute and looked so tiny on the ice.

Youth hockey players on the ice between periods.

The Pirates and Falcons on the ice. It was a good thing the youth league players weren't standing next to Mitch Fritz from the Springfield team. He made even the 6-foot plus Pirates' players look short (he's 6'8").

See all our Seen Team photos from the game

The Pirates were in the lead through the entire game but in the last second of regulation play -- actually there wasn't even a second on the board it was a couple of tenths of a second -- Springfield knocked the puck into the Pirates goal. I'm pretty sure the clock read 00:03 when that puck went in. L. and I, along with the friends we were sitting with, were shocked. None of us had seen that close a call before.

So the game went into overtime and neither team scored so they started a shootout. If you've never seen a shootout, it's edge-of-your-seat suspense. After the first players for each team made it past the opposing team's goalie, the next few rounds went scoreless. But then during the final round, Konopka made the final shot that won the game for the Pirates and the crowd went wild. L. and her friend were jumping and screaming right along with everyone else.

After L. yelled her fill in celebration, we left the stands to take a silly picture with a geocaching Travel Bug we're currently hosting...

This Travel Bug is from New Jersey and has been traveling for a little over a year but doesn't have any photos in its album. We decided to change that.

Go Pirates!

E-mail this entry to a friend