Guarding His Goal

by Ralph Henry Barbour

But memorizing all this didn’t make Toby a wonderful goal-tend. It doubtless helped him, but it is one thing to know what to do and quite another thing to do it. Probably a week of practice was worth fully as much as all his reading. On the other hand, it is possible that his reading made it easier for him to understand what was wanted of him and to profit by criticism. Grover Beech, the second team captain, was not a very good instructor. He played a good game himself at cover point and knew how the other positions should be played, but he lacked the ability to impart information. Rather impatient and short-tempered, he was far more likely to send a player who had performed poorly off the ice and summon a substitute than attempt to show the offender how to do better. In consequence, Toby, to a great extent, was thrown on his own resources when it came to learning the science of the goal-tend’s position. But he watched the first team goals and tried to fashion his play on theirs, seldom offended twice in the same way and, when he had been two weeks a member of the second squad, had defeated Warren in the struggle for supremacy.

So far he had not dug into his hockey fund except to the extent of the price of his new stick. He wore an old pair of running trunks loaned by Homer Wilkins, a sweater of his own, a pair of ordinary thick gloves of buckskin, and, for want of a toque such as the others wore, went bare-headed. Arnold’s second-best skates performed all he asked of them and an ancient pair of leg-guards, inherited by the Hockey Club from some former player, answered their purpose fairly well. He meant, however, to have his own guards and a good pair of gloves, and, now that it seemed certain that he had won the right to play the goal position on the second for the balance of the season, he only awaited an opportunity to journey to Greenburg to purchase them. But on most mornings recitations kept him busy and every afternoon was occupied with practice, and so it was the Thursday of Yardley’s third contest that the opportunity at last occurred. But before that other events of interest had happened.

There was, for example, the hockey game with Carrel’s School, the second contest on the Yardley schedule. Carrel’s presented a strong and experienced seven, of which two members were past-masters in the gentle art of shooting goals from all sorts of impossible angles. Dave Henry, the Blue’s goal-tend, was considered rather a competent youth, but that Saturday afternoon he had his hands full, so full, in fact, that he couldn’t begin to hold all that came to them, with the result that Carrel’s School led six goals to one at the end of the first twenty-minute period and in the last half, in spite of Yardley’s frantic, determined endeavors to hold her at bay and score a few tallies herself, quite swept the Blue’s defense off its feet and scored pretty much as she wanted to. It was a rattling good game, in spite of its one-sidedness and the audience which lined the barrier, stamping its feet and blowing on its numbed fingers, yelled itself quite hoarse before the referee’s whistle blew for the last time. Seventeen to four was the score then, and although the Yardley players gathered together and waved their sticks and cheered tiredly for their rivals, there was a noticeable lack of enthusiasm in that cheer. The wiseacres had to go back three years before they could find another such overwhelming defeat. Captain Crowell took the beating somewhat to heart, and even Arnold, who was not easily cast-down, moped all the evening and refused to be comforted by Homer or Toby or any one else.

On the following Monday Framer took Flagg’s place at point and Rose gave way to Fanning at left wing. Also Crowell experimented with the four-man defense style of play, which, while not so good for scoring, at least is theoretically a fine style to keep your goal inviolate. Crumbie was played back with Halliday on defense, leaving only three men to meet the opposing attack until it was well down toward the goal. The second team was summoned onto the ice “to be the goat,” as Sid Creel phrased it, and there was a very pretty struggle. The second swept through that four-man defense for three goals in each period, causing Captain Crowell grave doubts as to the value of it. But the first won, for neither Warren, who played through the first period, or Toby, who officiated in the second, could stop more than half the shots of the first team forwards. Sid Creel, slow-moving and apparently sleepy, was a tower of strength at point that afternoon, and Beech was as clever as usual at cover, but Crowell and Arnold Deering were slippery skaters and accurate shots, and the illusive puck went into the second’s net nine times in all.

The next day the four-man back idea worked better, Crumbie having by then a better knowledge of his duties on defense and refusing to be drawn out of position. Beech sought to meet the first team’s new tactics by adapting the Canadian scheme of playing three forwards abreast and the fourth behind. Beech selected the part of rover, but it can’t be said that he made a shining success of it. In any event, the first regained its old superiority over the scrub seven and won easily. And, with a few exceptions, every following day witnessed a similar result until, near the middle of the season, one Toby Tucker willed otherwise.

Greenburg High School followed Carrel’s and met overwhelming defeat at the hands of the Blue. But Greenburg was inexperienced and her players were poor skaters and the result had been expected. The only incident meriting mention was a fine goal by Arnold Deering in the second period. Arnold had stolen the puck from a Greenburg player in front of his own goal, had evaded the forwards, passed to Crowell near the middle of the ice and had then received the puck back again when the Greenburg cover point had challenged. The pass, however, had gone behind him and he had had to turn and take it as it caromed off the boards. He was not then in position to shoot and so, after breaking past a member of the enemy team, he skated in, seeking a chance to pass back to Crowell. Crowell shouted and Arnold slid the puck along the ice, but at that moment a Greenburg youth charged into Crowell and the puck dribbled by. Fanning should have rescued it, but Fanning was far over at the other side and skating hard, and the Greenburg cover point was the lucky one. But the cover point hesitated just an instant too long and Arnold, doubling back, swept past him, stole the disc from under his nose, dodged two opponents and bore down on the Greenburg point. Crowell, who had sprawled on the ice, tried to get into position for the pass, but was too late, and Arnold, sensing it, dodged the point, keeping the puck away from the latter’s swinging stick by a veritable miracle, circled the net at the rear and then, as he headed back close to the goal, slipped the puck deftly between the post and the goal-tend’s skate. As he did so two of the enemy crashed into him, the net careened, the goal-tend sat down on the ice and in an instant the air was full of kicking legs and thrashing sticks. But the puck had gone in before the upset and the goal umpire’s hand had already been raised when he was forced to flee from the careening net.

Greenburg protested somewhat perfunctorily and the audience cheered. And Arnold was hauled out of the melee with a two-inch gash over his left eye that put him out of the contest and gave him a desperate, piratical look for several days.

Of course, viewed from the standpoint of perfect hockey, Arnold’s exploit was nothing to cheer for. When a wing player has to skate all over the shop and finally hook the puck in from back of goal he naturally suggests to the unbiased mind that there was a lamentable absence of team-play; which there was. Captain Crowell knew better than to praise that performance. Instead, he told Arnold that it was good skating, blamed himself for letting the cover point upset him and waded into Fanning for being out of position. But the audience liked it immensely and for some days Arnold’s exploit was the subject of enthusiastic praise.

I forgot to say that the score of the Yardley-Greenburg High game was 16 to 3. Not that it matters greatly, however.

You are not to suppose that Toby spent all his time and thought on the enticing game of hockey. On the contrary, Toby was putting in some good licks at studying about this time. For one thing, he felt in honor bound to vindicate the faculty’s selection of T. Tucker as a recipient of a Ripley Scholarship, and for another thing mid-year examinations were on. “Mid-years” are serious things, and it behooves a chap to buckle down and get himself up on his studies, and especially those studies which, all during the Fall Term, he has sort of squeezed through on. So Toby worked hard and burned much midnight oil—only it happened to be gas—and did excellently well in everything save Latin and not so very badly in that. Poor Homer Wilkins came several croppers and for a time anticipated severing his connection with the school. But he managed by dint of many solemn promises and extraordinary application to weather the storm. Arnold, too, had his troubles, but they were not serious. Only two members of the first hockey team found themselves in hot water, Henry and Dunphy, and these were barred from playing until they had removed their conditions. There was said to be some doubt about Dunphy’s return to the team that season, but Henry’s absence from the ice was believed to be a matter of only a fortnight. Orson Crowell accepted the matter philosophically. After all, things might have been worse. He recalled one occasion, in his third class year, when exactly six of a hockey squad of fifteen had been put on probation after mid-years. Remembering that, he concluded that the temporary loss of Henry and the possibly final loss of Dunphy were not worth worrying about. Frank Lamson took Henry’s place at the net and tried very hard to fill Henry’s shoes. He never succeeded, however, even though, the week after the Greenburg game, an old-boy and former hockey captain named Loring, patriotically responded to the call for aid and put in five days of coaching, paying a great deal of attention to the goal-tend. But even Alfred Loring could not make a perfect net-man of Frank Lamson, although Frank did improve quite perceptibly, and it was thought advisable to draw on the second team for a substitute pending Henry’s release from probation, and the choice fell naturally on Toby, who, by that time had plainly shown his superiority to Warren.