Heartbreak at L'Arpidrome - Caps lose 2-1

Friday night's game ended in tears with the the Little Caps losing 2-1 to the Swiss team from the Leysin Sports Academy. The loss was heartbreaking, because the Caps had fought back from a 1-0 deficit in the second by tying the score early in the third, only to commit a penalty with 1:04 to go in the game. Leysin converted on the Power Play and scored the game-winning goal with :34 seconds left on the clock.

The Lil' Caps did not bring their best stuff tonight; they seemed half a step behind the pace of their two previous games. How can one blame them, though. They've played 7 games in 10 days and must be absolutely exhausted by now. The Caps brought enough of their game to play well enough to keep with Leysin, never give up, overcome a deficit in the 3rd, and play the game to within 34 seconds of a tie.

Here is the unfortunate sequence of events that led to the penalty at 1:04:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ON1Dh8KNNlM

That video clip is the Lil' Caps' season in a nutshell: a lousy line change, followed by a careless penalty that gives the other side an offensive advantage that we cannot meet.

If you can take watching it, here is the game-winning goal on the power play, 30 seconds later:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nHbePW0qr8

I'm heartbroken for Henry and the team. They played with grit today, and they came up short at the bitter end, and it must taste bitter right now to them. However, these past 10 days in Québec have been so remarkable, and so... magical, that the loss suffered in this way, in this game, is but a minor component of the much, much larger positive, superlative experience of the 2013 Tournoi International de Hockey Pee-Wee de Québec. As I wrote after watching the team's game at the Colisée last Friday (a lifetime ago), this has been a rite of passage for these young boys and Kayla, and such an experience - by definition - includes all the facets of life's experiences, bon et mauvais. These boys and girl are forever changed, for the better, as a result of their time in this beautiful, snowy, hockey-mad paradis. They'll remember their opponent's names 40 years from now. They'll have a fondness in their hearts for Québec and her people for the rest of their lives. That's a sobering, lovely, and extremely comforting realization.

Kayla and Henry went home with Patrick and his family (all five of whom came to the game to watch!) for one more evening à la maison. I'm so glad they get to spend one more night with their lovely famille d'accueil. Patrick will know for sure how to cheer them up.

Given all that we have done over the past 10 days, it was only proper that I was able to fit in one more amazing experience AFTER the game tonight. Once the bus arrived back to the Château, an hour later than expected due to the late start of the game, I hustled up to my room, put on my shoes and dress jacket, and scurried down to the ballroom to join my Québec Seaway friends for a lovely maritime industry dinner. My good friend Marc had invited me to join him and his lovely wife at his table along with other old and new friends. I quickly switched gears (and languages and moods) from the hockey world into the Seaway world, and had myself a lovely soirée finale au Québec. It was the perfect antidote to the heartbreak at l'Arpidrome, and I am indebted to mon bon ami Marc for the invitation. After dinner, and a rather bizarre but enjoyable floor show (hey, it's Québec after all!) of gorgeous belly dancers wearing all sort of feathers attached to parts of their bodies and dancing to a techno-Brazilian-salsa beat, we retired to the Frontenac bar. Last call was in the observatory section overlooking the lights of Vieux Québec with the ice-strewn St. Lawrence floating by down below. The conversation was très bonne, the view was gorgeous, one was among friends with a wine glass in hand, and tomorrow Henry and I were headed home -- a fitting nightcap to an amazing, one-of-a-kind experience in Québec.