A VIEW TO A KILL

As I know, and you all know, Neon will not be losing a single game this season. This is not an outlandish, sarcastic, or otherwise-motivated prediction...it is just not possible for Captain Vankoughnett's creation to fall this Fall season, barring a team-wide food poisoning episode, or some other such calamity. Captain Shawna Hamon's White were next on the Neon chopping block, and while they put up a very noble and noteworthy fight through two periods of play, the third proved their undoing. Alex 'Thanos' Giummo put Neon in front with his fifth of the season at 6:55 in the first (Jim LaGrossa), but White would not allow Neon to widen that lead, and Matt Rogers' first of the season at 4:40 in the second (Luke Wolmer & Alex Rockoff) brought the teams level at one apiece through twenty minutes of play. Even the shot totals were close to that point in the proceedings, with Neon holding just a 17-15 edge. The shot totals were not remotely close in the final frame, however, with Neon blasting fifteen chances on net to White's three. Captain Vankoughnett staked his team to a second lead with 9:28 to play (TK Mason & Gordon Schmidt), and Mason followed with her first of the season at 6:26 (LaGrossa & Schmidt) to add all the comfort Neon would need to coast to a second win. Giummo's sixth of the season came on the powerplay at 2:24 (Vankoughnett & Scott Wieland), and Wieland added his first of the season at 1:59 (Giummo) to round out the scoring in a close-at-first-but-ultimately-not-at-all-close 5-1 win over White. Mason earned first star honors for a truly terrific turn...one of the best games of her SDFHL career, by all accounts. Nick Meglich 17/18 snagged the third star nod for another strong showing, and Giummo's 2 and 1 settled him in as second star. John Kushneryk (27/32) can certainly hold his head high for keeping White in the fight through two, but the inevitable is inevitable, and the only silver lining for Neon opponents is the 'well, we got that auto loss out of the way' postgame exhale.

Captain Jeremy Copp's 'Dye Another Grey' is off to a bit of a messy start to the Fall 2026 season. While Grey did secure a 4-2 over White in their opener, it's (very) safe to say that it was not a 'clean' nor 'convincing' performance...narrowly scraping past an undermanned and underpowered team in a chaotic, chirpy, controversial whirlwind of a game. Copp & Company hoped to settle down and find a (much) finer form against Captain Mason Holcomb's Pink...a team looking to bounce back from a 3-2 Week One loss to Charcoal. Grey was happy to FINALLY welcome back goalie Jon Cima, who missed most of the previous season and Grey's first game of this season with a gnarly thumb injury. Cima would not have the luxury of 'easing back into things', with the likes of Kyle Snyder warming Holcomb up at the other end (*foreshadowing*). Snyder scored both of Pink's goals in their opener, and he opened their second game with three in the first period...7:16 from Justin Stege, 6:20 from John Kushneryk and Elyse Shattuck, and an unassisted third at 3:36. Snyder was not (remotely) done, however, notching his fourth of the game at 5:29 in the second to open a 4-0 Pink lead with half the game to play. Mark Daquipa provided Grey's first response at 0:53 in the second (Rob Gaudio), and while the late period goal provided some lift for Grey, it was going to take something special in the third to rally out of this rout. Mark DeGraffenreid's first of the season at 8:44 (Gaudio & Jordan Pynn) had Grey's hopes at doing just that soaring, but Snyder's FIFTH of the game at 7:29 (Arnold Gonzales) grounded Grey's spirits and restored a three goal gap. Gaudio cut the lead back to two once again with his third of the season at 4:09 (DeGraffenreid & Captain Copp), but Snyder would complete the DOUBLE HAT TRICK with an unassisted SIXTH OF THE GAME at 2:23 to seal Grey's 6-3 losing fate. If you're scoring at home, that's eight total goals for Pink over their first two games...ALL coming courtesy of Mr. Snyder. As incredible as that feat is, it begs questions about situations that might require 'secondary offense' for Pink, let alone games that Snyder may miss. The rest of the roster will look to find their respective firsts of the season this Sunday, as the now 1-1-0 Pink face the (spoiler alert) now 1-1-0 Blue...

Both Captain Wasif Hussain's 'Brownfinger' and Captain Bryan Ossa's 'REDACTED' found their winning footing in Week One, making this Week Two middle matchup the one and only BATTLE OF UNDEFEATED TEAMS. It's early in the season, and hardly time to start suggesting that any team other than Neon is a heavy favorite in a given game, so we would surely see a tight tilt between these two teams...or not. Yes, definitely not. Owen Perks took the scoring stud baton from Kyle Snyder and ran circles around Brown with it in the first, periodically bashing an opponent on the head with it, for good measure. Perks' first of the season/game/period came at 8:29 (Hima Joshi), his second just FIVE seconds later, his third at 6:36 (Mostafa Azab & Gary Peters), and his fourth at a gut-punchy 0:32 (Peters). Peters would add an even-more-gut-punchy-maybe-even-a-bonus-groin-kicky goal with just 0:03 to play in the first to push Charcoal's lead to boat race lengths, 5-0. The second period was starkly scoreless, by contrast, and as crazy as it seems, Brown was actually out front on the shot count through two (16-15). Brown's shot lead widened in the third (9-5), but not a single salvo would find twine behind super sub, Don Tran (25/25). Eric Willard accounted for the only goal in the third, his third of the season at 8:13 (Perks), but Charcoal would only really need Perks' first from early in the first, as they cruised to a 6-0 win over Brown to keep pace with the lead pack at 2-0-0. Will Heinl (14/20) absorbed his/his team's first loss of the season, and while I did not see any of the game first hand, I think it is safe to say that his stat line is more a reflection of Perks' brilliance than Heinl's shortcoming. Captain Ossa himself was not in the lineup for this one, but he will lead his team into a second straight BATTLE OF UNDEFEATED TEAMS this Sunday, as Charcoal faceoff against Captain Dorothy Kline's (spoiler alert) 2-0-0 Teal.

The penultimate (why do we have a word for this) game on the Week Two slate was the only BATTLE OF UNFEATED TEAMS, with Captain Emily Bennington's Green taking on Captain Ryan Karns' Blue. Blue were coming off their auto-loss in an 8-2 orgy of Neon omnipotence, while Green suffered a more conventional 5-3 loss to Teal, having waited until the third to show signs of life with an ultimately fruitless rally. Barring the first tie on the Fall 2026 season, one of these two would find their way to the middle of the pack with a first win, and the other would find themselves sharing the basement with the other two 0-2-0 teams. The other asterisk in Blue's opening loss (aside from just the fact that they were facing Neon), was that they were without the services of Brendan Jew, Jenna Chercoe, Mark Nagy, and Jason Olver. Jenna would find herself elsewhere once again (perhaps a family reunion in Winnipeg, since brother Mark was also out), and Olver would also remain MIA, but with Nagy and Jew back, and Shelby Shattuck standing in for Jenna, Blue knew they at least had a fighting chance in Week Two. A scoreless first (it's back!) saw Green outshoot Blue 8-4, but it was Blue who would break through first in the second, with Josh Wirt registering his third of the season at 3:44 (Shattuck & Nagy). Green's shot edge stood at 14-10 through two, and they clearly pressed hard in the third to finish with a 26-15 'win' in that department, but Nagy's powerplay strike at 9:09 (Wirt) had Blue that much closer to, you know, an actual win. Jew joined the scoring fun for returning players with his first of the season at 1:33, and unassisted empty-netter that he can tell his grandkids was a bar-down beauty someday. Will Heinl (26/26), was clearly the star of the show in a SUPER sub shutout stint that kept Blue cool, calm, and in control from start to finish in spite of a strong Green attack. The 3-0 win pushed Blue to 1-1-0, comfortably in the mid-table mix, with the 'auto loss' behind them and fellow 1-1-0 Pink up next. Don Tran (12/15) absorbed his and his team's second straight loss to open the season, and the twist between these two goalies is both eerie and amusing. Heinl backstopped his actual team in a losing effort to super sub Tran the game prior, with Tran posting a 25/25 shutout in (long lost cousin) Chris Tran's stead. Tran and his actual team then lost to super sub Heinl, who posted a 26/26 sparkler in lieu of Matt Henderson!

The Week Two nightcap saw Captain Dorothy Kline's Teal squaring off against Captain Grant Goins' Maroon. The former scored five goals in their opening week win, while the latter allowed five goals in their opening week loss, and while again it is far too early in the season to make accurate predictions about most matchups, the absence of both Chris Malki and (shocker) Justin Ker from Maroon's lineup were reason enough alone to have Teal as heavy betting favorites. It was another scoreless first (told you it was back!), with neither side even mustering much in the way of shots (5-2, in Maroon's favor), and it was very nearly a scoreless second, as well. Josh Tran finally broke the seal with just 0:13 to play in the middle stanza (Jackson Tomaszewski & Tom Darlington), and as these recaps have highlighted repeatedly, those late period goals are especially brutal blows. Still, down just 1-0 going into the third...certainly a position Maroon would have accepted blindly in an (imagined) pregame proposal coming into the game with two of their top offensive threats out of action. The offensive threats for Teal produce plenty of 'action' in the third, with (*double-checks box score*), yes...TOM Darlington netting his first of the season at 9:07 (Nick Vacchio), Tomaszewski's first of the season coming at 6:37 (Captain Kline), Adam Schindler's FOURTH coming at 6:04 (Janice & Tom Darlington), and Schindler's FIFTH at 0:57 (Janice Darlington) rounding out the 5-0 rout of Maroon. Only a clean sheet from Chuck Bender (16/16) could keep a scorching Schindler from his second straight first star to start the season, and TOM (yes...I have now triple-checked, folks) Darlington nestled in as the bronze star with a 1 and 2 (rare) gem. While there was some measure of 'moral victory' for Gabe Davenport (10/15) and Maroon for keeping it close (VERY nearly tied) through two, it is clear that they will need MUCH more scoring (one total goal in two games) to carry them through any given Sunday, much less enough Sundays to stay out of the cellar.