The greatest rivalry in Junior Hockey the Florida Eels vs the Jr Blades lived up to its billing this past week. All I can say is WOW. On Thursday night at Hertz Arena the Jr Blades played host to both the Eels Premier and Elite teams. In the Premier game the Jr Blades got out to 3 goal lead at the end of the 2nd period. This was a packed crown as so many Eels fans came to watch their guys. Some in the arena were a bit nervous thinking oh geeze the Premier team suffered a setback last Sunday at home and were concerned the boys were going to fall. But as the Blades announcer said on Hockey TV, the Jr Blades can’t come out sitting on their laurels. One thing for sure you can expect the Eels coaches to regroup their players and turn on their explosive offense and make a hard push.

Well in the locker room Coach Frankie Scarpaci did what he does best and that is to not panic. To make adjustments and get his players back into the game. He has some of the best players in the league. Many of the guys were nursing illnesses the flu etc. He needed 20 minutes. Twenty minutes to put it all together. And he laid out some creative plays. Some nobody has ever seen from the Eels. He also knew his goalie Jakub Kostelny would do his job. This kid truly is a pro type goalie. He is a World Junior Veteran from Slovakia. Without doubt we consider him the best goalie in the league. And he proved just that. For the next 20 minutes he was flawless. He not only plays that superb butterfly style he is extremely acrobatic and battles for every puck and he turned away everything the Blades had to bring.

As the Eels hit the ice it did not take long before they came a storming back.
The scoring went as follows:
1:13 EEL Jens Petersen (9) ASST: Demeed Podrezov (22), Jared Figueroa (21)

1:33 EEL Jens Petersen (10) ASST: Demeed Podrezov (23), Jared Figueroa (22)

4:23 EEL Jared Figueroa (17) ASST: Jens Petersen (29), Demeed Podrezov (24)

17:15 EEL Keve Toth (6) ASST: Yakov Yakzhin (16), Regnars Udris (19)

18:56 EEL Regnars Udris (5) ASST: Jared Figueroa (23), Demeed Podrezov (25) (PP)

19:06 EEL Demeed Podrezov (8) ASST: Adam Gaudet (16), Jens Petersen (30)

Take a look back for a second. Does anyone doubt the Blades woke up a sleeping bear? Talk about an explosive offense. Talk about emptying the tank. When the Eels came out from the 2nd intermission of play, they knew they had to bring a high-octane game and the pucks would not go in by a mediocre style of play. They knew it would have to be their typical Eels forecheck and shed the cobwebs off of their performance from last Sunday and the 1st  and 2 period of this game. These boys train like no other team 3-hours per day and they showed it Thursday. To say they were hungry and determined to win would be the understatement of the year. They are destined. They are on a mission. Lastly you can only imagine the smiles on their faces. They are a team. And they showed it Thursday as they have all season long. And they did it against their toughest rivalry in their barn. Great job guys