Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Wild Bus Ride for Georgia

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Wild Bus Ride for Georgia

    From HockeyYall.com

    (Blog focusing on SEC hockey and the SouthEast region they play in)

    Georgia and Alabama split their important weekend series (see On the Fly for details), but the real story was the Ice Dogs' 21-hour misadventure following their victory Friday night in Pelham, Ala. Or, as a tired Mike Legros, a Georgia assistant coach, put it late Saturday night, "We've never had a road trip to our own rink before."
    Normally a 2-1/2 hour drive, the Ice Dogs' extended return trip to the Atlanta area involved a fire department, police, a policeman's wife, an overnight stay in a Birmingham-area motel, two tow trucks and three buses, including the one taking the Alabama team to Duluth, Ga., for the second game of the home-and-home series.
    This saga began not long after Georgia, No. 14 in the ACHA South Region ranking, beat the No. 9 Frozen Tide 4-0 at the Pelham Civic Center. More about the saga in a minute; first, the prelude to this story. The bus that was supposed to transport the Dogs from Athens to Pelham Friday afternoon developed frozen hydraulic lines and had to be replaced.
    Now, about that return trip to Georgia. The chartered bus that wound up bringing the Dogs to Pelham, broke down on I-65 at around 11 p.m., about two miles into the return trip. Unfortunately, the bus came to a stop against a concrete wall on an overpass, leaving no room for the team or the driver to get out. A police officer stopped to investigate and called the Hoover Fire Dept., which sent its emergency response bus to take the Georgia team to Engine Co. 3, Fire Station 4. And a tow truck was summoned to pull the bus away from the wall so the team could exit.
    In the meantime, Legros instructed the players to huddle in the back of the bus to keep warm. Good thing he did. It was a couple hours before the HFD bus arrived, and the players were dressed only in nylon warmup suits.
    At the fire station, the firemen handed out bagels and hot chocolate, and blankets so the players could sleep on the floor. "The fire department guys in Hoover were outstanding," says Georgia coach John Hoos.
    At about 4 a.m. the charter bus company informed the Georgia team that a replacement bus would have to come from Atlanta and wouldn't reach Hoover until 1 p.m. Saturday. At this point, an exasperated Hoos had the firemen take the team to a local motel.
    The replacement bus, an older model, picked up the team when promised and drove them to their original bus to recover their equipment. Thirty miles farther down the road, the clutch on that bus failed, leaving the team stranded near Riverside, Ala. The wife of a Riverside Police Dept. officer provided the phone numbers of car rental agencies in the area, but none was open.
    Hoos contacted Buddy Demare of the Alabama hockey program to see if the Frozen Tide had left Birmingham for Atlanta. Fortunately, the Frozen Tide's bus was just five exits behind the Georgia bus. Assistant coach David Noble, who was to be the team's bench boss that night in the absence of head coach Jeff Chesseman, had his driver stop and pick up the Georgia team. This bus arrived at the IceForum in Duluth at 8 p.m., an hour before game time.
    "The result of the game (a 5-1 Alabama win) wasn't good for us, but the willingness of the Alabama hockey program to help us out really exemplifies the fraternity of our college hockey programs in the South," says Hoos. "We can be rivals on the ice but work together off the ice for the better of the game."
    Doesn't sound like alot of fun

  • #2
    Re: Wild Bus Ride for Georgia

    Man... road trip from hell.

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: Wild Bus Ride for Georgia

      That's incredible. At least no one was seriously hurt.
      Colorado College Tigers

      Comment

      Working...
      X