Making History

With Joe Malone and Cyclone Taylor both chasing history, I knew it would be an exciting finish to Season 14. Taylor got the record-setting party started in his team's penultimate game. Facing their bitter rivals, the Bulldogs, the Vics trailed 1-0 in the second half of the second period. Taylor fired a pass to feisty superstar Newsy Lalonde, who glided through the defense to beat Hap Holmes on a clean breakaway. The assist brought Taylor to 40 points. And then the same thing happened again. The Dogs won the ensuing faceoff and tried to dump the puck into the offensive zone, but Taylor snagged it and found Lalonde with another sweet pass. Lalonde skated in and scored again. That second assist brought Taylor up to a record-tying 41 points. The superstar broke his own record with a third-period goal. Although the Vics would go on to lose the game 4-3, Taylor had made history. After the final game of the season (more on that below), Taylor would finish with 44 points. 

And what about Malone and his 19 goals? In their penulatimate game, Malone and the Bearcats faced a Comets team that was deadlocked with the Cats in the standings. With the home-team advantage of the last change, the Comets were able to deploy all their best defensive forwards whenever Malone was on the ice. The star left winger was held to a lone assist in a 2-1 loss that guaranteed the Bearcats -- the defending Creighton Cup champions -- would finish in the fourth and final playoff spot.

As luck would have it, Taylor's team and Malone's team would face each other on the final day of the regular season. Taylor had already broken his own record, but would Malone set a record of his own at the Victorias' expense? Things got off to auspicious start for Phantom Joe when he tallied early in the first period. That goal brought him to 20 on the year -- making him just the second player (after Frank McGee) to reach that milestone. In the third period, Malone lit the lamp again to draw even with McGee. The clock would run out before he could score again, but with 21 goals in 20 games, Malone at least earned a share of the record.

Chasing History

Season 14 of my Strat-O-Matic historical hockey league is barreling toward an epic conclusion, and two superstar players are chasing history!

After spending a couple of years watching the Millionaires' Mickey MacKay win the scoring championship, rover Cyclone Taylor has reclaimed his mantle as the league's premiere point producer. Not only will he run away with the title this year, he also has a very good shot at breaking his own record for the most points in a single 20-game regular season. Taylor racked up 41 points back in Season 8, and currently he's sitting on 39 points with two games left to play. The Victorias have quite an offensive juggernaut this season, so I expect Taylor to blow that record out of the water. 

More interesting, perhaps, is the chase for the single-season goal-scoring mark. That record is 21, set in Season 8 -- the same year Taylor hit 41 points -- by Frank "One-Eye" McGee, the league's all-time leader in goals scored. 21 goals in a 20-game season seemed about as secure a record as any in this league, especially now that we're in an era of vastly improved goaltending and defense. For comparison, the top goal scorer last season was MacKay with 12, and the year before that it was "Phantom" Joe Malone with 15. But more than 21?! It could happen! Malone is absolutely on fire in the second half of Season 14; through 18 games, he has 19 goals. If he gets three more in his final two games, he'll break McGee's record and set a new standard for goal-scoring prowess.

Clayface Premiere

So we're getting a DCU Clayface movie before a Batman movie? Okay...well, anyway, it premieres today!

Damn Normans

It's the 960th anniversary of the Battle of Hastings. Yes, I'm still bitter about it.

Season 14 Update

I've got another Strat-O-Matic hockey season going on in the background, and at this point all six teams have played half of their 20-game regular-season schedule. The Victorias, who have stumbled a bit in recent years, are back on top of the standings at 7-1-2. Their aggressive rebuild strategy of bringing in speedy forwards to create a more up-tempo attack has been paying off in a big way; the Vics lead the league in most offensive categories, including a power play that's clicking at 40%. In second place we have the Millionaires, winners of the last two first-place pennants, who are having a strong season at 5-3-2. The Bearcats, last year's surprise Creighton Cup winners, are treading water at .500 (4-4-2). As for the Comets, Bulldogs, and Thistles, well, one of those teams will make the playoffs by default. 

Looking now at individual performances, "Phantom" Joe Malone is leading the league with 9 goals and is the frontrunner for Forward MVP. Defenseman Cyclone Taylor has racked up a league-best 21 points as he looks to reclaim the scoring title from the Millies' Mickey MacKay, who won it in Seasons 12 and 13. Taylor's teammate Hobey Baker is second in hte league with 18 points, and could give Malone a run for his money in the Forward MVP race. I should also note that George Hay, the Vics' big offseason trade acquisition, has been thriving in his new home and is tied for second in goals with 7. Heralded rookie right wings Punch Broadbent (Comets) and Babe Dye (Millies) haven't seen the hype translate into results just yet, and it's hard to say which one has the edge for Rookie of the Year. There's no such ambiguity among the goaltenders, as Bowse Hutton of the Vics has a commanding lead in save percentage (.941), ahead of Georges Vezina (Millies) and Hap Holmes (Bulldogs), both at .929.

What's the big storyline for the second half of the season? It could be which teams don't make the playoffs. There's an especially talented draft class coming up for Season 15, so the teams that crater now are likely to get some major talent for next year.

Cartography Woes

After no small amount of frustration and way more hours than I would have expected, the Torchlight campaign setting at last has a complete world map. Now we just need to find the time to play the actual campaign...

Torchlight Ignited

This month should see the release of some cool new Blade Runner-themed Lumibricks that will enhance my growing city of Vesper. I want the city to look and feel epic in scope before we start the campaign. I'm also not in any great hurry to begin because, well, the new edition of Cypher doesn't include cyberpunk info in the core rulebooks! MCG maintains a cyberpunk campaign setting, however, so I'm hopeful we'll see cyberpunk content in the upcoming player supplement that was part of the Backerkit campaign for the second edition. That book likely won't be in our hands until early in the new year. 

In the meantime, we'll test out Cypher 2 with a return to the Torchlight setting. Nathaniel and Amy will play in person, while Matthew will participate remotely and asynchronously from his distant outpost in Indiana. Torchlight was an easy call because I already have a campaign written for it -- something I drafted back in the days of Covid but never got around to using.