2011 PA Ice Hockey State Championships

This past Saturday was the final day for ice hockey photos. There were three games to determine the State Champions in the three divisions: A, AA, and AAA. I shot from the penalty box for all three games - and forgot just how cold it is standing there.

Here's a few of my favorites:

2011 Flyers Cup

The Flyers Cup was a little split up this year. Normally the three divisions championship games are on the same night. The highest division got to play at the rink where the Flyers play, the Wells Fargo Center, while the two lower divisions play at local ice rinks. I didn't have a chance to go through my photos and post any here before they were posted to the website from the game that was played at the Wells Fargo Center, but there's a link to the game on one of my favorite local sports blog websites, crossingbroad.com

The photos below are from the A championship game on March 18th at Iceline. My photography partner in the sports photos actually made it to the finals with the team he coaches. It looked like they were the dominant team, but had 8 penalties called against them. They scored a goal in the early third period to go ahead, but later gave up a goal and Springfield won it in overtime.

Opening Day

The Phillies made 20 fiberglass Phanatics and placed them around town in celebration of the season starting. I passed this one on Saturday while walking around town.

PA State Champs

This past Thursday was the PA State Championships for High School Ice Hockey. Two of our accounts were in the finals (there's three different levels). All three games were played in Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh. This was my first time to Pittsburgh, but I didn't really get to see much of the area. We did get to see just about the entire arena, from the tunnels under the stands and locker rooms to being down on the ice.

Stadium overview


Being in a professional rink, there is advertising all over the boards and even on the ice. It's tough to get a clean shot, especially from down low.


Anyone hungry for Dunkin Donuts?

Flyers Cup 2010

This years Flyers Cup was played at a few different venues. The AAA game at the Wachovia Center, the AA game in Hatfield and the rest in West Chester. The AA championship game was last night. Downingtown East vs Council Rock South. Downingtown East is one of my accounts so to see them make it to the finals and win was exciting. There wasn't a spot open where I could shoot without looking through the glass or a net, so I just shot from behind the net.




Downingtown East's fans came out to support the team and had a good time doing it. I especially like the kid on the left who wore his shoulder pads and helmet without a shirt.

Hockey

The end of high school hockey season is in sight. That means The Flyers Cup is right around the corner. We photographed a handful of the local high school hockey teams this year - both action and team shots. I shot a bunch of games this weekend, from Varsity on Friday night all the way down to the Elementary teams. It was a good warm up for the Flyers Cup.

Philllies Post Season

I won the lottery...for standing room only tickets for the first Phillies playoff game against the Colorado Rockies. It was a beautiful day, albeit a little windy. Cliff Lee threw a complete game and only gave up one run. Bethany and I missed a few of the runs because I wanted to go up behind home plate to make the photo below. Big thanks to Jimmy for getting me down into the camera well to be able to make a few photos of the field without people in front of me.

NASCAR at Dover

My little sister loves Jeff Gordon, so I always try to get a good stock shot of him for her. He was competitive in the race but never really had a chance to catch Jimmy Johnson.

Jimmy Johnson leads Chase points leader Mark Martin through the third turn.

Unfortunately Brian Vickers had a rough day and never had a chance to get near the lead. He finished 18th.

KR, Brian and Rob pose for a photo on the starting grid. We had a chance to talk with him about surfing and he said he'd longboarded a few times while on a trip to Costa Rica.

This year I was invited to come down to the NASCAR race at Dover to hang out with the Red Bull race team. It was a completely different experience than last year. I didn't have any assignments other than to shoot photos of Rob Kelly and Kevin Richards with Red Bull's driver Brian Vickers. Kevin won a bar tending contest Red Bull put on and the prize was a VIP day at a NASCAR race. I've been friends with them both for a while, so it was a lot of fun.

TD Bank Philadelphia Cycling Championships

Riders make their way up the Manayunk Wall

After a watching a lap of both men's and women's rider make their way up the wall, we walked over to where they start to come down and around this corner.

Riders would cut the corner so close to the curb my camera lens almost hit them

This year marked the 25th running of the Philadelphia International Championship. Sponsored by TD Bank and presented by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the 156-mile classic remains the longest running and most important single-day cycling road race in the United States. Bethany and I walked around the course and I shot a few photos before my camera ran out of batteries - whoops..

PA State High School Ice Hockey Championships

It's a shame this is one of the feature photos here because this kid played great and kept Council Rock in the game

'gotta support the team

This was the final weekend for high school hockey. The winners from last weeks games at the Flyers Cup (see below) and the Penguins Cup (played in Pittsburgh) played at Ice Line in West Chester. This was a weekend of good goalie shots for me. It seems a lot easier to shoot them when you're in the stands or in the press box as opposed to being on the ice like we normally shoot. The A game, West Chester Rustin vs. Mars was pretty unexciting except that the arena was filled with Rustin's fans. Rustin blew them out and the game was pretty much over by the end of the first period. The AA game featured a team from Latrobe who have gone 40-0 this season. They were actually down going into the third period, but scored two unanswered goals in the third to take the title. As expected LaSalle beat the team from Shaler to win the AAA division.

Flyers Cup Finals

This was probably my last time in the Spectrum, so it was only fitting to give it a farewell photo..

#88 scored the winning goal for West Chester Rustin by making a diving play

All eight teams attracted a pretty good crowd. Some were more into it than other as seen demonstrated above by the fans of North Penn High School.

Again, North Penn's fans supporting the team.

Tough to beat a good stick bending slap shot photo.

LaSalle's #18 scores the go-ahead goal during the second period.

LaSalle celebrates by showing off the Flyers Cup to their fans.

This past Saturday was the championships for all the teams playing in the Flyers Cup. There were a few different games; Girls Varsity, Varsity A, Varsity AA, and the final Varsity AAA game. I shot most of the action from in front of the press box at center ice and moved down for a period or two to shoot through the port holes in the glass in the corners (which weren't very big and didn't allow for too many great photos, but a cool angle).