I can't leave without throwing something else out there, I figured I'd make a little post talking about the Shovels for historic purposes. If other team owners want to follow suit that'd be cool but it's totally voluntary.

The Swisston Snow Shovels are named after the countless stone shovels New Danzilonan resident RoarkLeSkif went through when constructing the Swisston Hockey Rink. The flooring under the ice is comprised of 98% snow taken straight from the ground in Swisston, which recently went through some climate change and no longer gets snow. So when visiting the small rural island, you can see the lines and rows of grass in the snow where Roark was digging it up and packing it into blocks.

The team started with red jerseys with vertical black stripes, and keep in mind these were the days before helmets were introduced into the league. In fact, most teams didn't even have jerseys but rather the players wore their normal every day clothes to games, but they did have team colors for their logos.

Roark LeSkif went through a religious conversion however early in the season, converting to Purprism and became the leading theologist on the religion after writing his controversial holy book, Purpura Fidas, which loosely translates to "Purple Faith." With his conversion the team colors were changed to purple and white, and have remained that way ever since.

When the inaugural NDZHL season began, there were only three teams, Swisston, the Little Latvia Grizzlies, and the Mt. Augusta Avalanche. While Swisston and LL were comprised of homegrown players Mt. Augusta had a diverse selection of players from all over, and managed to dominate the standings in the regular season.

Swisston was always drawn to a rougher style of hockey, much like LL was, and whenever the two teams met fans were sure to see a fight break out. However when RoarkLeSkif and Neondan99 met Mt. Augusta in the regular season, the team hit a rough patch.

A mid-season pickup in the form of axwin34 proved helpful as the new resident of NDZ could find ways through opponents' defenses and became a staple of their offense. However Mt. Augusta's graceful and fluid offensive maneuvers bested the Shovels, and they were never able to figure them out. Enter peakman2. His debut game came during an away game at LL at it was here he earned his nickname, "The Iron Curtain." Up until this point the league had seen little in the way of defense, and peak showed everyone that it was just as important to stop goals as it was to score them.

The Shovels seemed to have found a niche between the rough, aggressive play style of the Grizzlies and the graceful, offensive play style of the Avalanche with a defensive powerhouse. While still focusing on hits, they also made sure their hits were cleaner and less aggressive, choosing to sit back and let teams come to them than go after them and potentially flub a hit.

While Swisston finished last in the regular season, they were still determined to win the first ever Danzilona Cup.

Heading into the tournament however, the players available were neondan99, an experienced veteran, peakman2, the defensive powerhouse, and Lowtuff, a player who had never even stepped onto the ice. Roark, in command as acting owner and manager, made the rash decision to put Lowtuff in as a striker, allowing the experienced neondan99 to field the middle of the ice and leave peakman2 at the back to stop any attacks.

The strategy was flimsy at first, as Lowtuff struggled to get the hang of passing and shooting the puck. Neondan99 eventually asked to ref rather than play, so Roark happily stepped in as midfielder, and commanded his team. Peak became an integral part of the offense to make up for Lowtuff's inexperience, and together Peak and Roark passed back and forth, cutting holes through the Avalanche's shaky defense. The Shovels ended up winning the Cup, the scrappy underdogs, the lovable losers of the regular season who became the champions of the server, all due to their hard work and determination, their dedication to never giving up and their overcoming of racism and bigotry.

Lag was also a big part of it.

Go Shovels!!! :D*