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By Jim Hodges Virginian-Pilot correspondent June 8, 2012 TORONTO At first, it wasn't a shot. But it became one that won the gameThursday night. In the magical season this has been for theAdmirals, maybe the puck that went into the net at 9:09 of overtimeto beat Toronto wasn't even a fluke. But no. This one was as fluky as it comes. "I was just trying to dump it in," said Mike Kostka, thelast player to touch the puck. "I saw it hit a stanchion. Thepuck was rolling across toward the net, and I don't know if Iactually saw it go in or not. Everybody started getting off thebench, but I didn't want to celebrate prematurely." While he wasn't seeing the puck, it veered strangely to the right,skittering across the goal line while Toronto goalie Ben Scrivensstood transfixed. He couldn't believe it either. Everybody else wearing a blue sweater was celebrating the 1-0 winin Game 3 of the Calder Cup Finals. It gave the Admirals a 3-0 leadgoing into what could be the final game of the season Saturday inRicoh Center. Dallas Eakins certainly wasn't celebrating. "I would rather somebody take a pair of steel-toed boots andkick me in a delicate region than lose a hockey game likethat," said Eakins, Toronto's coach. "That is a tough wayto lose in a playoff, on a stanchion." His counterpart, Admirals coach Jon Cooper, was perhaps equallyamazed, but he already has seen so much. "There's one thing I can say about this year," Coopersaid. "There's things, from the (28-game regular-season) winstreak to some of the other games, that I'd never thought I'd seein my life." He actually didn't see this one. "My vantage point was, I think, that I was about to vent onsomething to (assistant coach) Steve Thomas on the bench,"Cooper said. "So I turned, and then I heard the sound." That wasn't easy because most of the sellout crowd of 8,084 wasshocked into stunned silence. Several hundred of the Admirals'friends and family were there to let Cooper know that the serieswas on the brink of ending. About 30 of them were related in some way to Kostka, from Ajax, aToronto suburb. He rushed to them after the game and had to bepulled away to account for the shot that really wasn't a shot, butwhich went into the net. The beneficiary was Admirals goalie Dustin Tokarski, who won forthe seventh time in a row and turned in his third shutout in hispast five games. He has allowed only five goals in the sevenvictories. "I really didn't see it go in," he said. "I just saweverybody jump off the bench to celebrate, and so did I." Tokarski stopped 21 Toronto shots. Scrivens stopped 30. Tokarski expressed no sympathy for Scrivens. "No, it was alucky goal, but I thought we played well enough to earn a breakright there," he said. Perhaps he could remember another shot that wasn't, whenConnecticut beat the Admirals in the second game of the EasternConference semifinals on a "dump" that bounced offTokarski's stick, up into the air, then rolled across the goalline. It was another one Cooper thought he'd never see in his life. The difference was this one has the Admirals poised to win theCalder Cup for the first time. We are high quality suppliers, our products such as Digital Diving Camera Manufacturer , Hiking Compass for oversee buyer. To know more, please visits Outdoor Altimeter.
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