Joked on Twitter on Tuesday night that Dimond's 3-2 win over East in the Cook Inlet Conference tournament meant the Lynx qualified for the state tournament for the 3,147th straight season.
Eh, close enough -- turns out it's 20 straight seasons.
And the last time the Lynx didn't make state comes with a most excellent back-story, as coach Dennis Sorenson, in his 24th season as bench boss there, informed us by text today.
In 1995, when the CIC tournament was double-elimination and, remember, featured six teams -- South and Eagle River weren't around then -- the Lynx got knocked out by losses to Chugiak and East. And the dudes who did the damage were most definitely not guys whose names faded into history, never to be recalled by anyone other than their families or teammates.
Dimond fell 3-2 in overtime to Chugiak. The Mustang who delivered the OT dagger was none other than winger Ty Jones, who went on to become a first-round draft pick of the NHL's Chicago Blackhawks and played briefly in the NHL.
It gets better. The loss that ended Dimond's season came against East, which racked a 6-3 win. The T-birds were led by some sophomore kid ya mighta heard of -- Scotty Gomez, who went on to become a first-round draft pick of the New Jersey Devils, win two Stanley Cups and play more than 1,000 games in the NHL, where he still makes his living. All Gomez did in that tilt was bag 2-3--5 totals. He led East to the state championship, scoring two third-period goals in a 4-2 win over Service.
Hey, and it's not like Dimond didn't have some guns on its roster, which included Barrett Heisten, who went on to become a first-round draft pick of the Buffalo Sabres and played in the NHL.
So, turns out there were some pretty decent young hockey players in these parts 20 years ago.
The CIC tournament continues Thursday night when regular-season champion Service plays West at Ben Boeke Arena (6:30 p.m. puck drop) and Dimond plays South at the McDonald Center in Eagle River (7:15 p.m.). All four teams already have qualified for state. Now they're playing for a region title and seeding in the eight-team, large-schools state tournament.