Muck had one time-out and he called it the moment the Screech Owls tied the score. The players all gathered around him, waiting. Muck just stared at them.

“Just keep it up,” Muck said.

That was all, Just keep it up. Why would he call a time-out? Travis wondered. Just to make the Towers think he had a master plan? Just to put them off Travis had long ago given up trying to figure out Muck.

The referee’s whistle blew. Travis’s line was to take the face-off. Nish was on, wincing as he stood waiting for the puck to drop. Travis looked back at him and had never been so proud of his crazy friend.

Derek won the face-off and blocked off the Toronto centre. Travis was able to get his stick on the puck and slide it back to Nish, who fired low and hard, but not at the net. Instead, the puck flew at Dmitri, who simply turned his stick blade down and let the puck hit it and glance straight into the open net.

4–3, Screech Owls!

The Owls pounced on Dmitri, and also Nish, who had made the play.

“Watch it!” Nish kept shouting, to no avail. He didn’t want anyone dumping him on his bad ankle. He shouldn’t have been scurrying around the night before at the Hockey Hall of Fame, Travis thought. He should have been in bed, resting, just as Muck wanted.

The Owls held the lead until the final minute, when the Toronto Towers pulled their goaltender for a face-off in the Owls’ end.

“Don’t Panic!” Muck hollered from the bench. He had his hands over his mouth to make a megaphone. He sounded like Andy on the portable loudspeaker.

But they did. Derek lost the face-off, the puck went out to the point, Travis tried to block the shot and the defender simply stepped around him as Travis slid out past the blueline. It was now six-on-four for the Towers. The defenceman shot, the puck fell in a scramble of players, and a Toronto player put it in on the backhand.

4–4, tie game.

Dmitri had one more chance before the horn went, but lost the puck on the deke. The Towers were halfway back down the ice when time ran out.

Overtime.