RPI Engineers '23-'24

[DrDemento]

Good luck to the girls today for their opening game of the season against RIT!

[hab]

Good luck to the girls today for their opening game of the season against RIT!

Anyone see the game? I wasnt able to find a video link that worked. Seems to be an ESPN link but that probably doesnt work outside the USA?

[DrDemento]

Anyone see the game? I wasnt able to find a video link that worked. Seems to be an ESPN link but that probably doesnt work outside the USA?

saw a good percentage at a local pub. We outplayed them for two periods but simply could not finish. Rampado was simply excellent but the RIT goalie was a wall also. Third period we seemed to tire out a bit. Seems to happen when coach shortens his bench and plays his top line for too many minutes. RIT finally got one late and we almost answered a few times. Pulled Rampado with 3 minutes left and got the extra attacker goal fortunately. Went into OT on the power play but could not get any real good chances. Became rather obvious that RIT still had their skating legs and we did not and personally felt that we were fortunate for the game to end in a tie once it reached that stage. Still felt we were the better team for at least 40 minutes and the 5 new players in the line up showed they belong for sure.
Tomorrow is another day and hope to see some other sin the game and some different combinations. I personally do not subscribe to ESPN+ but we have a local establishment that will allow the college hockey games to show as long as the rest of the crowd is not clamoring for football or something else on all the TVs.

[Cornholio]

I caught some of it as well. Bench for sure seemed to be quite short. This seems to be a new pattern for the program. Teams like RPI, who will never have top end talent, will only win by out working the other teams. That requires high energy. A couple of years ago when the program was winning some games against good competition, 4 lines would be rolled and special teams would be mixed up. Last year started a trend of bench shorting and the program took a step backward. Only one game but tying one of the weaker teams on the schedule (and who they beat twice last year) is not a good sign and scoring goals looks to be even more challenging this year.

[DrDemento]

I caught some of it as well. Bench for sure seemed to be quite short. This seems to be a new pattern for the program. Teams like RPI, who will never have top end talent, will only win by out working the other teams. That requires high energy. A couple of years ago when the program was winning some games against good competition, 4 lines would be rolled and special teams would be mixed up. Last year started a trend of bench shorting and the program took a step backward. Only one game but tying one of the weaker teams on the schedule (and who they beat twice last year) is not a good sign and scoring goals looks to be even more challenging this year.

i have seen this the past 2 years for certain. obviously you would love your top line on the ice as often as you can but against most teams you simply need to make use of all 4 lines and keep that top line fresher for the latter parts of games. I hope tomorrow we see a different set of tactics and a few substitutions to give other girls some ice time.

[DrDemento]

Another 1-1 tie. Deja Vu all over again. The good - Skoda will be a tremendous addition to this program. Wish we had many more like her. Rampado was her usual fantastic self. The bad - pretty much everything else. Early in the season so hopefully things will adapt and change but for much of this game girls on the ice do not seem to know where others are and way too many turnovers in all zones but especially in our own zone leaving Rampado to face numerous odd girl rushes.

[hab]

NO panic. I know that I have a reputation for being eternally optimistic about this team....and I know that 2 early season ties vs RIT is not an impressive start. But...I do like the roster and I think that we can expect better as this team gels.

[DrDemento]

NO panic. I know that I have a reputation for being eternally optimistic about this team....and I know that 2 early season ties vs RIT is not an impressive start. But...I do like the roster and I think that we can expect better as this team gels.

From what i saw - there is talent and the new girls will work into the line up quite well. it is early in the season and the cohesiveness and team play is a bit lacking with far too many turnovers deep in our zone and just outside the blue line in center ice. Next week end presents a chance for a bit more switching and changing around both who is on the ice and what lines match up better. i hope as you do that we can see this team gel.

[sezenack]

This looked like the same team to me that I've seen my entire time following the team. Some stretches of good play but zero finishing ability and constantly getting bailed out by a stud goalie. The individual talent does seem to be improved, so I think they have a higher ceiling this year. They definitely have a lot to work on to get there.

[Cornholio]

The offense looks to be shoot on net from anywhere, get a tip or rebound. Very little puck movement. The one goal in the 2nd game is I think the only time I've seen 2 passes connect and tap in back door. The team has good size and speed and some hard shots but not a lot of puck skill. Will make scoring in the ECAC very difficult

[DrDemento]

The offense looks to be shoot on net from anywhere, get a tip or rebound. Very little puck movement. The one goal in the 2nd game is I think the only time I've seen 2 passes connect and tap in back door. The team has good size and speed and some hard shots but not a lot of puck skill. Will make scoring in the ECAC very difficult

Yup- they did a lot of shooting from further out than they should have instead of finding the open girl and passing. They did have a few partial odd rushes forming but seemed more intent on the simple shot from outside the circle. You and HAB have it spot on, there is more individual talent this year but a lot of work to do to get them to play as cohesive units and show some chemistry on the ice together. let;s see what one more week of play produces.

[25+years]

Went to Saturday’s game and watched Sunday’s on tv. What stood out for me is the team is a consistently better skating team than in the past, they lack players who can put the puck in the net, and the passing on the pp is far too slow to allow shots to get to the net (that is they give the defense far too much time to get in the shooting/passing lanes. All that being said, I thought they were fun to watch and I look forward to going to more games this season! Go Red!

[hab]

Lots of smart comments here. Consensus seems to be that there is a lot of talent here, but the coaching staff needs to figure out how to put it together for results. Cant argue with that.

[Cornholio]

I don't follow the team that closely, but is the only women's program I'll try to catch (and right now is the only real hockey going on!) so don't know each player, but from eye test so far, here is what I see from the forwards.

To start, to create a good scoring line, it usually consists of 1 shooter, 1 set-up/passer, 1 grinder/big body for rebounds and ideally one of the D who can move the puck and flash down as a 4th attacker when pressuring the net. For personal, so far, in terms of an "offensive - defenseman" only Alexander has shown that ability so far. She had a nice attack in the last game. Other D all seem to be "stay-at-home" defense and not showing enough aggression (or lack the skill/confidence) to jump down when putting pressure in the attack zone. Without that 4th attacker when there is pressure, it is very hard to score at any level (NHL included).

Next, in terms of forwards, my take so far from just seeing parts of the two games:
pure "shooters" - Kaiser, Papineau. Both have great shots and good speed. Have not shown the puck skills to set others up yet, especially on the power play.
pure "passers" - Jahnke, Christof. Both have show great puck skills and vision but seem too small/weak to finish.
pure "grinders" - Philip, Hildner, Taylor-Walters. All have great energy (and speed) but are not going to create.

Wagner is a shooter and passer, Beaudoin is a grinder and passer, Skoda is a shooter and grinder. I'm sure I missed quite a few and may be wrong but you would hope that there are 4 combinations of "shooter, passer, grinder" that can be iced to create some pressure, and another D or two steps up to show some offensive instinct. Also, the power play is just as bad as last year with the units seeming to go through the motions of moving the puck to the point but no one creating a quality scoring chance outside of long distance shots and looking for some puck luck on a tip or rebound.

[DrDemento]

Cornholio-Nice post with some very interesting thoughts. Also add that a couple of ladies have not seen much if any ice time as yet and might show something in your want list. The power play is abysmal and needs emergency surgery. There are teams that make their living off special teams and others where it just never seems to work. I usually feel that is coaching and practice related and honestly think we have the talent to produce far better results that we have seen in the two games thus far or most of the games last year. I hope to be able to see some of next weeks games to get a better idea about this.
One other point about this past weekend. RIT just might have been a bit more under rated than they deserved. i saw the games last year and this year's version seemed to have a lot more going for them.