Re: Colgate Univ offseason speculations
First, want to assure everyone I did not mean to minimize the intangible contributions of either Williams or Cox. I was referring solely to the goal scoring side of things (and even then did mean to mention that my gut was that Williams scored at some really opportune times last year). No doubt they will be missed on the ice and in the locker room. Chemistry is huge in hockey (even at the C level old mens level I play in.) But grit and heart can't be neutralized by better/faster defenses the way goal scoring capabilities can so in a way they are easier to replace. I have always felt like DV's teams are characterized by that 110% type of attitude even if the skill levels haven't always been a match for the competition. Obviously the attitudes and commitment of departing players will need to be replaced but I guess I just have faith that Colgate will have those guys year in and year out.
Our penalty kill last year was pretty anemic so if we get worse, we could be in big trouble. Interestingly, though we ranked a pretty weak 48th in penalty kill, we weren't in the bottom third in the ECAC. Despite the general perception on this board that the team takes too many penalties, Gate ranked 45th in that regard - in other words only 13 teams were penalized less. Maybe we just don't get enough practice on the kill! I am joking - except that Union and Princeton, two of the four ECAC teams worse than us on the PK were penalized even less than we were, and Dartmouth, also worse on the PK, averaged less than a minute more in penalties per game than we did (12.0 for 'Gate, 12.9 for the big green)
The other interesting special teams note is that our power-play - another source of teeth gnashing here was actually dead in the middle of the pack last year. What's more, a mere four additional goals would have put us in the top ten! Sure four more goals would have been nice, but I'm hard pressed to think of how those could have been parceled out across the games played to make us a substantially better team - unless you saved them all for the playoffs against St. Lawrence!
Finally, I am glad to hear someone who got to see more games than I has plenty of confidence in Evin. His save % was a more heartening .914 in 2010 though there were still a few clunkers - Yale, 3 in 7 minutes v. RoMo & 4 in the first 8 minutes against D'mouth (though he wasn't the only culprit in that one for sure!). While I agree that the additional experience at defense should help in net, I think Evin is going to need to step it up a notch for the team to reach the next level.
Regardless, I am excited about the coming season as I think we have probably the best overall talent we've had in quite some time.
Oh and thanks Shabby - passed - serious relief.
