Re: Golden Gopher Women's Hockey 2009-2010
At the break:
http://www.uscho.com/w/minnesota-golden-gophers/womens-college-hockey/team,umn.html
Good first half for this team all things considered in the morph from 2008-2009 to the present. I think goaltending has been as instrumental as predicted in the 2009-2010 WCHA, and certainly for the Gophers. The Gophers have done well in other aspects obviously...gathering 24 pts. the 1st time around the conference. The 2nd time around the WCHA will be very / increasingly challenging of course. The team will have some additional adversity through player absences. Pretty key how those absences are handled, with big opportunities for others to step in. Wouldn't mind seeing a little drop in penalty minutes, which would be a considerable plus going thru the conference again. While the PK has been good...they deserve a little break in 2010.
Frosh class have stepped into roles smoothly and helped the team.
Good luck and good health to the Gophers in 2010!
I started to write this earlier but needed to leave for an outside appointment. Just before posting I saw where you beat me to the punch, but I'll add anyway:
So what's the consensus for the first half of the season? You would think that the team has to be feeling pretty good about what they've accomplished so far: leading the league with just two losses, and being ranked at No. 2 in the nation as they head into their break.
I have to admit that the team's play has easily exceeded my own expectations, the Wisconsin and Harvard series notwithstanding. As highly touted as Noora Raty was coming in, who would have known she would figure in so prominantly on the team's success? A .965 save percentage and a GAA of .89? Certainly the team in front of her gets credit here as well, especially in the past 10 games when they've given up just 7 goals (0.7 average). This is an improvement over the first 10 games where they surrendered 20 goals (2.0 average) which is still good.
Of concern perhaps is the offense where their average has gone from 4.1 goals in the first 10 to just 2.6 in the second 10, brought down mainly because of the Harvard series. Removing those two goose-egg games from the mix the average improves to 3.25 but still not where they want it, I'm sure. During the second half I'm sure the coaches will be looking for ways to generate more offense without giving more scoring changes to their opponents. Quite often you might look to your defense to get more involved offensively, but the stats show that of the team's five leading point getters, already two are defensemen. So they'll be looking for some of the other forwards who haven't scored much to pick up the pace a little.
But the key to the second half will be to make sure they continue to do all the little things that have made them successful so far, and most of these have to do with playing good team defense and then take advantage of what the opponents give you. I believe that was the coach's gameplan going in, and at this point it seems to be mainly a case of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it - but there are always ways to make it run a little better".
But I did pay the admission; no sneaking in.