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Michigan State Hockey 202?-202?

Pirateasaur said:
Well, we’re roughly as good as Air Force. Where do we think they would rank in the Big 10?

Might have even caught covid while watching. Who knows?

I’ll have actual thoughts later.
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I don't think the question is where would AF rank in the B1G, it's where would MSU rank in Atlantic Hockey? And I don't have to tell you that's not a good look.
 
Alright, some quick observations:
Our top line of Middendorf, Nodler and Loughran is pretty good. Loughran was especially notable. I actually felt like from top to bottom, our forward lines looked more promising than we’ve seen in quite a while. Despite this, it seemed like we never really could put it all together last night. Hopefully that changes as we get a few games under us.

Defensively, I was disappointed. We gave up a lot of shots, a lot of scoring chances, and turned the puck over too much. AF bursts of speed both beat us to the outside and split the D up the middle. We looked slow and disjointed at times. Now, I fully anticipate AF to be nowhere near the fastest squad we play against so I hope this was just a weird aberration.

DeRidder was solid in net.
 
Pirateasaur said:
Defensively, I was disappointed. We gave up a lot of shots, a lot of scoring chances, and turned the puck over too much. AF bursts of speed both beat us to the outside and split the D up the middle. We looked slow and disjointed at times. Now, I fully anticipate AF to be nowhere near the fastest squad we play against so I hope this was just a weird aberration.

DeRidder was solid in net.
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We looked better defensively when Charleson was in net last week against the U-18s. Assuming he starts, I'm guessing we'll look better tonight.

I still have no clue who the goal-scorers are going to be, though.
 
Well, I wasn’t able to see the game last night due to a social function but it looks like we turned it around. Good to see. Looks like the PP clicked and we tightened up defensively.
 
Loughran is the new Pat Verbeek - the Little Ball of Hate. Didn't think the first goal was going to count because he had his stick pretty high (for him anyway). The second was just the will to get stuck in and be the first to a loose puck.

Cesana's goal is worth finding the video for. Swooped in and went between the legs, a real goal scorer's goal.

I don't know what it is about Charleston, but he always looks like he's going to topple over backwards. At 6'2" and 190, all his pads are ungodly big. Might be the most unathletic goalie in the last decade of college hockey, but somehow he gets it done occasionally.
 
John J. MacInnes said:
Loughran is the new Pat Verbeek - the Little Ball of Hate. Didn't think the first goal was going to count because he had his stick pretty high (for him anyway). The second was just the will to get stuck in and be the first to a loose puck.
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Loughran won me over Saturday night. Dude is feisty.
 
A little late to respond…on Friday I thought we were out muscled, didn’t forecheck well, didn’t get traffic in front of the goal, but still should have pulled out a win. On Saturday, while still giving up too many Grade A’s, we forechecked and attacked much better. Looks like we have 2 scoring lines and should score enough to compete in the middle of the Big 10.

My understanding is Berger and Haskins were injury scratches.

The next 3 weeks should tell us a lot more.
 
wsummers said:
A little late to respond…on Friday I thought we were out muscled, didn’t forecheck well, didn’t get traffic in front of the goal, but still should have pulled out a win. On Saturday, while still giving up too many Grade A’s, we forechecked and attacked much better. Looks like we have 2 scoring lines and should score enough to compete in the middle of the Big 10.

My understanding is Berger and Haskins were injury scratches.

The next 3 weeks should tell us a lot more.
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Thanks for the update on Berger and Haskins, WSummers. I was surprised neither saw any game action over the weekend, particularly Haskins who I thought acquitted himself nicely as a Frosh last season. Good to know we have those two promising Fs in the wings who can ideally upgrade a few spots on lines 3 and 4. That makes me slightly more optimistic regarding future offensive production from those lines.

That having been said, this was an Atlantic hockey opponent who typically recruits Tier 2 and D1 bubble players (I count 2 Tier 1 players on AFA’s roster). To not be prepared to win both games was a huge missed opportunity because it’s only going to get harder from here.
 
I won’t be able to attend this weekend which is disappointing because I am looking forward to seeing progress against a fairly beatable Miami team. I agree that our top 2 lines are promising, especially with Loughran out there. Some guys just pop and even in a lackluster performance by the team last Friday, he caught my eye.

Defensively, I am more concerned. We gave up a lot of shots on the weekend. Better B1G teams would feast on what I witnessed so far.

I think we are in decent shape in goal whether it be DeRidder or Charlson.
 
Overall, nice win against a team likely to be near the bottom of their league. Honestly, MSU should have scored another 2 or 3 goals based on the many odd man rushes they had.

In 3 games 6 of our 10 goals have come from transfers. 2 of the others are from Lewandowski, a 5th year player. The only other forward to score was in an empty net.

Haskins was in the lineup Friday as the extra skater and saw limited ice time as he recovers from injury.
 
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A few thoughts…

Good come from behind victory tonight. MSU had no powerplay opportunities while they had to skate off 2, including a 5 minute. After the game the Miami coaches didn’t come out to shake hands.

MSU is off to a 3-1 start and first sweep in over a year.

This team is much more talented offensively than the last couple. Nice to see them carry the puck in instead of dump and chase.

Both goals tonight were also from transfers. Without them we would probably be 0-4 or 1-3.

MSU had an unbelievable number of great scoring chances which they either fanned on, missed the net, missed the tip in, or were stonewalled by the goalie. Hopefully, they’ll start converting on those opportunities.

Due to a postponement, Mass Lowell will have not played in the last two weekends after splitting with ASU. That should work in MSU’s favor on Friday.
 
Miami also dipped deeply into the transfer poral and even attracted the Cornell F that I coveted. But props to Cole and staff for seemingly getting our transfers to gel earlier and more often than Bergeron & Co. I realize it's early but I'm slightly more optimistic about our prospects this season than previously. The sweep is something to build on, let's see where it goes from there.
 
FLHockeyMom said:
Miami also dipped deeply into the transfer poral and even attracted the Cornell F that I coveted. But props to Cole and staff for seemingly getting our transfers to gel earlier and more often than Bergeron & Co. I realize it's early but I'm slightly more optimistic about our prospects this season than previously. The sweep is something to build on, let's see where it goes from there.
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I think this team has the potential to be a high middle of the Big 10 team…they should be competitive against all except the top two (one of whom shall not be named). They are generating a lot more scoring opportunities than the last couple of years and have a powerplay that looks like it should click at about 20%. Defense is still pretty good. PK was excellent this weekend, but quite frankly, Miami’s PP was not impressive.
 
wsummers said:
I think this team has the potential to be a high middle of the Big 10 team…they should be competitive against all except the top two (one of whom shall not be named). They are generating a lot more scoring opportunities than the last couple of years and have a powerplay that looks like it should click at about 20%. Defense is still pretty good. PK was excellent this weekend, but quite frankly, Miami’s PP was not impressive.
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After seeing Notre Dame in person this weekend, the best that that Spartans can hope for is 4th. Fast, physical, and deep...and now they have possibly the best goalie in college hockey in Matt Galajda.
 
Two very different types of pain over the prior weekend. On Friday, it felt like we hung around until the dam broke in the third. On Saturday, MSU came out unmotivated and the dam broke instantly. (On the whole, despite somewhat pulling it together in the last 25-ish minutes, I was quite disappointed with Saturday's game.)

In a weird way, I think this weekend will set the tone for the rest of the season. Ferris isn't great. It will probably say a lot about the direction and motivation of this team if MSU finds itself struggling again.
 
aallenpollreisz said:
In a weird way, I think this weekend will set the tone for the rest of the season. Ferris isn't great. It will probably say a lot about the direction and motivation of this team if MSU finds itself struggling again.
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Well said. Ferris is indeed struggling, and these are two games that theoretically MSU should be able to win comfortably. Interestingly, Ferris's leading Frosh scorer (5-2--7 in 10 GP) who's off to a strong start is Brad Marek, a former MSU commit.
 
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