MSU having another bad jersey year?This could be ugly.
MSU having another bad jersey year?
Or maybe a bit of a goofy goalie that had a hot year but may never do it again? (Cough, Kangas) Haven't heard how Williams has been.
You'll see Huggins in net Friday, and probably Saturday unless he gets lot up. He's been good this far and Williams has struggled to help this team win.Williams has been bad, but I think he'll get it back...eventually. But maybe not this year. Defense hasn't helped. We miss the smarts, leadership, and physical stay-at-home play of Elbrecht more than we thought we would, and Josh Nelson got hurt and may be out for a long time. Offensively, who knows what's been wrong? Blueger is noticeably better, but he's about it among all the returners. Leitner hasn't been close to last year's performance. Missed a couple games with back problems. Don't know if that still lingers, but his dropoff has made our power play pretty mediocre so far. Still have hopes for the long haul this year, but I'm worried we won't be competitive this weekend.
You'll see Huggins in net Friday, and probably Saturday unless he gets lot up. He's been good this far and Williams has struggled to help this team win.
Leitner wasn't hurt, so there's no worry about that. Like I said in our season thread, it was discipline for violation of team rules.
Josh Nelson is likely out for the year, he's going to have hip surgery.
Zach Palmquist and JP LaFontaine have seemed to regress; something is off with their games. Palmquist has been a -3 the last two Fridays. When you're #1 defenseman is -3, good luck winning games.
The Mavericks will play hard, and may have turned the corner with a gritty OT win on Saturday. We'll see.
Even when the Mavs are down, they always seem to get that extra gear lined up right playing the Gophers.
Looking forward to a couple good games this weekend. Even when the Mavs are down, they always seem to get that extra gear lined up right playing the Gophers.
Oh, we'll play hard, I have no doubt about that. We played with an incredible amount of effort Saturday againt BGSU, and as noted, getting up for the Gophers is not a problem for us. My earlier comment where I questioned whether we'd be competitive is because we will play hard, but we haven't been playing well. For all of our effort Saturday, we got killed on faceoffs, couldn't get the puck out of our own end for most of the 3rd period, got outshot, and almost none of our shots were Grade A-type chances.
Effort alone isn't gonna beat the #1 team in the country on their ice.
Exactly. This is a team that, from my point of view, has been extremely undisciplined to this point. I'm very confident that will turn around and will turn around soon. Losing little battles, taking dumb penalties and giving up odd man rushes are killing this team right now. From a defensive standpoint, there isn't a standout leader and it's showing. We know McInnis is going to lead and show up on offense, but we need a guy that calms everyone down on the ice when the opposition has our guys on their heals. We had it with Ehlbrecht the last two years and don't have anyone that's been the calming influence yet this year.