sterlippo1
Well-known member
Re: Northeastern Hockey 2013-14 Season
lolz
oh please great one, tell us what has to happen in the most dogmatic way.
lolz
oh please great one, tell us what has to happen in the most dogmatic way.
Because I dont think they are having a good season. I think the GOALIE is having an All-American, perhaps best season in the pipes I have seen since Robitatille. The rest of the team is blah.
This team does not have 2 scoring lines. It has 2, maybe 3 dynamic forwards depending on where you want to put Hedges. The rest of them are interchangable and occasionaly pot a goal. Think about it this way, leave out Roy and Szmatula, which forwards on this team would other teams want? Leave out the top 2 teams and the bottom 2 in the league to be fair. Think anyone is going to rush for ZAR or Snydeman or Reid or Pond or McMurtry? Not knocking their hustle, or their want or anything along those lines, skill wise pretty limited. Personally, I am not sure its all their fault because its hard to play forward when the defense struggles to get you the puck, but some of these guys cannot pass or recieve a pass either. And a few of them suddenly think they are Roy like with the puck, when it could be farther from the truth.
They have done a good job of beating up on the little blind poor sisters outside the league, other then that, they have looked average in a bad Hockey East year. Clay Witt keeping them in games they probably did not deserve to be in. They are 8-6-1 in the league, scoring 4 more goals then they have given up, which is amazing since the goalie has seen 100 shots more then the guy closest to him in amount of saves. Demko has played 1/2 the minutes Witt has in the league but has had to make something like 370 less saves. Thats crazy.
Think about it this way, if Witt was even league average this year, how many people would be saying how great a job JM is doing? They would probably be right where everyone thought they would be, around 9th place. Everything said about this team before the season was basically spot on, except at the goalie position, where they have gotten incredible play.
Not going to be able to make to to Amherst this weekend like I planned, does anyone know if UMass has a stream for the game?
First off, nobody here (retsap) needs to be calling names. Let's act like adults.
Okay to address all these points...
Huskies01 is at least partially right, without Witt contending for a Hobey, we are 8-10 in HEA. That is pretty much a fact.
BUT, you are underestimating our offensive depth a bit. Look at UMass-Lowell, they have 11 players with at least 10 points this season. Northeastern also has 11 guys with at least 10 points. Only two of their forwards have hit 10 points in HEA games, we have three. Lowell has 4 players with 9 or more goals, we have three and Hedges at 8.
The offense is fine and Ferreiro has been injured (he needs to be on the 2nd line, Snydeman is not a top 6 player).
And don't use the conference only stats argument because the HEA schedule this year has forced teams to play multiple non-conference games against conference opponents. Comparisons are fair.
The defense is the big issue but it is kind of thrown together, I think 2014-2015 is the year when we get the guys Madigan really wants playing. Hopefully better skaters. Right now the most talented defenseman on the team is Benning but he's a freshman. I don't know what they have to do to get the shots allowed down but **** it, if we need to play a 1-3-1 system in the neutral zone so **** be it. If they could get the shots allowed down from around 40 to around 30, this team has a very high chance to win each game with Witt back there.
Goaltending...what else can be said, Witt is putting on an absolute show and should be a Hbey finalist if he keeps it up down the stretch. He is so much more mentally prepared and tough than Rawlings. He lets a goal in and it's RIGHT back to business instead of collapsing. Assuming we make the tournament he gives us a chance to go places.
Coaching...Still not sold on Madigan. My issue is with adjustments. If something's not working, you change it. It's time for Ferreiro to move into the top 6, we need him playing with other talented players to utilitize his shot etc. It's time to alter the defense to cut shots down. I'd also like to see Schecter get some playing time, kid was phenomenal in the first weekend against BC.
Your "little sisters of the poor" comment is a bit off base. The only truly crap team we've played in Alabama-Huntsville. St. Lawrence had swept Maine and split with an elite Ferris State team coming into the series vs. Northeastern. Our other non-conference games have included Notre Dame, Vermont, Western Michigan and Boston College.
Regardless of how you analyze it, to be T-10th in the pairwise in February was not expected so some credit has to be given and this team has 12 freshmen, don't care how old, there is an adjustment to HEA and moreso, they've pretty much had to create chemistry as they go as opposed to teams who know the guys they are playing with. The offense is better than we thought, I mean we scored 81 goals last year, 81, that's god-awful. The defense is what we thought it'd be. Just not enough ability to control the puck.
Down the pipeline the 2016 class is stocking up with Jozefek and Filipe coming in. Either way, Witt's a junior and that's the best news.
Since this is Valentine's Day, I'm going to have nothing but love for both Huskies01, who said so many things that are spot on, and SkinsFan09, who also made some great observations. Let's get the easy stuff out of the way first. The D has been painful to watch and, inexplicably, the only Dman with the quickness and explosiveness to keep up with BC (as demonstrated the first BC weekend) has been sitting in the stands in street clothes since the less-than-fleet-footed Gunn returned to the lineup. JM does not think the D is bad because we don't give up many goals. In his interviews, he is not concerned with all the shots on goal the team gives up because he doesn't think those are quality shots. As we all know, there are a lot of quality shots in there, but Witt has been extraordinary. As you will recall, the last time Witt didn't play, we gave up 8 goals to a 2-11 team. And he didn't change the lineup at all for the next game, other than in net. Which brings us to the next point, adjustments. As SkinsFan09 points out, JM does not make adjustments within games and he doesn't make them from game to game. When a lineup has a crappy game (Air Force), he says he expects more from them and gives them another chance. Then, they stink it up again against Dartmouth the next game and get another chance at redemption. If there is no accountability for playing poorly or stupidly (e.g., dumb, costly penalties), then it is tough to expect improvement. I do believe that the O is a little deeper than Huskies01 believes, but he makes a good point and the stagnant lineup is not so deep that the deck should never be shuffled. There should be no sacred cows and kids should sit for other than injury and different line combos should be given a chance. It seems like the lineup and the power play and penalty kill were all put in place based on how well it worked against Dalhousie and Alabama Huntsville and there have been no creative changes since then. Yes, the team is in decent position right now, but they haven't won anything yet, except for a silly trophy at a sub-par tournament at ND. The key is to actually try to win something meaningful, like a Hockey East Championship, and to make it to the NCAA tourney. At the current pace (1-3 in the last 4 games) and with the current lineup and power play, I'm afraid there will be heartache once again on Huntington Ave. unless Clay Witt plays even better than he already has. But, since this is Valentine's Day, let's look on the bright side - if he doesn't play unbelievably well, there is a better chance that he returns next year instead of testing the free agent market.
Clay Witt should never have to buy another drink in Boston. He won this game for us when the rest of the team did everything they could to lose it. Our powerplay is worse than atrocious. If Keefe wasn't the recruiter he is, I'd be screaming for his head. He has zero idea what he's doing with the PP. Gunn is a buffoon for losing his cool and getting a misconduct when we were down to 4 defenders. Beyond that, I am hoping and praying that Manson and Benning's injuries weren't as bad as they sounded. Losing our top 2 Dmen in one game would sink this team. 5 goals is nice, especially since most of them were grind-them-out dirty goals. But our Achilles heel just got even worse.
Congrats to Pond on his first collegiate goal. Take the 2 points and get outta Amherst.
PP sucks. Takes the life out of this team everytime. What are the chances that NU has more PP goals in conference then shorthanded goals given up? Slim at this point.
Nice to see the lines finally get changed, about 3 weeks to late, but it finally got done. Stevens play has really fallen off, he managed to be on the ice for 0 goals scored by NU, and the last two scored by UMA. Gunn with the hat trick tonight, 3 penalties, one in each period, and if anyone was listening to the UMASS feed like I was, the NU feed was horrible tonight, you got to hear loud and clear why he got the misconduct.
Hopefully this is the game that gets Roy scoring again. Only his 3rd goal in 2014, two of them against UMASS and one against Harvard. We need him to produce against the big boys now. Sophomore slump? Mentally checked out before he goes pro? I am leaning towards lack of guys to get him the puck. I think he really misses Vinny S. out there who was willing to feed him the puck.
I'm beginning to wish we could decline the penalty like in football...The UMass radio broadcasters were quite startled by Gunn's outburst, it made me laugh at how apologetic they got. They were livid regarding the calls at the end of the game, with the shoulda-been-icing and then the ensuing faceoff in the UMass end. Was anyone watching the stream and coach shed some light on what happened?
The only silver lining to any potential injuries is Shecter potentially getting back in the lineup.
I disagree. With the mess that the defense is, if they do not think that Schecter is worth playing over DD or Fennell, that should tell you something.
Just like why they kept Witt behind Rawlings, right? For three years...
Schecter can actually skate, this was evidenced vs. BC when he was by far the best defenseman out there.