Re: Rep Retirement Lodge 101: Saturday Morning
Helluva game, Shot. Congrats to your team, and also, kudos to your fanbase in being gracious with their win.
I hope payback will be in style tomorrow night, though.
Brent, What I'm about to say certainly cannot be proven, but without Cheverie in goal last night--especially for the first forty minutes of the game--I think Minnesota would have enjoyed a lead as comfortable as 2-0.
In Denver's last 10 games versus Minnesota the Pioneers have gone 8-1-1 and Marc Cheverie has been a major factor in that stretch as he's posted four wins in a row against the Gophers.
Throughout the entire first period--but not as much in the second--one particular Denver deficiency stood out for me. The Gophers were able, almost at will, to bring the puck up to, and through, neutral ice with the Pioneers offering next to no resistance. Waving a stick blade at a Minnesota player was the entire extent of Denver's "aggressively forechecking" the Gophers.
Minnesota had little trouble bringing the puck into Denver's defensive zone and that was reflected in Minnesota's 14-8 shot advantage after one period. Even though the shots were 26-16 after two periods Denver did a slightly better job of forechecking Minnesota in the second period.
Cheverie continued his superior goaltending through the third period and the Ruegsegger-Rakhshani-Colborne line scored three goals to carry the day for the Pioneers.
One aspect of the Pioneers' play which has concerned me all season is the almost complete lack of scoring from whichever players constitute the third and fourth lines on any given night. At this point in the season Ruegsegger, Rakhshani and Coloborne have scored 48 of the team's 90 goals. The second line of Jesse Martin [currently out with a shoulder injury] Anthony Maiani and Kyle Ostrow have done their fair share of scoring as well. After that there's been a huge gap in scoring from the third and fourth lines.
To overstate the case, Denver's offensive game plan has been "let's score two, or maybe three goals" and let Chevy do the rest in goal. If Denver ever gets scoring production from its third and/or fourth lines over the remainder of the season the Pioneers would be capable of beating any team they play. Denver has solid, but not spectatcular play on the blueline, and with Cheverie in goal is as strong as any team in division 1 in that area of play. Again, if DU could get some scoring help from the 3rd and 4th lines.....!!
As always there were many Minnesota fans in the building last night. Lots of gold and maroon sprinkled throughout the building. Looking forward to tonight's game.
