Re: St. Lawrence University: Big Time, Old Time Hockey 2014-15
As disappointed as I am in this weekends results........I think you are way off base here, particularly with your last statement unless it is pure sentiment of missing someone who is no longer here.
We all miss Joe for the great character, coach and influence he was on the team, players and university. We also miss his sense of humor. However, nothing is forever and change and a new coaching staff was inevitable. Also, if you have seen Joe since he retired you would know how great he looks, how happy he is, how healthy he is.
I for one am very comfortable with the coaching staff we have. In fact in many area's I think the coaching set up we have now is far superior to what we had. Our recruiting is better and stronger....the program is being grown in ways (that it was not growing before.) We have top level talent with NHL and AHL coaching and playing experience behind the bench. The program is better and growing in ways that it needed to and frankly as much as we all loved Joe, it was not growing the last few years of his tenure for a variety of reasons including his health.
Also....if you think this team is every man for himself; then we have not been watching the same team all season. Sure, we are disappointed in the recent results, but this group has played with more team work, verve, hustle and teamwork than any of the past 5-6 teams have. We're in a rough patch. We were picked to finish 11th or 12th. Success isn't going to come overnight and I think our expectations were falsely raised with the start this team had. It'll get better. And I for one love the staff we have in place, and am completely comfortable with the direction the program is headed.
100% ditto. I agree right down the line on this one. For a team picked to finish 11th in the ECAC to have wins against Ferris, Miami, Yale, Cornell, 4 shut outs at the midpoint, I am not complaining. We were the better team tonight. We won a lot of battles. Unfortunately, we lost one important one at the end of the game that gave them an odd-man rush and essentially a breakaway goal. Graham, I think, goes up catches the puck puts it on his stick and the Husky player is skating full speed and steals it off his stick as he puts it down off balance. He got out-muscled, plain and simple. Sure, we'd be much worse off without Hayton, but Parks did play well against Vermont and just imagine how good we could have been last year with Hayton.
First, while I am ****ed we lost, at least we played with some gumption tonight. It was night and day better and some guys like Horn, Bayreuther, Martin were 100% better. Further, I am certain that Horn's shot at the 10 minute mark of the first was in. Several others sitting by me also thought so. ****ed it wasn't reviewed. I had a good angle and it hit the bar at the top of the back of the net and was in and out very fast. Second, we played tighter defense and moved the puck out of the zone much more easily. Northeastern is a fast team too, we can't overcommit forechecking. Their best player played tonight and he was very good. He got their first goal on a good individual effort and he got their empty netter. At the end of the night, we had more chances and we didn't bury them. They had enough chances and they did. Their first two goals were powerplay goals and no one is stopping their second goal. Officiating was much better tonight. At least the game had some flow. They still missed a ton, and until they got nailed for too many men I was starting to think it would take someone getting shot for them to call anything on them. Linesmen were brutal both night with "what the hell were they thinking" icing and offside calls and non-calls. My opinion on some of our offensive woes is that we win the speed battles and the skill battles but not the strength battles. Having Smolcynski out also hurts. He is a decent PP guy and one of our better offensive players. I am not enamored with the PP unit of Hughes, Doherty and Ward. Bottomline, crappy results this weekend. Crappy effort last night. Much better tonight but Northeastern stole it. Hayton was good, but mortal. The angle I had I thought they were going to score when they hit the pipe on the PP with about 6 left. Better job staying out of the box tonight but their PP was 100 times better. Again, I thought we were the better team.
As for this team, this staff, and this current streak. 3 or 4 points next weekend and these two games are pretty meaningless. I don't understand why we continue to meltdown every year after losing to Clarkson. We do need some more reliable scorers. We do need some forwards that can score on the PP. But I am not ready to hit the panic button or jump off the bandwagon. Our defense is 10 times better than last year. So is our goaltending. Our forwards are not as good with loss of Carey squared and Wick, but we are deeper and can roll four lines better than last year, and we have guys in the Freshmen class that are going to have very good careers. Lough, Marnell, and Horn in particular can contribute offensively, and I really like Sullivan as a 2 way player. I think we are already going to be better next year than we are this year. The recruiting is drastically improved with more emphasis on the USHL. Nielsen, Conger and Corriveau are all very good from what I have seen and assuming they dont get swiped by Boston scum, I think we are going to be in the hunt very soon. Carvy wants to win. Carvy is smart as hell. I don't know DeMichel, but Carvy and Hurly are total class guys that know the game, know how to coach, and represent the university impeccably. Th ere is parity. Even with Princeton who can't score, there are no easy wins. I miss Joe. I'm sure Carvy and Hurley miss Joe. He was our mentor and he got results with guys that were less talented than some of us would have liked. He was the best coach in the game, but he didn't want to coach anymore and was sick of watching guys get concussions. I think Jared Keller's woes took 5 years off his career. And because Joe cares, he wanted to turn the program over to someone that he knows can take us to the next level and when Carvy came home it was an easy decision for Joe. We had a great recruiting class last year with Bayreuther, Sweetman, Graham, Masella, Ward, Hudson, McGovern, Parks and whoever I missed. Bayreuther was the leading d-man scorer and, for my money, the SOLE ROTY of the league last year even though Sweetman is my fave of the two. Then the come back with Lough, Purmal, Eden, Hayton, Marnell, Horn, Sullivan, and whoever I missed and are recruited for future years. For my money there is no more clear MVP for their team than Hayton in the entire league and should be well positioned for ROTY. I think the corner has been turned. Yeah, this is frustrating, and yeah there were a lot of offisides, but Northeastern was trapping and their clear was a lot of lobs out of the zone to counter SLU's speed and transition game. They also were swinging guys high to neutralize our points. They also dove a lot and got calls that they shouldn't have both nights. Bottomline, this was a crap weekend but it was not a 'the world is ending' weekend. I personally think we are on the way up, and though I love Wellsy, I think we have the perfect staff for today and for the future...maybe even better than Joe. Take a deep breath. Look at how young we are. Look at where we are and have faith. Hope we break this slump and at least get to .500 hockey. But regardless, I like our recruiting, I like our staff, I like our trajectory and I like the way we responded after a bad effort. We were much better. So was Northeastern and they got a key bounce at the end. If Horn's shot was in and it counted, that is a much different game. Rather that pull the chute I just challenge the guys. You know you can play with and beat anybody, so do it because losing sucks. I'll put $5 on the table now that we get to LP this year. I think we will if we avoid key injuries and the guys don't quit.
. Seriously, hurts the better skating team and gives them 6 timeouts instead of one. That was one of the least entertaining games I can remember. We started the first half with a thud. Let's hope we can find our winning ways tomorrow and find some chemistry on our lines. There sure wasn't any tonight. We also need to be weary of makeup calls. After every call we got, they got one deserved or not. Calls on Masella and last one on award were to of the worst calls I have seen all season and on the latter they should have got the only one for diving!
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