Re: UMass Lowell 17/18 Season Thread: 21 Year Old Freshman Eating BU's Lunch
Bad habits and a poor work ethic have led to the inconsistency that we have seen this year from the Hawks and thus the reason why we have not seen this team play well in back to back games, put together a series of wins and keep the fans wondering what team will show up game to game. When I look at the past weekend and especially the game against St Lawrence, the Hawks got outworked in every facet of the game and the players have to own this. However, as equally noticeable, they simply got out-coached again and this staff did not make any adjustments to counter St Lawrence's game plan. When faced with teams that forecheck hard down the walls and keep tracking back above the puck in the offensive and neutral zones, the Hawks have real troubles breaking out of the zone and making plays. I have yet to see any real adjustments made by the coaching staff to counter this and you can go back on a number of games vs various teams both this year and other years where this has been the case. Quite frankly when your offensive strategy is to chip the puck off the glass into the NZ and then dump it in and make a line change, you are not going to create much offence and are going to spend most of the game defending. The Hawks were forced up the walls all night and seldom did we see this team make consecutive passes on the breakout and through the NZ or utilize the middle or weak side of the ice to open things up. Too often the defence either choose or are forced to pass to a forward in the NZ that is standing still and has no options and nobody coming through with any speed and support. If you have watched any of the World Junior games or even BU in the game in Boston, their forwards are always in motion and have a 4 foot pass to a support person coming with speed. As a result they can attack the blue line with numbers and speed and/or dump the puck into an area where they have several players attacking for puck retrieval. Very seldom do we ever see the Hawks make consecutive passes through the NZ, attack with numbers and actually speed up on the attack as they enter the offensive zone.
Every game we hear Coach Bazin mention special teams as one of the keys to the game. Yet the PP is operating at a mere 15% and has only scored 14 goals this year. Watching it on the weekend the PP has digressed. There is no creativity, player movement, interchanges or quick puck movement. It is slow and deliberate and the players pass it around the perimeter without challenging and creating 2 on 1 on the point of attack. A key to any PP is puck retrieval on entry and after a play on goal and I am not sure why the coaches continue to use the strategy of dumping the puck into the zone on the entry because puck retrieval, outnumbering the PK and winning battles is probably one of the weakest areas for this team. Too often the players stand around and watch one player battle for the puck and hope it comes to them. You don't see teams dump the puck anymore because all the teams play a 3+1 PK and overload to win the battle along the boards. Yet we consistently see the Hawks dump the puck to areas where there is only 1 player in a position to retrieve and get outnumbered losing the puck battle. It might be time to change up some players on the PP because the experiments of using freshman on the points and continuing to use certain players who do not have the creativity, skill set, hockey IQ, ability to read and react and who have only scored a few goals on the PP or in their entire careers is not working.
This team is running out of time and games if they are going to gain any momentum and change the work ethic and habits they have formed. I keep hearing about the leadership and what I will say is that it is time for all the players to stop cheating the game and start playing the game as it should be played. When is the last time we saw the so-called top 6 forwards and top 4 d-men be difference makers in a consistent fashion and put together a series of shifts that change the momentum in a period. When is the last time where we can say that we outworked a team throughout an entire game. Holding all players accountable by the coaching staff at this stage of the season is critical to gaining some consistency in the play. This year the Hawks have become predictable, soft and a relatively easy team to play against. They no longer intimidate teams with their work ethic and do no have the skill or depth to win games on these factors. This weekend they need to begin to change this identity and start building some momentum in terms of their consistency and standard of play. The saving grace is that Hockey East is up for grabs as there are no real dominant teams and the league is probably the weakest it has been in quite a few years as evident by the Pairwise and OCC record. Hopefully the team recognizes an opportunity. Nothing short of 2 wins is needed.
