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Vermont 2022-23: New Jerseys, New Attitude

Congrats on the win against Maine!! The Catamounts came to play and did it in a nearly sold out Alfond Arena. Good to see them making progress under Woodcroft.
 
Shout out to the team and coach Woodcroft on a big win last night.

This season had it's ups and downs, but in a rebuild that is what you are going to get. It helps build the character and foundation for future success. Win or lose from here on in (and of course I hope we win), this season can go in the books as a very solid step forward for the program.

I'm optimistic that we can use this season as a springboard to get back to being a .500+ program next season. I like where we are headed right now, if we can just figure out how to score a little bit more we will be a tough out in the future. To me that's the piece we are missing, those one or two really talented guys who can light the lamp consistently. I get you could say that about most programs, but we've been missing a lot more than that in recent years.
 
Catfantoo said:
Was at the BU series this weekend. Thought Cat's played a spirited game on Friday and hung close (4-3, late), ENG by BU for final margin. We made some errors that a very talented team jumped on and turned into goals. Saturdays game didn't feel as "good" as Fridays and BU rolled to the weekend sweep. Think we saw the most talented and currently highest nationally ranked Hockey East team. Their speed, puck possession, and overall hockey skills were impressive. Not sure if they have the goaltending to take them far and steal a game in the NCAA's. It was alot of fun watching potential NHL'ers on the BU roster. They have 12 drafted players with many of them in the early rounds. Guys that definitely will get a hard look and pro opportunities. Cats saw what it takes to compete at highest levels and hopefully the weekend provided some stepping stones for the future. Season wrapping up over the next few weeks. Thursday night game this week to kickoff the weekend.
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Good analysis, and as a BU fan can't really disagree. Regarding your comment about the goaltending, it's not that they don't "have" it; it's more that it seems as though Commesso's head is not always in the game. That and the fact that we seem to have defenses lapses (leaving people uncovered in front of the net, etc) is a problem. I would say it's the type of team that wins because we outscore the opponent. It's not a defensive-minded team and I think you need at least a little of that to go far in the post-season. I also worry that, because they have an NCAA spot locked up, the motivation might not be there. I hope I'm wrong. Either way, I am concerned about every game from this point on.
 
Great to see the resilience from the team yesterday. I was surprised to see them bring in Lombardi mid season, but he does add some speed and skill. Buyalsky and Walther have both started to make strides and hopefully can find another level next year. I do think if the offseason goes well (no major transfers leaving) this team should be aiming for a .500 record next year. Still a long way to go, but they've shown that on their day they're a hard team to play against. That's a start.

Zero expectations for BU on Saturday, other than playing hard.

On another note, there have a been a number of articles in RDS (french language TSN) lately. My french is "vraiment mal" but toward the end it talks about recruiting in Quebec, including Daniel Heroux and it sounds like Woodcroft alludes to another potential Quebec recruit.

https://www.rds.ca/hockey/la-grande-...oft-1.16666781
 
NYCatamount89 said:
Great to see the resilience from the team yesterday. I was surprised to see them bring in Lombardi mid season, but he does add some speed and skill. Buyalsky and Walther have both started to make strides and hopefully can find another level next year. I do think if the offseason goes well (no major transfers leaving) this team should be aiming for a .500 record next year. Still a long way to go, but they've shown that on their day they're a hard team to play against. That's a start.

Zero expectations for BU on Saturday, other than playing hard.

On another note, there have a been a number of articles in RDS (french language TSN) lately. My french is "vraiment mal" but toward the end it talks about recruiting in Quebec, including Daniel Heroux and it sounds like Woodcroft alludes to another potential Quebec recruit.

https://www.rds.ca/hockey/la-grande-...oft-1.16666781
Click to expand...

Yes, Daniel Heroux has committed to Vermont, but he plays at Kimball Union in New Hampshire under Tim Whitehead who recruited him.
 
Maine was the 6th seed. Long road trip to Orono. If we played them 100 times, they might win 99. But not tonight. Tonight, we played like Champions…

let’s hope BU is looking past Saturday. They already have an invitation to the tournament…

Win or lose Saturday, I like how the program is going. And we have Minnesota boys coming in next year.
 
Nice to see the win last Wednesday at Maine as its a great motivator to the future steps the team will take.

In regards to Chickod and comments relative to BU. I agree with your goalie comments. I should have made reference to performance as I can clearly see his past lineage to USNTDP and felt he needed to play at a higher level (sounds like we agree). You mention having a spot already locked up. I would think the potential to get a #1 NCAA seed (one of the top 4 slots) by winning HE would drive BU to not take anyone for granted? BU sitting at #5 in pairwise could jump a spot. We'll see how it plays out.

Other comments about Lombardi - I'm really warming up to him as a center. First ~8 games without any points I was unsure why the urgency to pull him in midseason (other than # of injuries). However after getting more comfortable he's been a very good contributor and he's driving play.

Todays game on NESN at 4:30. Good luck Cats.
 
Tough Saturday as we saw the explosiveness of the BU offense. Very talented, very fast, and able to get to dangerous areas of the ice. I liked the Cats fight as they did most of the season. Down 5-3 in 3rd, just too many things going against them for 2nd upset. Winning playoff game at Maine capped the improvements this year. Thought Todd's comments post-game were appropriate as well. Lemay onto ECHL, Bouquot into portal and Grad students to move on. Time to make some room for incoming recruits, maybe add a few 1-2 portal/grad students to provide a little stability. But in long run want to see the 3rd class of Todd's regime get into the lineup and see what we have. All in all, a step forward this year from m y perspective.
 
I want to go to the garden and HE final 4 with UVM playing someday (please). Tons of excitement. Merrimack continuing Cinderella season with 20 buses full of their fans last night. Umass Lowell having a $20 special ticket that gets admission for both nights and round-trip bus. Pregame outings for the different schools at local establishments. Both games go into OT, can really see the clamp-down defensive style and high-level goaltending that is needed to compete. Maybe someday.......
 
Agreed! Great pickup for the Cats. Now hopefully they can pick up a couple defenseman. There are a ton of guys available who could help them next year. The portal is such chaos right now. Glad guys have the freedom to move around, but it's still wild to see.

Also interested to see where Kyle Haskins of Huntington and Nicholas Niemo of Middlebury end up. Niemo had a strong Freshman year at Bentley.
 
The name Dubinsky kept running around my head. So with a little digging - his dad was quite the player at Clarkson with 152 pts. in 89-93. Then followed it up with 375 NHL games and over 600 games total in the pro's. Portal activity is going to be interesting as recruiting sites have UVM at 14 incoming next year with 7-For, 6-def, and 1-Goalie. Things can change and some recruits can be convinced to spend another year in juniors. We had 6 Grad players and 2 SR's who have or will depart. I haven't heard if any underclassmen are planning to move on.
 
Porter Schachle listed in portal. 1G/3A last year in 30 games. Nice size works hard but found himself on 3rd/4th line most of time. Assuming with Zach D. from portal and incoming freshman class forward group he's seeing the handwriting on the wall.
 
Catfantoo said:
The name Dubinsky kept running around my head. So with a little digging - his dad was quite the player at Clarkson with 152 pts. in 89-93. Then followed it up with 375 NHL games and over 600 games total in the pro's. Portal activity is going to be interesting as recruiting sites have UVM at 14 incoming next year with 7-For, 6-def, and 1-Goalie. Things can change and some recruits can be convinced to spend another year in juniors. We had 6 Grad players and 2 SR's who have or will depart. I haven't heard if any underclassmen are planning to move on.
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Looks like they got defenseman Jeremie Bucheler from Northeaster as a grad transfer. They do have a big group of D recruits committed. Malinski and Barnett are both guys who are going to be there next year. Ramsay and Kinsman both need another year in junior although maybe they get brought in next year. I am curious to see what happens with Calvarino and Gasparini because neither of them have really looked great at this point. They both committed when Sneddon was still the coach, do they even end up on campus?
 
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