Did someone say hockey?  :-)

Kariya and Lawson together again.  For some reason they were split
apart as Maine tried to make things more interesting, but together they
have done some great things.  In one game alone (January 10 vs.
Northeastern) the two combined for 10 points (5g and 5a).

While Lawson's play has been steady, perhaps this is a move to get
Kariya jump-started again?  In the last 4 games, Kariya has 3 assists.
For the season he's averaging more than a point per game.  While I
would not say that he's slumping or struggling, Kariya certainly
performed better with Lawson, so why not keep them together?

Derek Damon has also performed well with those two.

One player that is slumping and hopefully will pick it up and carry us
on his back is Colin Shields.  Granted, Colin has been banged up but he
has struggled to put the puck in the net. He has 13 goals, but only 3
in Hockey East games.  I took a quick look at the box scores and I am
not sure Colin has scored in the 2003 calendar year.  He toyed with 30
goals last year so we really need him to step up.

But I think a big problem exposed recently is that our defensemen are
not very good in their own end.  Frank Doyle and Jimmy Howard are SO
good, that they've been able to cover for and make up for a lot of
mistakes in our end.  We have some good defensemen, but for whatever
reason they can't break the puck out consistently.  There is no reason
such a gifted offensive player like Francis Nault should be giving the
puck away in the slot.  Cliff Loya as a senior should be leading the
charge to just be conservative in the approach at getting the puck out.
 In March and April teams will be able to capitalize on that.

In some ways this is almost like a hangover from St. Paul and the
Minnesota game last year.  We seem to struggle with some of the same
things that cost us that game, end zone faceoff coverage and turnovers.

Maine might be able to win in March and April if the goalies stand on
their head, but realistically they need to improve in their own end.
Whitehead talks about it, we talk about it and it doesn't seem to get
much better, though purely looking at the third period numbers from
Sunday vs. Merrimack is encouraging.

I'm still very concerned with this aspect of their game right now.