I was at the first game.
The one thing that stuck out was tha the puck seems to
be made out of superball rubber when UMass plays.
Neither team can control it and it bounces, rolls and
does what it wants to. I have seen Umass play at home
against Maine, and I have seen them play at Merrimack
and at Lowell and it is always the same.
My thoughts. Ben seems to be back (unless the person
was correct who said, online, that Ben was clearly
injured in the second period of the Sunday game.) He
gave up only a few horrid rebounds, but his
positioning was great, he did not give away the top
corners and he handled the puck very well.
The whole team looked very good. The passing is still
not good, but it has not been good for years. They
hustled, they blocked shots and it was clear that they
all wanted to win.
Bret Tyler actually looked fast in catching UMass
players who had gotten behind him.
Sweetland stole the puck off the Umass goalie's stick
to set up the second goal. The goalie went behind the
net to stop the puck for his defenseman and I guess he
could not quite control it... without hitting the
goalie, Sweetland reached the tip of his stick in,
from behind the goalie and plucked the puck away from
him and passed it out front to Orsiini. It was the
kind of plucking that Leveille used to do a lot of.
(and almost nobody else even attempts.)
Keenan had the hits of the night. Yes, Keenan Hopson,
rattled someone on par with Bellamy. MANY people
were talking about that hit after the game in the
Dexter lounge. (I still remember the time Adam Oates
checked someone too).
Zach Sill had a couple great passes to Brendan Walsh
and Mike Morrison assisted on a couple goals and I am
just wondering if anyone is reading this far.
There was about 15 minutes of the second period that
the UMass trap did absolutely NOTHING and the whole
game was wide open, up and down and was great fun to
watch.
I like what I see out of the freshmen defensemen. it
has been a very long time since I have seen any of the
freshmen make any horrible freshmen mistakes, so that
they are a very promising group for the futire. (I
remember thinking that Begg and Nault would not amount
to much after seeing some of the dumb plays they made
their freshman years. Even Peter Metcalf made some
bad ones, but after some seasoning, they became pretty
damn good...and I think that our freshmen are already
past being freshmen.
As I told to someone on this list at the game, I look
forward to Sweetland learning to bury his shots. the
kid gets more chances every game than almost any other
college player I can think ofm ever... he has more
"almosts" than anyone. When he turns the "almosts"
into goals, he will be an All American.
--- Adam Parker <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I didn't get to see or hear either of the games -
> all I could work from were
> forum postings (mainly USCHO.com).
>
> Anyone have any thoughts about how the team played?
> It sounded like overall
> they played pretty well. I'm not sure what happened
> when they blew a 4-1
> lead on Sunday, but I'm glad they got the win in OT.
> Can anyone give those
> of us less fortunate some insight?
>
> So, thanks to the sweet, we are 2 points out of a
> playoff spot with 4 games
> to play. Also, because of the sweep, we own the
> tiebreaker over UMass. Our
> last 2 series are at Vermont (#3 in HE) and home
> against Lowell (#7 in HE).
> On the other hand, UMass plays at BU, home against
> BC and then a home/home
> against Merrimack.
>
> Thoughts on the odds Maine makes it in?
>
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