Well, I left for the game at 4 and got back to clarkson at 10...the six
hours in between were a total waste.
 
(sorry, I have no box score, I'll see if I can get one later)
 
Saturday night at Canton's Appleton Arena, St Lawrence Saints routed
their Route 11 rivals Clarkson Golden Knights by the score of 5-0.
Unfortunately the game was as lopsided as the score indicates. SLU
dominated every facet of the game. The only Clarkson players to put
forth a decent effort were goalies Jason Currie (starter) and Chris
Rogles. 3 of the 4 goals scored on Currie were PPG's.
 
The game started off as an intense hard hitting matchup. The Saints netted
a pair of PPG's while on a 5-on-3 (and then 5-on-4) advantage midway through
the first. Both were scrambles in front and the screened Currie had no chance.
Pushing and shoving led to a near brawl after the first period ended but no
penalties were handed out.
 
One would've expected the embarassed and outplayed Knights to respond in the
2nd...but they respond by doing even worse than in the opening stanza. SLU
outskated and outhit Clarkson. The 3rd goal was another screen while the 4th
(another PPG) went in from a strange angle. A friend from Clarkson TV
WCKN stopped by during the period and mentioned he had the period off, I
muttered that the team took the period off too.
 
Clarkson played slightly better in the 3rd but the few decent shots were
snagged by SLU goalie Paul Spagnoletti, who made a few good saves in the
3rd to preserve his shutout. Late in the 3rd, a SLU player completely
pickpocketed a Clarkson defenseman (either Ed Henrich or Kent Anderson,
I believe) and beat Rogles (who came in during the 2nd intermission) through
the legs. With about 8 seconds left, the SLU bench emptied to congratulate
each other but another near brawl broke out. No penalties (including no
too-many-men penalty) were handed out, even though they should have.
 
First a point about the refereeing. No sour grapes here, most of Clarkson's
games have been well-officiated, but ref Galagher did a poor job tonight,
obviously intimidated by the SLU crowd. Case in point, only one of Clarkson's
6 or 7 power plays went the full 2 minutes w/o a penalty being called on
them. Gallagher was obviously from the "even-up" school of officiating
,even though all of SLU's power plays went uninterupted (like when
a delayed penalty was being called vs. Clarkson, Gallagher neatly
missed a charging/boarding penalty on one of the Knights, and they
were fighting for the puck too). Although this is not to say the
officiating made any difference as SLU totally deserved to win.
 
Just a point about the 2 Clarkson-SLU games. SLU was better in every facet
of both games, most noticeably, puck control and speed. This is especially
applicable to the defensemen. Clarkson's defensemen mostly dumped and
chased while SLU's defensive core were much better at puck control and
could stickhandle through forecheckers into Clarkson's zone. SLU's
passing was much better and CLarkson's forechecking was non-existent.
Clarkson rarely had a man in front of the net while four of SLU's goals
resulted from screens. Finally, Currie and Rogles played respectably but
Spagnoletti was in top form for both games (even though he played better
in the 4-3 win in December). Finally, Clarkson needs to put together a
solid performance against a good team to convice me that the deserve to
have a shot at an ECAC crown repeat. They haven't had a solid performance
against a good team since a 4-1 win over Cornell in mid November.
 
SLU and Clarkson both play next weekend at UVM and Dartmouth. SLU moves
into a first place tie with Yale and Harvard while Clarkson drops to
fourth, one point ahead of 5th place Cornell but only  one point behind
the threesome on top.
--------------------------------
 
By the way, Bob Croce's column didn't appear in the Times-Union today.
The only coll. hky stuff was an article on the RPI-Union game and the
T-U top 10 posted earlier by Wayne (by the way, the #9 ranking given
to Clarkson was VERY generous).
 
-------------------------------------------
Bri Farenell
Clarkson '95
[log in to unmask]
___________________________________________
A FAN OF USA HOCKEY AND PROUD OF IT!
"It's a great day for hockey" ---Bob Johnson 1937-1991
 
 
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