After skating to a thrilling 4-3 OT game on Thursday night, one would
have thought that the UAH Chargers and Canisius Ice Griffs would  provide
another nail-biter in their re-match on Saturday.  Apparently, the UAH
team was having none of that, however, as they got out to an early 4-0
lead in the first period and coasted to a 5-1 win.
 
Ryan Wood led the way on the scoreboard for the Chargers with 2 goals,
although many players had fine performances, including frosh goalie
Mike Zeller.  Zeller made only his second start of the season Saturday
and was visibly nervous at the onset (his previous start had been against
an opponent not nearly as strong as Canisius), but he was up to the task, making
a number of tough saves.  Zeller finished with 20 saves, I believe.
His defense found nearly every rebound and blocked a lot of shots,
making his job much easier.
 
I felt that the first period of the game was played pretty evenly, but
UAH seemed to convert on most of their chances and get the better of the
bounces.  After that, it seemed that Canisius let up a little, and for the
last 30 minutes of the game they looked a bit tired and didn't apply as
much pressure as they had.
 
I hesitate to go off a bit on a tangent for fear that it will start
another ref-bashing war, but I do have to make some comment on the
officiating, because it was sub-par.  The officials muffed at least three
icings in the first period alone and seemed to
have trouble all night figuring out if a puck shot the length of the ice
was icing or not.  A number of times, the ref at the far end of the ice
had to signal possible icing and then skate all the way down to the
other end to physically blow the icing because the linesman and other ref
down there were not paying any attention to his upraised arm.  Other times,
one ref would signal icing at the far end and the guy at the near end would
wave it off,
followed by the ref at the far end blowing his whistle for icing. I can
understand missing one icing, or being liberal in calling icing for
a shot that came from just short of center ice, but these guys
just weren't working together.  In fact, one of the officials gave me the
impression he didn't know the mechanics of officiating in the first
period.  The refs got better in the second and third and certainly didn't
effect the outcome of the game, but they just weren't at all together
in the first period.
 
I also want to comment on the officiating in the UAH-St. Anselm's games
of a week ago.  One of the refs was named Brown and it was announced that he
was from Boston.  Brown really called a fantastic game - he was consistent,
he was observant, he was in position, and I felt that the players knew
that he was the boss.  Perhaps someone knows which leagues Brown usually
refs in - I haven't seen him down here before (UAH usually has a local
guy as one of their refs and cycles between two or three other guys
as the other ref).  Too many of the refs for games here seem to miss
a lot of stuff - I'm not saying that they're partial (they're not - they call
it even up), just that they don't seem to be looking in the right places as
often as they might.  Brown was clearly an experienced ref.  Maybe he was an
NHL or ECHL guy trying to keep sharp, although he reffed like a college ref
would call a game.
 
Tim Newman