Another article from the GT today.
 
CC working hard to regain killer instinct from early season
by Steve Page
 
David Paxton saw it and participated in it, but the senior defenseman still
couldn't believe it.
 
Colorado College, ranked second nationally and comfortably in first place in
the Western Collegiate Hockey Association, had become complacent.
 
And last-place Minnesota-Duluth took advantage of the suddenly generous Tigers,
outscoring CC 6-1 during the game's last 21 minutes en route to a 6-5 upset win
Saturday.
 
"It was weird, sitting on the bench and watching that happen," said Paxton, a
senior from Thunder Bay, Ontario.  "Then when you were on the ice, you'd try
too hard to change it, and it just made things worse.
 
"We played two good periods, then it was like no one showed up for the last 21
minutes of the game.
 
"We got a little complacent.  When we started the season, and we got up 4-0,
we'd win, 8-0.  Not now.  We lost that killer instinct.  But we're working to
get it back."
 
The Tigers have little choice.
 
They take their four-point lead in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association to
third-place Wisconsin this weekend, then to fourth-place Minnesota next week.
 
Paxton's coach, Don Lucia, is confident the Tigers will rebound.
 
"It was just a little blip on the ol' screen, "Lucia said.  "We made a lot of
mistakes, but these mistakes are correctable.  We showed them their mistakes
on the video.  It helps when they can see what they did."
 
Lucia said he has no doubts as to his defenseman's abilities.
 
"How well we do is predicated on our three defensive defensemen," he said of
Paxton, Jon Steiner, and Bob Needham, who produce more hits than points.
 
At 6-foot-1 and 200 pounds, Paxton packs more wallop than most.
 
"David is our big hitter," Lucia said.  "He's one who is capable of turning a
game around with a hit.  One reason we have done as well as we have is our core
of defensemen."
 
Paxton carries Lucia's confidence into the series at Wisconsin.
 
"We went over what every person has to do," he said.  "The first half of the
season is over.  We're in better shape this year than we were last year.  It's
a new season.  We'll start from there.
 
"We feel we can go in there and get four points.  That puts them (the Badgers)
nine (points) back.  We can do it, but we've got to play 60 minutes - every
game."
 
(end of article)
 
Also, for anyone wanting to see the game, I found out from both the paper and
from the school that Saturday's game will be broadcast on ESPN2 at 8pm ET.
The local cable company is being generous here and offering the broadcast for
free to subscribers who don't normally pay for the channel.
 
Karen
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ Karen Heasley                        ~ "Sometimes I think the surest sign  ~
~ Colorado College '95                 ~  that intelligent life exists else- ~
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