>> #23 is indeed Matt Garver, who transferred from RPI and, according to
>>  him, couldn't be happier. He's bonded to this team very well, and was
>>  certainly part of the "circle the wagons" mentality the Tigers had in
>>  Omaha. He got a stick to the cage at the end of game one for his
>>  "How's that for D-III?" comment in front of the UNO bench, which
>>  apparently had been taunting him all night. That's all the players
>>  wanted to talk about after the game.
 
>Why shouldn't he be happy?  He's the big fish in a small pond, now.  He
>probably got the poke for making the comment after being all but invisible
>in game one.  Then again, hockey player stories tend to degenerate into
>"He said/He said" situations.  Unless you were right there, you don't know
>for sure.
 
Garver was a big fish in a big pond. He was 5th in points in the entire
 ECAC with RPI last season, and would have been the leading returning
 scorer for RPI. UNO, especially Skogland, along with Edwards and
 Yurecko/Glover did a great job of shutting down RIT's #1 line of
 Garver, Staerker and Murphy for much of the series. If the second game
 had ended at 16:05 of the thrid, they would have limited that line to
 a single goal. Unfortunately for UNO, that line got three in the final 3:55.
 
And I think that was Garver's point. UNO thought that if they could
 shut down Garver and company, they would win. They did in game one,
 but still lost because more conventional "D-III lines" that perhaps
 weren't given as much attention/respect came through.
 
Chris Lerch
US College Hockey Magazine
US College Hockey Online -- www.uscollegehockey.com
Color Voice of RIT Hockey on 89.7 WITR
http://members.aol.com/chrislerch/main.html
 
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