We need a leader on the offensive end of the field. I thought the offense would be our strength but clearly it isn’t. We can’t pass and catch when the game is on the line which tonight shouldn’t have even been close in my opinion.
Does anyone know how many goals we gave up on man down? That unit has done well but we need to be able to adjust when the game is truly on the line.
Our offense needs to know when to turn off the tricky and just execute. Joey not starting with the ball in OT was piss poor.
Lastly Rhoa and Leo need to be on the same line. They create matchup issues. Rhoa needs to be on man up.
Time for some adjustments.
They were 4-8 on man down, though like others pointed out, they failed to clear at least once out of a penalty kill and promptly gave up a goal. Also not sure if scoring two goals during an unrelease-able penalty is just a 1-1, but they did score twice on March penalty. So really it felt more like 6-8. For the season they are allowing goals at just 33% of the time in man-down, which is pretty good. I would like to know how many goals they surrender right after a penalty, when the full time starters are still on the sidelines. I think they should mix and match starters more often. Again, it wasn't so much that they gave up EMO goals, it was how easily they did it.
I agree about Rhoa and Leo on the same line, with English that would be a lot of dodging prowess. I think Thomson could still fit in well with Stevens and Birtwistle. Not sure it will happen but that's what I would do. Other adjustments on offense seem harder to figure out. The top six is very good, but something still seems off.
If they want to bench Mule, I'm not sure Deere is going to do much better, as he's more of a classic finisher. It made sense to sub him for Hiltz, but not sure I see the benefit if you are trying to take advantage of a short stick. Birtwistle hasn't exactly been dominating matchups this year, I have a hard time believing he would fare much better than Mule on short sticks (he gets them now, and isn't really taking advantage).
Last night was just very, very bizarre. I'm not sure how in the world you go from scoring 14 goals in a half, to only three the rest of the way (the last one was off a face-off and kind of a fluke anyway). So really 2 goals for 29:50. The disappointing part is so many of the issues seemed to step from the upper classmen, Hiltz, Mule, English all just very careless with the ball. I can forgive Rhoa, he's scored lots of goals that way, but, it just felt like when things got a bit tight, the players we should be relying on the most, let the moment get to them. I can't quite remember an SU team that was this "Boom" or "Bust".
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