Part I

Well, we knocked off some rust last night down in Queensbury, NY against Union and accomplished what we set out to do.  We wanted to leave the scrimmage a better team than when we walked through the door and I think we did that.  We'll wrap up our first week of practice this afternoon and accomplish a first in the program in that we'll be outside for our fifth straight practice to start the season. 

As I'm running out to practice I'll give you some quick highlights from the scrimmage last night.

We have a competition on our hands in the goal.  Juniors Charles Ward and Ryan Deane both played very well over the first 3 quarters and sophomore Jack Reilly did his part as well.  All three guys have a legitimate shot to be our starter this year.

Freshman Brian Foster (Medfield, MA) and sophomore Peter Jennings (Wellesley, MA) both did a nice job facing off last night. Hopefully we can keep up our tradition of great face off specialists with them this year.

At attack we have some very good options going into this season.  Co-Captain Pete Smith was more aggressive dodging last night than I've seen in his 4 years and came up with a few huge hustle plays as usual (while he was nursing an injury).  Junior David Hild finished with 3 goals in about a half of play and is shooting the ball very well as we start up this season.  Sophomore Tim Cahill continues to show incredibly soft hands as he catches everything fed to him inside and has a knack for getting open.  Sophomore Jack Balaban is a playmaker, he probably finished with 4 assists in a few quarters of play.  Senior Jack Masur has been excellent in practice and has a knack for getting to the goal.  Finally, freshman Mike Giordano has a bright future ahead of him.  He's a very balanced player with both hands, great vision, and the ability to put the ball in the back of the net.   We may need to move one of these guys to midfield to get them on the field this year.  

On the defensive end we have a lot of bodies out there and as of now things are wide open.   We played a ton of guys last night and played pretty well across the board.  We definitely have a long way to go and need a few guys to separate themselves from the pack.

Next up is St. Lawrence next Sunday, should be a fun week!

Part II

After going back and breaking down the Union scrimmage I figured I'd share a little more info about one performance that stood out.

I mentioned that Jack Balaban is going to be a playmaker for us this year and that he had a good scrimmage.  I didn't realize how well he played until I went back and kept track of who scored and assisted on all our goals.  We put him in the game during the 3rd quarter and he proceeded to score 2 goals and assist on 5 others.  He had a hand in 7 of our last 8 goals of the scrimmage and was a part of all 6 goals in the 4th quarter.  Not a bad day at the office.

On a different note, I had a senior in my office today who's looking to get into finance.  If anyone out there has the time and would be willing to speak with him please let me know and I'll put you in touch.

Finally, it looks like our scrimmage with St. Lawrence will be moved to 6:30pm this Sunday at the Adirondack Sports Complex in Queensbury, NY. 

That's it for now, looking like we'll be outside again today in the stadium.  It's a great day to be a Panther!