We came out on the wrong end of a hard fought game the other day against the Jumbos.  If someone had told me going into the game we'd double them up in shots (59-30), out ground ball them, out ride them, and win 60% of our face offs, I would have taken it in a heartbeat.  Unfortunately it wasn't enough to earn a W as Tufts made the most of their opportunities and their goalie played a good game in the hoop.  

Tufts led almost the entire way, 4-2 after the first, 8-5 at the half, and 9-8 after the third.  We finally tied it up at 10 with 9 minutes left and proceeded to win the next two face offs. Unfortunately we gave up the final two goals of the game off of those face off wins as well after turning the ball over in our defensive end on the first one and on a fast break on the 2nd.  Our team played with a tremendous amount of heart all day and continued to battle despite a number of mental lapses over the course of the game.  Going forward we'll need to play with more poise and composure in big moments but it was a huge step forward for our team to be able to compete the way we did on Saturday. 

Our face off specialist, John Jackson, is one tough competitor.  John won the face off battle 15-10 over Tufts' specialist Conor Helfrich who's one of the best in the country.  John is just a grinder and continues to get better each time out on the field for us. Coach Brakeley has also been doing an outstanding job with our face off unit.

Going forward we know we have plenty to work on but I love the group we have this year.  Our schedule doesn't let up this week with St. Lawrence coming to town tomorrow at 4pm.  They are undefeated after some convincing wins to start the season and have a dynamic attackman in Connor Healy. He may be the best athlete we face this year and is a heck of a player.  We will certainly have our hands full with him and his supporting cast!  We will then travel down to Wesleyan this weekend