The Dartmouth scrimmage was held this past Friday, it turned out to be a good decision playing Friday as it was a beautiful day and the cold, rain and snow came in over the weekend.

We were pleased with how we played, particularly considering where we are in our season. We had at least one top player out at each position due to injuries and hockey, 5 practices/only one outdoors under our belt. Those would be excuses if we had played miserably or had been embarrassed. That was not the case. We certainly have a long way to go, but we did not look as if it were so early in the season. I think it is a tribute to how hard the team works in the off season.

Krieger played the first half in the goal and looked great. The defense in general played extremely well, holding Dartmouth to either 2 or 3 goals in the first half when we primarily played our starters on defense. One of the positions that jumped out was our midfield defense. Mike Murray and Dave Leach looked particularly strong. John West has moved to close D and looked strong. He started along with Caleb Holmes who had worked out a lot this off season, greatly improving his strength, and it shows in his game. Sophomore Will Rawson started at close with them. He had played mostly Long Stick Midfield last year and may again this year, but he gives us a quick close defenseman who can pressure a quick #1 attackman. Junior Tom O'Connor played a solid game at Long Stick Middie, while a bright spot for the future was freshman Gabe Wood. Gabe is big and athletic, he started for the soccer team at 6'2 200lbs. He has great poise clearing the ball. He could play either close or LSM.

At Attack we played 10 guys fairly equally and did pretty well! A couple of guys will end up moving to midfield, so we will not keep 10 attackman but we wanted the opportunity to see them play first. Charley Howe has played great in the pre-season, but had a severely sprained ankle and missed the scrimmage. We hope to have him back by the first game on March 8. Mike Saraceni has the most experience as our 4th last year and played well against Dartmouth with a goal and a couple of nice opportunities. He is a great off ball player and scored on a nifty off ball cut. The rest of the spots are wide open. Junior Ben Tobey is extremely quick, had a great goal on a dodge just going by his defenseman with his speed. He has played both Attack and Mid and will contribute significantly wherever we play him this year. Freshman Jon Sisto was the 3rd starter and showed flashes of his exceptional play while also showing flashes of being a freshman with a couple of turnovers. He can make things happen, though, both scoring and assisting, so expect to see a lot of him. Freshman Henry Sheehan did not get a shot until late in the game but played great, making a case for moving up the depth chart. A number of the other attackmen have played well both in practices and games, so we will take a while until any final decisions are made and even then we might play more guys in each game than we did last year when we were dominated by seniors.

The midfield showed good depth with the defensive middies I already mentioned along with Senior Captain Mike Frissora who had 2 goals on great shots and played his usual dominant defense. Our defensive middies are expected to run the field and play offense, so Frissora, Murray, Leach and Greg Bastis (injured, did not play but should be dominant) will be on the field a lot. Andrew "Gio" Giordano played well in an offensive role and he should be a major contributor. He has a great shot and showed an ability to carry the ball and feed as well. Senior Captain Christopher Davis had a great shot for a goal, we are hoping to get one or two shots for goals a game from him. Sophomore Jamie Duke will be another major contributor on offense, although he did not play his best in the scrimmage and Junior Bob Wannop played well in a "jack of all trades" role. Freshman Travis Meyer has a great stick, very good shot and is a great finisher. He played with a bunch of studs at Landon, so he is used to getting open, having someone put the ball on his stick and finishing, and he does it well. He finished with two goals and another great opportunity. As with all frosh, he has to learn team defense a little, but he could see considerable time this year.

Senior Captain Brian McGregor handled most of the face off duties and did well. Murray was particularly strong as a short stick on the wing. Gabe Wood has looked tremendous on the wing in practice, did not get many opportunities in the game.

Overall, it looks as if we might be down a little in the 1st Team All American type talent (although it is early and some guys are heading in that direction!), but deep in overall talent. Top to bottom we are very strong. We have to figure out who to play and in what combinations, but that is a good problem to have.

We are scheduled to scrimmage Skidmore at home this Saturday at 1:00pm. The weather does not seem to want to cooperate this year, we'll be indoors again today, so we'll keep our fingers crossed for the weekend.

Erin