Middlebury
13 – RPI 4
It was
quite a contrast going to RPI compared to our Bowdoin experience! RPI was a Tuesday at 5:00 in front of a handful of parents, leaving
several players behind who had tests to study for, a couple of players were too
sick to travel, a couple of players were sick enough maybe they should not have
traveled, we got dressed in a building several blocks from the field and then
bussed over, etc. There were a couple of times during the game
when the silence was almost surreal, but the players did a great job for the
most part generating their own excitement and emotion and playing at the level
we should be playing.
It was a nightmare scenario for a zone team such as
RPI. We won most of the face offs, we forced many turnovers in the riding
game, we were very sharp passing and shooting on
offense and had some excellent possessions. At the defensive end we had several great possessions during which we caused
an early turnover without yielding a shot and gained possession of the ball.
The players
we need to step up against a zone did so yielding the following stats: Cabrera
5/0, Sheehan 3/2, Coviello 2/2, Herter
1/1, Meyer 0/2. These guys
moved the ball great, shot great and made excellent decisions with the
ball. Sheehan ran the show from X, Herter and
Meyer controlled the ball up top, while Cabrera and Coviello
spotted up on the right-handed wing for shots. The only lull in the game
for us was a stretch in the 2nd Quarter during which we still
generated a number of great opportunities but we did not shoot as well,
combined with the goalie making a few saves. It caused a little consternation
at halftime among the boys, but in a positive way. After having let a
couple of big leads get away from us in the past few games there was
justifiably a concerted effort to keep this game rolling and finish on the
right note. We restablished ourselves early in
the 3rd and reached the 12 goal mark by
around the midpoint of the 3rd Quarter. That allowed us to
liberally sub all of the guys who have not had much of
a chance to play during the season of one goal games.
We were not
able to put up many goals with our back ups, but they played fairly well.
RPI kept in their starters until very late in the 4th,
so our guys were faced with playing against starting players who were already
loose and in the flow of the game. Freshman Attackman
Tom Petty played very well on the offensive end, scoring his first collegiate
goal on a nifty inside move. Conor Lyons played
great on the defensive end, matching up on their star senior attackman who is an excellent player and who attempted to
attack aggressively against Conor but was unable to
beat him.
Up next is
Trinity this Saturday at 1:00.
Best,