On a sunny but cool afternoon Middlebury played a great second half to beat Williams 11-7, keeping the Thomsen Trophy-awarded to the Middlebury/Williams winner-for the 13th consecutive year.  For those of you who have forgottten, or who did not know, Ferris Thomsen, grandfather of Jeff '83 and Dan '92, commissioned the Thomsen Trophy when Jeff was playing for Middlebury and his brother, Peter, was playing for Williams. 

If you remember, I talked about us being a zone team's worst nightmare when we played RPI (we possessed the ball, won face offs, shot well and rode extremely well.)  The first half today was an up-tempo man team's worst nightmare for us.  Williams had long, effective possessions while their goalie made some outstanding saves early-5 saves in the first quarter.  The first half turned into us tightening up offensively, throwing some balls away and pushing some shots instead of letting them rip.  At the defensive end we played on our heals, allowing Williams to generate quality shots while also possessing the ball.  It is a subtle difference between playing great and playing tight and we walked that line today.  Fortunately we were playing pretty well and had the confidence to come out and play well in the 2nd Half.

It did not come easily for us in the 2nd half, however.  Williams has played very well recently and they were playing with a lot of confidence in the 2nd Half.  They are more athletic than the past couple of years, they are executing their offense well and they disrupted our offensive flow with some adjustments in the first half.  It is a great tribute to our team, however, that they hung in there.  It took until the 4th Quarter for us to pull away, but we did so in the 4th Quarter , largely due to the play of Nick Bastis.  Nick's play was sympomatic of our team today.  He was fairly ineffective for most of the day, but did not pack it in.  Instead, after sitting for much of the 3rd he was inserted back into the lineup in the 4th and quickly scored 3 consecutive goals, all on nice shots.  It was particularly rewarding for us to see Nick pull through in that he has always been athletic, but he has worked hard to be a more effective, fundamentally sound, overhand shooter and that is how he is scoring many of his goals.  Other players excelled during our run in the 2nd Half including senior middie Jeff Pello, Freshman Midfielder Mike Stone and Junior Defenseman Ben Raymond.  Ben harassed his attackman effectively all day and Gabe Wood was typically excellent against his attackman as well.

Up next is Bates.  Although they have lost several games in a row they remain a difficult opponent.  They are deep and disciplined on offense.  They have a very good defense and an outstanding goaltender.  They play with both passion and discipline. 

Best,
Erin