8
cheers
cheers
Struggles Continue in Michigan
submitted by user Colonialhead 305 days ago, January 20, 2008
The Wolverines received another solid effort between the pipes from Billy Sauer on Saturday night and spread the scoring around between five different players to hand Notre Dame a 5-1 loss and sweep the Irish in their home and "home" series. More...
Comments (2)
+2 cheers
The Irish are 1-4-1 after the Lighting Classic Consolation Game. What's going on? I thought Jeff Jackson and the Irish were going to be better than last season.
+1 cheer
That's a fair question Bew, and unfortunately not one that I have a good answer for.
Ultimately, it comes down to 3 items (in my opinion):
1.) Injury and Absence: As you probably know, the team did lose Ian Cole (World Juniors) and Teddy Ruth (injury) just prior to the LCHC. They have also had some other players (Garrett Regan among others) who have been playing banged up. This isn't making excuses, but Jeff Jackson has made reference to the team being "banged up" and I think sometimes the "bumps and bruises" can actually be worse than some of the more defined injuries that will take a player out of the line-up altogether.
2.) Not getting any production whatsoever from their PP unit. They are currently scoreless on their last 41 chances with the man advantage and it is killing them. Sometimes, things like this are just like a hitting slump in baseball. They ARE better than this, and if they could get out of this special teams slump, I think their record would indicate that they are a better team than last year's squad. But the unfortunate fact is that slumps hit at innoportune times and when a team isn't scoring on special teams, it's a killer. If "defense wins football games" then "special teams wins hockey games"... and right now, they aren't getting help in that dept.
3.) Last but not least, they are only getting production from one line. Condra, Thang, Deeth show up virtually every night, but if the team is going to have success against the likes of UM and MSU, they need to get production from Garrett Regan, Christiann Minella, Christian Hanson, Mark Van Guilder etc.
In the past, having David Brown in net would make up for any lack of production from the depth players. But they don't have that luxury this year. Jordan pearce has been good, but not David Brown good. And he isn't going to keep the team in the 1-goal games that Brown might have last year.
So anyway, that's probably not a great answer because it doesn't address the "why". But I suppose if there was an easy answer to that, Jeff jackson would be fixing it. In the end, the team is going to need to find a solution to those 3 major glaring problems, but I don't know what that answer is.
Ultimately, it comes down to 3 items (in my opinion):
1.) Injury and Absence: As you probably know, the team did lose Ian Cole (World Juniors) and Teddy Ruth (injury) just prior to the LCHC. They have also had some other players (Garrett Regan among others) who have been playing banged up. This isn't making excuses, but Jeff Jackson has made reference to the team being "banged up" and I think sometimes the "bumps and bruises" can actually be worse than some of the more defined injuries that will take a player out of the line-up altogether.
2.) Not getting any production whatsoever from their PP unit. They are currently scoreless on their last 41 chances with the man advantage and it is killing them. Sometimes, things like this are just like a hitting slump in baseball. They ARE better than this, and if they could get out of this special teams slump, I think their record would indicate that they are a better team than last year's squad. But the unfortunate fact is that slumps hit at innoportune times and when a team isn't scoring on special teams, it's a killer. If "defense wins football games" then "special teams wins hockey games"... and right now, they aren't getting help in that dept.
3.) Last but not least, they are only getting production from one line. Condra, Thang, Deeth show up virtually every night, but if the team is going to have success against the likes of UM and MSU, they need to get production from Garrett Regan, Christiann Minella, Christian Hanson, Mark Van Guilder etc.
In the past, having David Brown in net would make up for any lack of production from the depth players. But they don't have that luxury this year. Jordan pearce has been good, but not David Brown good. And he isn't going to keep the team in the 1-goal games that Brown might have last year.
So anyway, that's probably not a great answer because it doesn't address the "why". But I suppose if there was an easy answer to that, Jeff jackson would be fixing it. In the end, the team is going to need to find a solution to those 3 major glaring problems, but I don't know what that answer is.