Our first league game happened Sep 13 at Extreme Ice in Indian Trails
Game 1 – Saturday, Sep 13 @ 12:05 – Won 1-0
Our goal for this game was to extend what we have been working on in practice, focused on taking the initiative in 50/50 puck battles, aggressively moving to open support positions, and doing team-based attacks (making plays) instead of run-and-gun, unsupported single shots.
First period had us on our heels, but we were working them well, and we kept the score 0-0, despite them being in our zone more. Theo did an amazing job, and defense was great about coverage.
Our wings helped low, but probably too low, and Queen City was able to get it back to their points too often. Nonetheless, we scored on a power play early in the second.
- We were hustling, but passing let us down a lot, particularly backhand catches.
- Our forwards should be moving more east-west through the neutral zone; there were too many suicide passes.
- Physicality was much better
- The tempo must continue to increase – some guys taking too long to make a decision.
Game 2 – Sunday, Sep 14 @ 8:05am – Lost 1-2
First period started well, with a lot of forechecking effort which held QC back. We were able to score our first goal and felt good about how we were managing them.
But they did a few things better than us:
- Like yesterday, our wings were not defending their points well enough, and we gave them multiple chances to set up plays
- Their passing was excellent. We continued to be plagued with slow passes, missed passes, bad catches, and the worst – blind passes.
- They had a guy open for breakouts and on the opposite side of the ice almost always. We kept pushing the puck up the strong side.