Feb 07, 2016 | Ryan Stewart | 572 views
Playoff Game #1, February 7
Welcome to playoff hockey folks! Our team should be very proud of our performance through the regular season, this solid showing all season has placed our team in the top LMLL Atom division for the playoffs! Great job! So now what?????
As it turns out, the better you are in the regular season means the harder it gets in the playoffs. Having said that I would pick the top pool anyday over winning the playoffs in a lower pool. The challenge we face equals the reward we will feel if we succeed!
No weak teams are in our division folks, any mistakes we make will be magnified in the playoffs. Our opponents are as good as we are and the team that works harder will probably prevail. Today that team was Lambeth....they made us pay for the slow start when we found ourselves down by 2 goals less than half way through the first period. Coach Ryan really tried to get us off to a good start but the kids heads weren't there at the beginning of the game.
The second and third periods were much better but we had trouble getting the puck in their net. Jacob Molnar was on his game and scored both of our goals with the assists on both goals going to Carson Cordeiro and and Sam Stewart. Unfortunately Lambeth managed to get a total of 3 goals on us so we lost the game 3-2.
The good news is we played much better in the 2nd and 3rd periods, we outplayed our opponent and had lots of opportunities but failed to capitalize.
Some other positive comments about today's game from my perspective, Tess Alcock was a wall on defence, she made some plays that we could not have expected her to make by shutting down the Lambeth rush coming into our zone. Will Stewart also played awesome, his pinching in and hustling back was as good as we have seen all season. Dillon Lynch worked hard along the boards and won many battles for the puck. Jacob Molnar was working hard and dialed in on his own rebounds and it showed on the scoreboard.
Shake it off, enjoy the Super Bowl and get ready for game two! We will get another shot at this team next weekend. I know we can take them with 3 solid periods of hockey.
GO Cougars Go!
Coach Pat