roadhockey.net

Turning a disadvantage into an advantage

Playing without a substitute player to spell off their starters, Unabomber thought his team would quickly fade in Sunday's game. Instead, they outwitted their opponents to outscore them, 20-15.

What Unabomber and his mates lacked in energy and speed, they more than made up with smarts, preserving their legs by playing sound positional road hockey and taking advantage of all their scoring chances to build momentum and deflate their preening opponents.

"You've got to really conserve energy," said Unabomber of his team's shorthanded strategy. "You just can't always forecheck as hard as you normally would, you just have to position yourself to take out the lanes."

"You've just got to play a smart rotation on defense," said Cowboy Bill. "You don't run around and waste your energy."

Perhaps lulled into complacency by their manpower advantage, their opponents couldn't build on their fast start that staked them to an early lead. Sparked by the Kid's deadly touch around the net, the underdogs scored five straight goals to seize the game's momentum.

"We got some momentum, kept passing it around and everyone was cooperating good," said Unabomber.

"We just didn't make the key plays when we needed to make them," said Wendel, who wheezed his way through only his second start of the new year. "We were just a little too fancy sometimes, too many passes and too few shots, that made all the difference."

And so did some solid goaltending from Nibs, who won his fifth game in seven shotstopping starts this season.

"Nibs played really well for us, and that allowed us to open it up a little bit more on offense," said Cowboy Bill. "You know you're going to go against guys who have a little more energy, so you've got to make sure you have a goalie who's able to come up with a couple of big stops."

Nibs heroics tightened the grip opposing scorers held on their sticks, causing them to miss open nets, bank shots of the goalposts and dribble harmless tricklers into the goalie's smothering pads.

"We were just a little too fancy sometimes," said Wendel. "We were trying a little too hard sometimes to be the heroes, to make the pretty plays."

Posted by jaysuburb at February 28, 2006 08:06 PM