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North Dakota vs. UAA - Saturday Gameday


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3 out of 4 points is not a bad weekend. AA played well tonight and well we didn't play so well. I thought our defense got caught a little flat footed a few times and our power play needs some serious work. Should be a real good week of practice for the boys. Oh and I really like the Rocco,Caggiula, St. Clair line. Was at the game tonight and boy Rocco has some wheels and really really good hands. Really impressed by Forbort tonight outside of Mac he is our best defense men and he scores now too.

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The Sioux lost most of the puck battles along the boards against UAF last weekend, and they lost a lot of them tonight, though they weren't dogging it. UAA just played a very intense game. I love the speed and quickness of this Sioux team, but one thing they will have to improve on is winning the scrums, particularly in the o zone. Interesting to see how they play on big ice.

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With the exception of Rocco,Saunders,St Clair and Rodwell the team lacked intensity tonight. Saw alot of lazy play out there but do give AA alot of credit. They came to play tonight and were the better team. Hard to say a guy is happy with a tie with AA especially at home but yes it's early.

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There is no 4th period in Hockey, it is OT. If you are in the playoffs and you don't settle in the 1st period of OT you have a second period of OT and so on.....

Maybe midco was too busy trying to sync up the audio and video again to pay attention to the graphics...
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Rocco is the most dynamic player I've seen at UND since Parise hands down. Once he actually gets his finishing touch back he's going to dominate. His teammates need to match his energy. The passing tonight kinda sucked for the most part and you could tell things aren't quite clicking yet, go figure it's not after Christmas yet.

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I think someone already said it. Typical Saturday night performance early in the season for North Dakota.

I think one thing I was a bit upset with was when UND went down by a goal Anchorage was the hungrier team. If you didn't know what the score was you would've thought that Anchorage was down by a goal and pressing when the opposite was true. Got lucky to get the point tonight. Take it and run with it. Its a tough league to sweep in, thats for darn sure.

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Just got back from a beer league double header and watched the game.

Flat footed is a good way to put it,

But really it just seemed like one of those odd nights when the puck just doesn't bounce your way.....

An odd hop here a bounce there and the darn thing just wouldn't sit right ..... That and being flatfooted against a hungrier team playing more aggressively and it's tough to get good chances.

Rocco hit two posts..... Millimeter the other way and Sioux win by two.....oh well lucky to escape with a point but I bet Hak doesn't like it all to well.

And one other thing.....i

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I agree with Frozen4Sioux, it was a night where we had no puck luck - bounces and timing just off. That happens in hockey, just have to gut those games out. Add that to this being the 3rd time we played the same team in 8 days, and 2-0-1 isn't too bad.

Rocco hit two pipes, and Kristo hit the crossbar in OT with a rocket.

AA really played up tempo and looked to disrupt and pressure. We have to be prepared for that- making 30 foot passes under pressure is not a recipe for success!

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You smarter hockey guys help me here.

It s e e m s like our Saturday nights are more difficult partly because we have a pretty conservative transition game (hit the winger on the wall or go cross ice to the other D, not often passing up the middle) and they adjust the second night to be all over our wingers. The result is a chip-it-up-the-boards scrum just inside our own blue line and no real flow. If the other team is high energy working hard, we play uphill. BUT

I really don't trust my own observation there. It doesn't explain the improvement we always show as the season progresses, for one thing, unless Hak expands the breakout schemes as the guys become more disciplined with the basics. Hak will always stress two way responsibility, so he (like most coaches) will prefer using the perimeter in the D zone, and it works. But it would also be a scheme that a team like AA last night can disrupt if they have enough quikness and work hard enough.

How lost am I here?

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For how good Kristo was friday night I thought he was a step slow last night. Give AA credit they simply outworked our boys. I did see some lazy play from us and that is not acceptable. I thought Saunders,Grimaldi,St Clair,and Rodwell all worked their butts off but you gotta have everyone doing that if you want top be succesful in the WCHA. It felt like a loss last night and probably should of been but I will take the point and move on to BU this weekend.

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I agree with Frozen4Sioux, it was a night where we had no puck luck - bounces and timing just off. That happens in hockey, just have to gut those games out. Add that to this being the 3rd time we played the same team in 8 days, and 2-0-1 isn't too bad.

Rocco hit two pipes, and Kristo hit the crossbar in OT with a rocket.

AA really played up tempo and looked to disrupt and pressure. We have to be prepared for that- making 30 foot passes under pressure is not a recipe for success!

In the third period this is where UND dug itself into a hole. They tried to fly a winger and Anchorage just wasn't allowing that pass to happen at all when they got the lead. Its tough to be patient when you want to try and hit a homerun and score a goal, but it nearly cost them the game. I guess the short passing game was off all night anyways, so chalk it up to one of those nights.

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In the third period this is where UND dug itself into a hole. They tried to fly a winger and Anchorage just wasn't allowing that pass to happen at all when they got the lead. Its tough to be patient when you want to try and hit a homerun and score a goal, but it nearly cost them the game. I guess the short passing game was off all night anyways, so chalk it up to one of those nights.

UAA moved their pressure up the ice on Saturday and we didn't really adjust to that....I thought the last 8-10 minutes of the 2nd we looked like we might have figured it out but in the 3rd we reverted back to what we had done the first period and a half. I will say the 3rd and 4th lines were moving back to help out the D get it out of our end but other than the second half of the 2nd period our top 2 lines seemed content to look for the long passes from the D or let them bring it out on their own.

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Very simple explanation, AA outworked UND last night and the team was lucky to escape the weekend with three points. It fits the pattern of the past couple of decades that the Sioux never did well in the weekend series that followed a trip to Alaska.

I was wondering if they ran out of gas as well.

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I thought Saunders,Grimaldi,St Clair,and Rodwell all worked their butts off but you gotta have everyone doing that if you want top be succesful in the WCHA.

I like the game that St Clair has. I think he's got some great attributes in his game.

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I like the game that St Clair has. I think he's got some great attributes in his game.

I've been very impressed with his play so far as well.

Rodwell also played like a man wanting to make sure he plays 40+ games this year-

I also noticed that we appeared to lay-off some of the heavy corner and end board physical play- it almost looked as if we were more concerned with the potential for penalties and therefore took our foot off the accelerator in the heavy impact zones.

I like keeping Rocco on a separate line from Knight and Kristo, but then putting him up there if we need to put on serious offensive pressure.

I thought Gaarder looked a little out of place- his positioning was odd to me. He kept hanging around the slot, but then he'd chase the puck-

Along those same lines, I've seen MInnesota do a lot of this, and AA did it last night- pass to open ice based on positional play and anticipation. We tend to wait to see the man and the tape before we pass. I like passing to open ice in the offensive zone, obviously in our own end, we have to be more careful with the puck.

Anyone have a clue as to what the referee convention was all about on that goal review- it looked like a no brainer from where I was.

Rocco is just unbelievable- we have in him a dynamic player in that Parise/Oshie skill level. I had heard the scouting report was he was likened to Brian Gionta- I believe it.

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