They're ranked #2 in the country in pretty much every poll in the country. The computer agrees. I'm all about being quite contrary even though my name isn't Mary Mary. But in this case, arguing that the Pios aren't deserving of the ranking/poll status would be a bit of folly. They're 13-5-2 overall right? They have beaten some pretty decent teams. Their early season splits with Vermont and Ohio State are probably the ugliest mark's on their record but both of those losses came with Adam Murray in the crease.
Their only other three losses came at the hands of UAA, SCSU and UMD. They took 3 points from rival Colorado College in a home and home series. They got three points against Mankato in Denver. They swept the Gophers at the Mariucci. They swept North Dakota at the Magness. They crushed UNO this past weekend and managed a come from behind win versus Boston College in the Denver Cup championship game. All in all, they've won the games they were supposed to win, especially when their starting goaltender was healthy.
This coming weekend they appear to be fully healthy. Patrick Weircioch's on-again/off-again reported knee injury appears to be permanently off. The one player they have on the U.S. Junior team will almost certainly play this coming weekend.
In national statistics, the Pioneers don't bowl me over but then again they are nothing at which to sneeze. They certainly have some nice numbers but in a relative sense so do any number of other top 10 or 15 teams. Drilling down to league stats tells a similar story. They're taking the fewest penalties in the league and their penalty kill is #1 as well. But in the other team categories they're consistently in the middle of the league.
The best looking individual stat is goaltender Marc Cheverie's numbers. He leads the WCHA at .931 save percentage. He's #1 in goals against at 2.04. And his .821 winning percentage is also the highest in the WCHA. On the offensive side, Rhett Rakhshani leads the league in goals scored. He's tied for 2nd in overall points and teammate Tyler Ruegsegger is currently 4th in overall points. Joe Colborne is tied with the 7th most points in the league.
So ... yeah. The Pioneers are pretty good. But they're not dominatingly good by any stretch of the imagination.
In a straight up comparison of statistics between UAA and DU, the Seawolves falter. The only reasonably decent comparison is Penalty Kill numbers. DU is at 87% and UAA is at a respectable 83.5%. I say it's a respectable number in comparison because UAA has taken an average of 4 more penalties per game than DU. If the games were played on the statistics table then UAA wouldn't have much of a chance this weekend. Thankfully though, the games are being contested on the ice.
I'll have some analysis tomorrow as to what types of tactics the Seawolves can employ this weekend to give themselves the best chance to win. The team really needs to come out strong here in the 2nd half in order to build toward something good at the end of the regular season and into the playoffs.
3 comments:
Unrelated to the post, but my congrats to the US Junior team and US hockey in general. You deserved to win and were without a doubt the better team. We Canadians live and die hockey, so it's a hard pill. You really silenced the crowd.
Congrats to the US team. I was disappointed in the outcome but it was a great game. Eberle is phenominal.
You know what? We Canadians coming back to win the last two games vs the US, after being down by two goals late in the game, was lucky enough. We can't expect to go down against a great team like the Americans' and expect a late miracle win each time. Congratulations Team USA on a fantastic game.
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