Home | Schedule | Roster | Recaps | Stats | Coach's Corner | Photos | Articles | Predictions | Multimedia | Ice Cube | About Us | Message Board

Eagles defeat the Kent State Golden Flashes 7-5 in a game in which Kent State made more mistakes than the Eastern Eagles.

Ann Arbor, Michigan- The Eastern Michigan Eagles defeated the Kent State Golden Flashes 7-5 at the Ann Arbor Ice Cube Friday Night. The Eagles played a lot better than the last time that I saw them, but there is still a lot of room for improvement. The game came down to the poor performance from the Kent State Golden Flashes and the Eagles being opportunistic and taking complete advantage of silly mistakes and turnovers.

The Eagles opened up the scoring of the game at 7:37 in the first period with Paddy O' Reilly scoring on the Power Play with assists from Robert McNamara and Mike Koveleski. The Eagles then doubled their lead 4 minutes later when John Fritz made a wonderful individual play to steal the puck out of the hands of the Kent State player and shot it passed the Kent State goalie Jordan Jacobs. The Eagles followed this up a minute later with a third goal scored by Derek Wilson, again due to a Kent State turnover. The Kent State club in the first period played extremely sloppy and let their goalie hang out to dry. The Eagles were intercepting passes and were showing more effort than I had seen from them in this first period. The Eagles let Kent State score one back though, but regained the momentum going into the locker rooms with a goal by Frank Garcia. The Eagles played pretty well in the first period, in particular defensively.

In the second period, Kent State tried to steal the momentum from the Eagles and for a bit it seemed like it might have just worked. Directly off of the faceoff, Kent State skated beyond the blue line and #55 Gene Spadaro shot the puck along the ice and somehow it sneaked by the Eastern Michigan goalie Tom Gresham. The goals that Kent State scored were for the most part rather strange. Their third goal for example, was scored due to a mad scramble in front of the net in which the Eastern players and Kent State players were all fighting for the puck desperately on the ice. However, Pete LeGrange found a way to poke the puck passed the EMU goalie. In this period, things started to break down more for the Eagles defensively and offensively it seemed as if they were too focused on dumping the puck in, instead of setting up plays. Also, Kent State was skating at will against the EMU defense, and conversely the Eagles were skating through the Kent State defense. Neither side showed a lot of fire.

The third period was for the most part eventless as Kent State scored the only goal of the period, however again most of the play was in the Eagles zone and forced the defense to play things out. The Eagles in this game took advantage of poor puck handling on the part of Kent State and actually taking advantage of their Power Plays to win this game. Kent State was the team that made more mistakes and didn't look to have a lot of energy and heart out their, even though they played a very hard-hitting style. Also, the Kent State goalie was off of his mark, which led to him being pulled 3 minutes into the second period for their regular starter, Cameron Lee who performed admirably. If I was the Kent State coach, I would continue to go with Cameron Lee as their primary goalie despite his recent struggles.

The Eagles have done in two weeks, the one thing that they need to consistently do every week of the season. This is to improve. The Eagles however offensively are still not clicking as their plays aren't in sync yet, their plays aren't working as they usually do, etc.. It needs to gel and it needs to gel quickly with the upcoming gauntlet of home games against quality competition. The Eagles seemed to only be able to have success tonight when Kent State gave them the opportunity to be. Give the Eagles credit though, they took advantage of their opportunities. Offensively, I feel that if they would carry the puck into the zone more and play a tad more aggressive and get on net, they'll create more opportunities. With dumping the puck in tonight, Kent State was for the most part able to prevent any real attack from the Eagles pressing at different chances with these dump-ins. Kent State shot themselves in the foot and ultimately it cost them.  

The Eagles special teams played well, as I in particular saw positive play from their penalty kill. I feel that their one man up, was disrupting Kent State all night and really didn't allow for Kent State to bolster much of an attack. However, when Kent State attacked the defense straight ahead, they found success. The Eagles need to continue to sacrifice their body as they did tonight, and need to continue to intercept the passing lanes. Also, breakaways are still occuring as minor lapses in their defense are present. With a young team though, things like this will happen and luckily Gresham was up to the task for stopping a couple of these.

The Ann Arbor Ice Cube felt cold, quiet and eerie tonight. With the absence of the band, and a large majority of fans the Cube seemed more like a funeral home than an ice rink. Heck, I could swear that the five or six Kent State fans were making more noise than the Eagles fans were at times throughout the game. It really didn't feel like a home game for the Eagles, it almost felt like a tournament game on a neutral site in which no one cared about the result. Hopefully, the fans show up on Saturday though and the band. We need you, and the Eagles will play better with you. They need the energy, not hearing the dead silence as you do at a funeral home.

So, bottom line. The Eagles could have played better, but they improved and won. That's all one can ask for.

Referees: Johnson, Deliman and Sheran

B 
The offense was primarily formed due to individuals making plays against individuals on Kent State. Hockey is a team sport and the Eagles are still not quite executing their offense as a team. The individuals are showing their own talent with the puck, but they need to learn how to set up higher percentage plays for goals. Once this happens, watch out. Offensively, the Eagles almost seem as if they were playing in slow-motion, just manuevering through things and just playing very nonchalant. Overall, an opportunistic offense tonight and it worked. But against a team that gives you few opportunities, games like this will not be wins, they'll be losses.

B 
Defense played solid at times, and collapsed throughout the second and third period. The first period things were really ticking well defensively in my mind, they were preventing Kent State from doing much at all and limited them to a measely 6 shots. The second and third proved differently though with holes everywhere and things just not as crisp. But overall, a solid job. I'd probably personally like to see a bit more aggression, but that's just my opinion.

A-  
Solid job tonight, the Power Play was effective and opportunistic. The penalty kill only gave up one goal. Not much to complain about in this department.

A-  
I think the Eagles left Gresham out to dry a lot of the time, and the goals tonight were all rather odd in my mind.

B  
The Eagles are improving, but are still not quite to a level where I can see them being a team that could surprise some people. I think the individuals on the team have some talent, and if the Eagles can find a way to gel this I think they could play up to the form of two, three years ago and be solid. Kent State gave the Eagles this game though, and the Eagles must play better to reap these same rewards.

Page Design by Kevin McCrumb using Microsoft Frontpage