The first game of the year proved to be a rough one for the Red Devils. The Red Devils were missing scorer Jake Schott who missed school with a fever. Jake is one of our best offensive players and was sorely missed as Chaminade scored only 5 goals on 18 shots.
A very physical, very confident Kirkwood team played hard for four quarters and really took advantage of every opportunity. Kirkwood took 10 shots all game and scored on 6 of them. That shooting percentage is hard to beat.
The first quarter ended 1-1 as Senior Jack Meara scored for CCP on a counter attack and Kirkwood's Brian McVey scored on a free throw outside 5M. CCP added two more goals in the first half. One came on a 5M goal by Meara created by fellow Captain Chris Watkins' great drive. Ed Rose added the other on a rebound. The score would have been 4-1, if not for a great effort by a Kirkwood player to get back and knock down an Ed Rose breakaway. Down 3-1 at half, the Pioneers battled back to even the score 3-3 in the 3rd quarter.
The 4th quarter was intense as Kirkwood took an early two goal lead off of a Jake Entwistle kickout and a counter-attack goal on a missed Red Devil 6-on-5. The Red Devils answered with a Jack Meara laser from 7 meters out and another Ed Rose rebound goal. The death blow came with 24 seconds left as Kirkwood put the Red Devils away for good. A last second weak-side drive attempt failed and sealed Kirkwood's upset.
Overall, the game came down to opportunities. Kirkwood made the most out of theirs, the Red Devils did not. Our defense was solid and so was our effort on the offensive end. What was missing was the execution.
Things that went right:
- Hole Defense - Jake Entwistle and Chris Duncan did a magnificent job stopping the Kirkwood 2M's when they went inside
- Perimeter Defense - I counted only one goal that came from set offense. The other 5 came from either broken plays or counter-attacks. The defensive pressure was great and lead to 22 steal.
- Offensive effort - the drives were executed very well and we had a LOT of open people on drives.
Things that went not so right:
- Passing - too many missed opportunities. When under pressure, our wings couldn't get separation to make a good pass, or it would take too long to get separation, resulting in a previously open losing his open water.
- Counter-attack passing - if we are going to be successful, the first pass off of a steal or from the goalie needs to be on target
- Closing teams out - Kirkwood scored 1 goal in the first half and 5 goals in the second half. A would-be 4-1 lead turned into a 3-1 lead which quickly became a tie game. We can't expect to win a game when we don't score for an entire quarter.
Goals: Meara - 3, Rose - 2
Assists: Entwistle - 1, Meara -1
Steals: Entwistle - 6, Hoette - 5, Watkins - 3, Duncan - 2, Glauber - 2, Meara - 2, Faust - 1, Rose - 1
Kickouts: Entwistle - 1
Saves: Lauber - 4
Player of the Game: Entwistle - 1 assist and 6 steals
Up Next: 7:00PM on Thursday March 19th v. SLUH at Chaminade.
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