Tonight v. Parkway West

Tonight, the Red Devils will be taking on the Parkway West Longhorns at Chaminade. The JV game will begin at 7PM, followed by the varsity game around 8PM.

The Longhorns varsity and JV both have some kids who played for me at Jungle Cats. On JV, we need to pay attention to sophomore Matt Stolwyk who was a coaching favorite last summer and over the winter. Matt came to nearly every practice, worked extremely hard and was very coachable...just like...our boys...

The varsity has a few guys to watch out for, such as senior and former Jungle Cat John Logan who leads the team in goals. Former Cats Adam Bixler and Alex Dwyer are also in their top 5 in scoring. Our boys who play Daisy will recognize freshman Steven Emde who is second in goals and assists. Their starters are solid and they have played well against Kirkwood, Parkway Central, Parkway North and Marquette (teams that have either beat us, played close to us, or may beat us in the future). They should not be overlooked as my JCWP colleague and friend Charlie Cutelli is a good coach who knows how to game plan for a team that plays like we do. Coach Cutelli is in his third year at West and this will be the first time we have gone head-to-head in our careers. I am excited for tonight.

Chaminade 9 - MICDS 2

Any team is going to have a hard time against us when we put together a complete game. In what was a fitting end to the first half of the season, just before Easter Break, the Red Devils imposed their will against the MICDS Rams en route to a 9-2 victory. Short two key players, senior captain Danny Faust and junior Ed Rose, the Boys in Black played solid game at both ends.

As always, there was aggressive drives, great 2MD (provided by seniors Jake Entwistle and Chris Duncan) and an increasing amount of strong moves in front of the cage (highlighted by senior captains Jack Meara and Chris Watkins, as well as juniors Kevin Glauber and Jake Schott). A new strength has emerged the last two games as our goalie combo of senior Peter Hoette and junior Chris Lauber have stepped up the shot blocking, passing and stealing. We still need improvement in all those areas from these guys, but the last two games have been solid. In the field, we need improvement in the perimeter passing, especially under pressure, and patience in front of the cage. To often we will force shots inside, and we need to be able to take a foul and take advantage of the great drives we are getting.

Still, these last two games have been the most complete and mental-mistake free game we have played all season. Once we get matched up defensively, we are hard to score upon.

Goals: Meara - 4, Glauber - 2, Schott - 2, Watkins - 1
Assists: Watkins - 3, Hoette - 2, Lauber - 1, Meara - 1
Steals: Entwistle - 5, Duncan - 4, Meara - 4, Hoette - 3, Lauber - 3, Schott - 3, Watkins - 1
Kickouts: Duncan - 1, Schott - 1
Saves: Lauber - 4, Hoette - 2

Player of the Game: Peter Hoette and Chris Lauber: combined 3 assists, 5 steals, 6 saves and a big improvement in the quality of passing and stealing aggressiveness.

CCP WP Development Program Continues Today

Due to tomorrow being Holy Thursday, the CCP WP Development Program will occur today (Wednesday) at 3:15PM. Last week featured just 8th grader Mark Corwin (future superstar goaltender). I hope we can make a concerted effort to get more guys out today. The future depends on it!

DeSmet 6 - Chaminade 4

DeSmet put up their lowest goal total of the year as the Red Devils played their best team game of the year. Player of the Year candidate, Junior Matt Stipanovich, was marked all game by our defensive MVP, senior Jake Entwistle, and Jake held the big lefty to only one goal. That is a major improvement from this past weekend where Matt put up 8 goals on the Red Devils.

Chaminade's defense was relentless the entire game as we pressed hard everywhere and didn't give DeSmet any easy passes. Every pass was contested which led to 21 steals, many of which came from in front of the cage. The 2M defense was excellent as DeSmet couldn't get a goal out of set. After the first quarter, the team was very happy with how well were were matching up against the explosive Spartans.

To DeSmet's credit, they capitalized on the few mistakes the Red Devils made. Two counter-attack goals by senior Danny Holtgrewe came from perimeter steals. Juniors Stipanovich and Schonhoff scored off fouls outside 5M (two of maybe four such opportunities). Senior Bob Morrisey unloaded on one of DeSmet's two 6-on-5 opportunities and senior goalie Kyle Dolan scored on a last second lob.

As I said after the game, DeSmet is a very good offensive team, and 6 mental mistakes led to 6 goals. We need to be perfect if we plan on beating them next time around.

Things that went right:

• Defense...everywhere
• Getting open on offense, through driving hard ball-side
• Mental toughness - the boys were focused coming into this game and there were very few moments of rest as we were short two starters.

Things that went not so right:

• Passing under pressure - still too many wayward passes to open guys, too many passing attempts with defender hanging on arm.
• Shooting - need improvement in accuracy and aggressiveness. We get open shots and hit the goalie in the hands.
• Aggressive moves with the ball - when I ask officials why we don't draw any kickouts when we have position to the goal, they all tell me we don't make a move, that we give up. While I think this has more to do with the defenders using our boys the way swimmers use lane ropes while the coach isn't looking, I do think we need to be more aggressive when trying to relieve pressure. There have been moments where we try and turn our defender (Junior Ed Rose made a nice one tonight), I think we should try to make aggressive moves more often, to either turn the guy and head to the goal, or force the defender to foul.

Goals: Faust - 2, Meara - 1, Watkins - 1

Assists: Hoette - 3, Meara - 1

Steals: Entwistle - 5, Hoette - 5, Faust - 4, Lauber - 2, Meara - 2, Watkins - 2, Rose - 1

Kickouts: Duncan - 1, Rose - 1

Saves: Lauber - 9

Player of the Game: Faust and Hoette. Faust had 2 goals and 4 steals and handled DeSmet's Michael Schonhoff very well. Hoette had 3 assists and 5 steals, doing all of the little things that we need to win; play tough perimeter D, force bad passes, make steals, guard hole well if taken in, wing out to get the ball from the goalie and make good passes. Great games by both seniors.

Up next: Thursday April 9th v. MICDS at Chaminade. JV will begin at 7PM, varsity follows at 8PM.

Tonight v. DeSmet

For the second time in 3 days, the Chaminade Red Devils will take on the DeSmet Spartans. We will be playing at DeSmet's home pool, which is Chaminade. The JV game will begin at 7:00pm and the varsity game will follow at 8:00PM. Varsity will be missing juniors Kevin Glauber and Jake Schott as they are on a retreat. Sophomore Aaron Gremp will be called up from JV to supplement the varsity team.

DeSmet is a tough matchup for us as they are physical and are good shooters. Beating the #2 team in the state will require relentless press defense, because we cannot afford to get into a shootout. A winning score for Chaminade will be 5-4, not 16-15. We need a defensive battle.

See you tonight.

Chaminade 12 - MICDS 8

Goals: Meara - 4, Rose - 3, Entwistle - 2, Glauber - 2, Duncan - 1
Assists: Glauber - 2, Watkins - 2, Entwistle - 1, Faust - 1, Meara - 1, Rose - 1
Steals: Entwistle - 6, Meara - 4, Faust - 3, Rose - 3, Watkins - 2, Glauber - 1, Hoette - 1, Lauber - 1, Schott - 1
Kickouts: Duncan - 1, Faust - 1, Glauber - 1
Saves: Hoette - 3, Lauber - 3

Player of the Game: Meara - 4 goals, 1 assist and 4 steals

SLUH 14 - Chaminade 4

Goals: Rose - 3, Meara - 1
Assists: Duncan - 1, Rose - 1
Steals: Entwistle - 4, Faust - 4, Hoette - 3, Meara - 2, Rose - 2, Schott - 2, Lauber - 1
Kickouts: NONE!
Saves: Hoette - 3, Lauber - 1

Player of the Game: Duncan - 1 assist and great defense

DeSmet 16 - Chaminade 7

Goals: Meara - 3, Rose - 2, Watkins - 2
Assists: Duncan - 1, Entwistle - 1, Rose - 1, Watkins - 1
Steals: Entwistle - 4, Faust - 3, Schott - 3, Glauber - 2, Meara - 2, Rose - 2, Duncan - 1, Watkins - 1
Kickouts: Entwistle - 2, Faust - 1, Rose - 1
Saves: Hoette - 8

Player of the Game: Watkins - 2 goals, 1 assists and 1 steal