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Post by Clubber Lang on Sept 24, 2010 15:39:07 GMT -4
I had heard this about Horyl also .Yesterday but I chose not to post it because I considered the source to be luke warm at best . Since it is out there , I will add that they in fact are looking at some stop gap solutions at the 20 year old spots . Stay tuned !  Too Bad really because Horyl is a Class Act . Heard Horyl has some family issues that i won't discuss but most know family comes first. I is believed he has left the team for personal reasons and there is a strong chance he won't be returning to hockey this year. |
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Post by Hat Trick Swayze's on Sept 24, 2010 15:55:38 GMT -4
I had heard this about Horyl also .Yesterday but I chose not to post it because I considered the source to be luke warm at best . Since it is out there , I will add that they in fact are looking at some stop gap solutions at the 20 year old spots . Stay tuned ! Too Bad really because Horyl is a Class Act . Heard Horyl has some family issues that i won't discuss but most know family comes first. I is believed he has left the team for personal reasons and there is a strong chance he won't be returning to hockey this year. WOW........ Best regards.. :/ |
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Post by Hat Trick Swayze's on Sept 25, 2010 8:16:40 GMT -4
Well in regards to the game Im gonna try NOT to Touch on the 1000 negatives to come out of this game........
Hrabarenka- This guy needs to stop being a tree, he was caught out of postion ALOT last night, He doesnt seem to wanna work in the corners, worst player for the Eagles on the ice.
Shaw- Needs some smelling salts to wake up and realize if he doesnt fix his game he will be flippin burgers for certain people rather than playing hockey in the Future.
Ref's - I have seen worse but man he missed his fair share for both us and the pocket rocket.
Now to the Plus side of last night.......
Our best players on the ice IMO of course were MacIntosh and Parker
I cant believe I had these two on the buble in training camp, Cory played a really good game he was blocking shots great hustle, he clearly worked on his skating in the off season, It was even nice to see him get some PP time ....... ON THE POINT for that matter...
Mario Must know he only has 1 good puck moving Dman in Ellis cuz he had Hertz and MacIntosh both on the points last night......
Speaking of PP.... Mario HAS.... HAS to get a new system for the PP...... The Chris Culligan to Nic Chouinard Play is getting really old...... it was old last year but at least we had a finisher in Luke...
Cuzner had a fair game.... He put on some size but I find hes trying to do to much.
Lacerte played a HELL of a game to be outshot 30-13 after 2 and at one point the shots were 25-7 in the second he deserves to play again tonight.
And last I found it nice to see they let Farrell to dress for the opening announcement, I got really exited when i seen Horyl in the opening as well, So he must be still close to the team and cant see him taking the year off if he was there and did that last night IMO
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Post by reality on Sept 25, 2010 9:08:04 GMT -4
I wish Stephen Horyl and his family nothing but the best! As witnessed last night, he would be a great loss to the Eagles in terms of skill, scoring and leadership.
Mario has used the dot to dot to dot power play since his arrival. It certainly makes it much easier for the other teams to defend when they know our system by heart. However, it can still produce good results with proper execution and skill.
I watched Mario's interview on Eastlink last night. He still insists on saying that even though the Eagles are young that they have 15 to 16 experienced players on the roster. By his reasoning if a player dresses for 5 - 7 games and gets 15 to 20 shifts total they are an experienced player, I guess. It's just not my idea of true Q experience , which involves having a regular role and getting significant ice time!
If Horyl is not coming back, will the Eagles acquire a 2nd 20 year old? Hard to believe that the team had, I think 9 19 year old's last year and the Eagles might only have 1 of them back. The trades to acquire several 19 year old's last year just don't seem to have worked out very well.
On the other hand right now, the Lacerte trade is paying huge dividends, simply in terms of competitiveness.
The Eagles will have to get their share of wins against PEI, Halifax and Moncton this year, especially at home, since they play them a lot, to approach 500 hockey. They also will have to win the majority of games against the weaker teams in the other divisions whom they don't play as often. A lack of scoring, especially without Stephen Horyl, will make it very difficult against the other high scoring teams.
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Post by hal on Sept 25, 2010 9:30:36 GMT -4
Really upset that Paradis did whatever he wanted out there last night . Seemed to be a little too active after the whistle .
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Post by Deer on Sept 25, 2010 11:55:14 GMT -4
Game thoughts:
Certainly can't fault the guys' efforts, they just couldn't get anything going offensively. The opening-night jitters were very clear, especially in the first period. Routine plays were being flubbed up in almost unbelievable ways, ways that only happen when guys are trying too hard. Of course that's completely natural when you're such a young team playing your home opener in front of a big, healthy crowd of 4000 people.
Yes, I said "young team" - this business of how we're "young with experience" and "aren't rebuilding because we have 15 guys with Q experience under their belt" has got to stop. I maintain that I like the makeup of the team we have this year, I think despite the bumps in the road they're overall going to be a hard-working and rewarding bunch to watch. But to anyone who saw last night's game, did that look like a team with "experience"? It was a team with a lot of good qualities, including plenty of character, but it's a team that's quite raw right now. "reality" has it spot on - just because a player played a handful of games on the fourth line last year doesn't make him an experienced Q player. You need to have a true role, and experience on the powerplay and PK. Last night we were using lots of our "experienced" guys on the powerplay......... that actually had little to no powerplay experience whatsoever. I think the fanbase is going to like what we have, but I don't understand why Mario tries to make our team out to be more than what it is.
Back to last night's game.....
What can you say about Francois Lacerte? He was absolutely sensational - rarely have I seen the old cliché of "gave us a chance to win" be more true. We really could have won a game we had no business at all being in, thanks to Lacerte's efforts. Once again, reality hit the nail on the head with one word - competitiveness. This guy battled his guts out every time the play crossed his blueline... several pucks stayed out only because of this kid's flat-out refusal to give up on a play that looked almost hopeless. Shots were 30-13 after two, but the score was still 1-1, and at least half of those 30 shots were point blank shots, wild scrambles, and in general top-quality chances.
Most of the time he was reading the play beautifully and getting himself square to the puck. A few other times he was scrambling like crazy, but kept em out with instinct and that refusal to give up. Only goals that beat him were 1) a glaring turnover 2) a scramble where he'd already made at least three saves. Remarkable effort... we have a long list of excellent goalies, but I'll go as far as to say that's the best opening night goaltending performance we've seen in the team's 14-year history.
No matter how good Lacerte was though, the offense looked pretty anemic. I don't know how much of it was nerves and how much of it was simply a lack of experienced high-end skill, but a friend of mine put it best: we're not going to see many pretty goals this year. This is a team that's going to have to score ugly goals - mucking in the corners, getting to the front of the net, etc. The absence of Horyl was absolutely glaring. Having seen two road games with him, and a home game without him, it looks like him being out leaves a huger hole in our offence than I'd thought.
On defence I continue to be a big fan of Hrabarenka, and I'm not sure if Jersey Guy and I saw the same game - I thought he looked very good. I also disagree with him on Ellis being our only puck-moving defenceman... what about JS Fournier? However I agree with him on our lack of a quarterback on the blueline.... with all due respect to Cory MacIntosh, who's had possibly the best start to the season of any returning player, we know we're stretching things when we're using a two-way guy on our 2nd-3rd line on the POINT on the powerplay.
And people are correct that the dot-to-dot powerplay has been old for years, but on the other hand - with such a young team do we want to be complicating the PP too much, especially this early?
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Post by Deer on Sept 25, 2010 12:14:02 GMT -4
Splitting it up into two posts...........
On the PEI side, they looked very good last night with several higher-end skilled guys.... but until further notice I'll expect that franchise to find a way to ruin the season like they do every year. Last night though, it was men against boys - simple as that.
The Paradis-Nestrasil-Duffy line was far and away the best on either team, as you'd expect looking at the lineup sheet. Nestrasil had seven shots on goal and that's no surprise - he seemed to have the puck a ton. Had a lot of sick dangles, very slick player, but I'd watch out for a tendency to try and get too fancy - could give Rocket fans some headaches that way. Paradis seems to have accepted he'll never be a 50-goal scorer like it looked like he might become back when he was 16. Instead he's turned into a freight train with the capability of 25-30 goals and 60 or so odd points. Most physical player and best agitator on the ice last night by a mile. HAL, you are absolutely correct - Paradis basically walked into our house in front of 4000 of our own fans and did whatever he wanted. He didn't do anything dirty, in fact the 3 or so times he crushed guys with huge hits they were absolutely clean. But he walked the fine line, and got into guys' faces after every second whistle, and our team didn't do enough about it. If this happens again tonight, Spencer Metcalfe should make it clear to the guy that he'll have to deal with him if he keeps it up.
Polasek and Hobbs were great on the Rocket blueline, which looks so much better without that clown Jordan Southorn! Polasek is simply a pleasure to watch skate, so effortless. Hobbs was a pillar on the blueline in the offensive zone. Polasek had a few bad penalties though.
I like that Louick Marcotte, he should be a good one if PEI doesn't ruin him. As for a guy who is teetering on the line as to whether or not the Rocket will ruin him, Ben Duffy looked good last night after a pretty disastrous year last year. He could be one of the league's bounce-back players... or not.
Mosher barely broke a sweat in net, but his rebound control was good when he was tested. Travis McIsaac is a good player, but it really makes me wonder that three out of the four PEI players wearing letters are guys who've been Rockets for half a season or less. I think it's a pretty glaring sign of the leadership issues that plague this franchise!
Back to the Eagles, let's see what tonight brings with the nerves being far less a factor. There's nowhere to go but up in terms of creating scoring chances. However it's quite unlikely we'll get another goaltending performance like we got last night, no matter who's in net, so even if CB generates 25-30 shots and scores a few goals, a win might be tough to come by once again. But every game is a clean slate, maybe we'll leave the rink tonight finding it hard to believe PEI dominated so much on Friday.
Speaking of goaltending, Verroneau should get the start tonight. Lacerte has been excellent, and clearly earned the start for the home opener. But he's gotta be tired after last night's superman effort, and Verroneau is still pegged as the team's goalie of the future. It's time to give him another chance after that one bad start in Saint John - let's see what the kid can do.
One last thing is the renovations. Beautiful! There was much hype about these but for the most part they clearly live up to it. The main concourse got a great facelift, the boxes look first-class, and one of my favourite parts upstairs is the glassed-in corridor that overlooks the main concourse. They have white-shirted young staff basically catering the boxes and club seating upstairs. There's a lobby upstairs between the club seating and the boxes that is gorgeous. The dome windows behind the boxes look great and modern. The press box is still a work-in-progress, will judge that one once it's complete.... last night it was a bit of an adventure looking around the many ceiling beams to see the play. Overall though, these renovations really bring C200 into 2011 - it's worth coming to a game just to check em out.
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Post by iolaire on Sept 27, 2010 18:53:08 GMT -4
Game thoughts: Yes, I said "young team" - this business of how we're "young with experience" and "aren't rebuilding because we have 15 guys with Q experience under their belt" has got to stop. I maintain that I like the makeup of the team we have this year, I think despite the bumps in the road they're overall going to be a hard-working and rewarding bunch to watch. But to anyone who saw last night's game, did that look like a team with "experience"? It was a team with a lot of good qualities, including plenty of character, but it's a team that's quite raw right now. As a hockey novice keeping an eye on the fortunes of the Eagles from afar thanks for your in depth reports on the games. Was wondering is there any obvious reason why the manager is pushing this line about having an experienced team and not being in a rebuilding phase? Is this just to cover for him 'going for it' last season and making a big mess of it? If so is there no way to take him to task over what would be blatant propaganda? Question and answer sessions with owners/managers are a great way to get these things out in the open and make for a better relationship between club and supporters, does that ever happen over there? |
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Post by reality on Sept 27, 2010 19:33:28 GMT -4
iolaire, there seems to be no accountability at times!
After insisting that the Eagles were an experienced team despite their youth in the Eastlink interview, the next morning in the Post he pointed out that it was difficult for the Eagles to play PEI because they had so many 19 year old D and a 20 year old goalie as well as several 19 year old forwards.
The next night in the post game, Blair Joseph talked about the age difference again.
What happened to all that experience in only 1 or 2 games and wasn't team management responsible for creating this situation?
The "Hockey" fans know that this team is young, inexperienced, lacking scorers and that it is going to be very difficult for this year's team to approach 500 hockey. They already know that many teams are much older and more skilled. There's no need to point out the obvious!
The fans will however embrace this year's team if they give an honest effort every game and show some level of improvement in their play and discipline.
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Post by dt281 on Sept 27, 2010 19:34:12 GMT -4
That's 1 of the things I don't get with Mario. Why does he insist we have so much experience when everyone else knows the difference?
You would think he would be lowering expectations by saying what a young team we have and how with some experience under their belt, they will improve.
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Too Bad really because Horyl is a Class Act .
