NLL Mid-season report: East division

Posted on February 29, 2012 by Graeme

We’re half-way through the ~~school year~~ NLL season, so it’s time for report cards. Let’s have a look at each team and see how they’re doing offensively and defensively. I’ve assigned letter grades to each team’s offense and defense (which includes goaltending). Note that despite the fact that I’ll be spouting off stats all over the place, the letter grades are purely subjective based partially on the stats but partially on my own impressions of the team. The letters compare roughly thus:

A	2011 Rock (Champions)
B	2011 Stealth (Finished 3rd, but did well in the playoffs)
C	2011 Mammoth (Crappy record, but made the playoffs)
D	2011 Rush (did not make the playoffs)
F

In case you are unfamiliar with the logo, that would be the Syracuse Smash, who went a combined 6-30 (0-18 on the road) in three NLL seasons from 1998 to 2000. In one of those seasons, they went 1-11 and allowed 72 more goals than they scored – they allowed an average of more than 17 goals per game. In 2001, the Smash moved to Ottawa to become the Rebel, who were only marginally better. Only the Charlotte Cobras, who went 0-10 with 18.6 goals against per game in their only season (1996), were worse than the Smash. But at least the Cobras’ logo was cool – the Smash have the honour of having the worst logo in the history of sports.

Anyway, back to 2012. We’ll start with the NLL East.

Buffalo Bandits

Offense: C-

I suggested in the pre-season that the Bandits could be a very good offensive team with the additions of Wiles, Buchanan, and Giles. But alas, it was not to be. John Tavares is having his best offensive season in years and Wiles has been great. Giles hasn’t been bad but Buchanan only has two goals and Tracey Kelusky only has four. The Bandits are sixth in the league in goals per game at 11.7.

Defense: C

The Bandits are tied with the Wings for second in the east with the lowest goals against per game, at 12.7. Good news, right? Well, no. In this case, tied for second in the east also means tied for sixth in the league. Only two teams have worse numbers – the Knighthawks at 12.8 and the Stealth at 13. The goaltending wasn’t that bad but just got better with the addition of Anthony Cosmo. Mike Thompson started off with two very good performances, enough to make him the starter in the All-Star game where he played very well. But then the Bandits lost four in a row which wasn’t entirely his fault, but I suppose Darris Kilgour figured a bit of a shakeup was necessary. Having two goalies this good fighting for playing time is a problem many GMs wouldn’t mind having.

Overall: C

The Bandits have only played six games, and have had two bye weeks in a row. The NLL schedule maker will not be getting a Christmas card from Darris this year, methinks. Despite losing four in a row, the Bandits haven’t looked terrible, except maybe in the game against Minnesota. There’s too much talent on this team to continue losing for much longer so I expect a better second half from the Bandits, particularly with their new goaltending tandem.

Philadelphia Wings

Offense: C+

Dawson is second in the league in scoring, Crowley is eighth. Mundorf and Westervelt have also been good and Brodie Merrill leads the league with 3 short-handed goals. The team is seventh in the league with 11.3 goals/game.

Defense: B+

The Philly defense has been inconsistent. They’ve held opponents to 10 or fewer goals three times, but allowed 15 or more twice. Their overall goals against per game is 12.7 (tied with the Bandits for 6th) but if you take out that one blowout, it’s 11.2, which is good for third. Giving them an B+ because they’ve been pretty good in the last few games and I was very impressed with the Wings defense in their win against the Rock.

Overall: B-

Yes, they’re tied for first in the East, but three of their four wins have come against the Bandits and Stealth. They blew the Rock out of the water, and then got beaten handily by them 2 weeks later. They lost to the lowly Rush. If the Wings can get some consistency, they could be dangerous in the playoffs.

Rochester Knighthawks

Offense: A

The Knighthawks are the only team in the league with six players with 20 or more points – even the Roughnecks only have five. However, the Knighthawks are also the only team to have played 8 games. They are third in the league at 12.8 goals per game.

Defense: D-

They have given up exactly the same number of goals as they’ve scored. Their 12.8 goals against is second-worst in the league, ahead of only Washington.

Overall: C+

Like the Wings, the Knighthawks have been inconsistent. They scored 22 in their first game, then lost their next three. They lost five of their top players and won, then got most of them back and lost. There seems to have been a few different teams calling themselves the Knighthawks this year – they really need to figure out which one they are.

Toronto Rock

Offense: B

The Rock with Colin Doyle for a full game are 0-3. The Rock with Doyle for less than half the game (or not at all) are 4-0. Doyle’s been more of a setup guy than a goal scorer over the last few years, so maybe the problem is that with the return of Josh Sanderson, the Rock now have two setup guys. Sanderson may be deferring to Doyle because Josh is the new guy and Colin’s the captain, but that means Josh isn’t playing his game. Without Doyle, Sanderson can return to what he does best. Hopefully when Doyle returns, he’ll let Sanderson continue to run the show and Doyle can focus on shooting more and passing less.

Stephan Leblanc still has not shown his full potential this year, but in the absence of Doyle and Manning, Sanderson and Garrett Billings have really stepped up. In the last four wins, the Rock have scored 13, 14, 15, and 16 goals, so they’re going in the right direction. They are fifth in the league with 12.1 goals per game.

Defense: B+

Other than the one game against Philly, Matt Roik has been solid all season and has kept the Rock in games. And even in the Philly game, he certainly wasn’t “on” but he wasn’t horrible either. The defense in front of him has also been solid despite the rash of injuries (Phil Sanderson, Stephen Hoar, Drew Petkoff, Rob Marshall, Patrick Merrill, Bruce Codd, and Bill Greer have all missed games due to injury – and that’s not counting forwards Colin Doyle, Blaine Manning, and Rob Hellyer). The Rock are fourth in the league with 11.7 goals against / game.

Overall: B

After a slow start, the Rock really pulled it together and started playing like the defending champs – until they got smoked by Philly. But they recovered to beat Rochester a week later. Assuming that Doyle and Manning’s eventual return doesn’t screw up the offensive chemistry the team has built up in their absence, the Rock look to be heading back to the playoffs with an eye to their third straight Championship game.

Coming later this week: The NLL West.

Game Report: Rochester 12 at Toronto 16

Posted on February 25, 2012 by Graeme

It was a historic night in Toronto, for a number of reasons. The Toronto Rock honoured Bob Watson, one of the best goaltenders in lacrosse history, by retiring his number – the first such retirement in team history. It was historic for rookie Jesse Gamble, as he scored the first goal of his career. And history repeated itself, as this game was oddly reminiscent of a game from earlier this year:

both were played in Toronto on a Friday night against the Rochester Knighthawks
both saw the Rock win
both saw Colin Doyle leave the game in the second quarter and not return

The first time it was a “lower body injury” which turned out to be a hamstring problem. The Rock were without Doyle for two games – winning them both – and then lost the game in which he returned. Now they lose Doyle again, this time to an “upper body injury”. Doyle fell awkwardly into the crease and immediately grabbed his shoulder. He left the floor and his night was over. The Rock are now 0-3 in games where Doyle plays more than half the game, and 4-0 in games where he plays less than half. Obviously he’s a liability and the Rock need to ditch him, right? Hey, I wonder if Paul Rabil would… nah.

But after losing Doyle, the Rock lost someone else and immediately replaced him with someone much better. The Stephan Leblanc who’s struggled most of this season also struggled in the first half of this game, scoring zero points on roughly a million shots. A few minutes into the third quarter, he looked quite frustrated. But shortly after that, he was replaced by the Stephan Leblanc who we saw last year, and that Leblanc went on to score four goals and two assists within ten minutes of play in the third and fourth quarters.

The game was very streaky. Only three of the 28 goals scored were singletons, all in the fourth quarter. The Rock scored five, then Rochester four, then Toronto four, then Rochester four, then Toronto two, then Rochester two,… I won’t have much to say about this game in my Money Ballers column this week; not a single point was scored by any Knighthawks, and only two Rock goals qualified for Money Baller points.

The Rochester offense was spread out – only one player had more than 5 points and nobody scored more than two, but nine different people scored goals. Cody Jamieson was the top scorer, not surprisingly, and Jordan Hall had a strong game as well. Craig Point didn’t score but had four helpers, and Brad Self scored a couple of nice goals. However, their shooting accuracy was terrible. The Knighthawks were missing the net all night long, and not just by a little. Shots were soaring several feed wide at times – and I’m not talking about behind-the-back desperation shots or shots taken while running sideways or backwards, though there were plenty of those as well. No, many times a Knighthawk forward had time to plant his feet and fire with nobody around him and still managed to miss the net by three feet. I just checked the game sheet to see if this impression was correct – the Knighthawks took 67 shots but only 37 hit the net, for a measly 55% shooting accuracy. The Rock took eight more shots than the Stealth, but had twenty-three more shots on goal, for an accuracy of 80%. The Rock also won 2/3 of the face-offs.

It seems odd to say that Rochester’s defense was pretty solid when the Rock scored 16, but the Rock had two different stretches of 10+ minutes without a goal; one of those was almost 15 minutes. Matt Vinc didn’t have his best game ever. Matt Roik played very well for the most part, though he did give up a couple of softies, and even allowed one over his right shoulder, presumably as an homage to Bob Watson.

But back to the Watson ceremony for a minute. I am a huge Watson fan, and I don’t deny for one second that Watson is deserving of having his number retired. But that said, I do have to wonder why he was the first Rock player to be so honoured. Both he and Jim Veltman are legends, both had long careers, both spent most of their careers with the Rock, both won several championships with the Rock, and both are in the NLL Hall of Fame. But Veltman went into the HoF a couple of years ago, while Watson has been retired for less than a year. The only explanation I can think of is that Veltman was an assistant coach with the Rock during the Kloepfer years. When that era ended, Glenn Clark and the rest of the coaching staff except Veltman were fired. Veltman was apparently given some sort of vague front office advisory position, but his employment with the Rock was never mentioned by the team again. Maybe there was some bad blood between the team and Veltman because of that, or for some other reason. But surely with new ownership, a new GM, and new coaches, the team can put all that behind them and retire #32.

Other notes:

Jesse Gamble had a great game, and not just because he had his first career goal and assist.
At one point in the second, the Rock had a shot clock violation, so the Rock player put the ball down. Knowing that the Rock were unable to touch the ball, the nearest Knighthawk defender made a move to pick it up, but ran by it without touching it and headed to the bench. The Rochester offense came out, and one of them grabbed the ball. Smart play by the Rochester defender to allow his team to get the offense set up.
Matt Roik picked up the ball in his crease, then went to pass to a Rock defender, but the ball fell out of his stick and rolled behind him. Lucky for him, he wasn’t standing directly in front of the net, so the ball didn’t roll into the net. And yes, if it had gone in, the goal would have counted. We’d have called that “pulling a Cosmo” since it happened to Cosmo when he was playing for the Rock in the early 2000’s.
The announced attendance was 10,274. Not a chance. I’d say there were no more than 7 or 8 thousand people in the ACC.
Did Jamie Dawick really say “Let’s win one for the Whipper?” Yes. Yes he did.

Week 8 picks

Posted on February 24, 2012 by Graeme

Like fellow Rock fan and blogger Jon Turner, I had another 2-2 week. I’ve now gone 2-2 in four of the seven weeks so far this season, which means I’m better than .500 this year at having .500 weeks! In terms of my picks, I had a pretty average week, but outside of that, it wasn’t an average week at all. Not only did my sister have a baby on Sunday (totally not lacrosse-related, but pretty freakin’ awesome), but I will be posting my first-ever interview here on NLL Chatter tomorrow. If those weren’t awesome enough, there’s more. I posted an article about Geoff Snider, which he read and liked. But wait! There’s still more! Again like Jon Turner, I also won a trivia contest on Twitter today run by the Toronto Rock. The third question of the day was “Who was the other goalie alongside Whipper on the 1988 Founders Cup Champion KW Braves?” and I was the first to answer Steve Dietrich (full disclosure: a somewhat educated guess on my part, in that I was pretty sure Chugger was from K-W), so I won an autographed All-Star Card and lacrosse ball.

So I’m now 5 games below .500 overall, which means that even if I go 4-0 this week, I’ll still be under .500. But this is the week, I just know it. This is the week where…. ah, who am I kidding? Let’s just get to my ~~random guesses~~ predictions for week 8:

Record: 11-16 (.407)

Game	Comments	Pick
CAL @ COL	If anyone can beat the Mammoth, it’s the Roughnecks, and I wouldn’t be shocked if they did. But as I said last week, I’m just going to keep picking Colorado until they lose.
PHI @ EDM	Philly’s first in the east, Edmonton is second-last in the west. Easy pick, right? If you think so, you’re new to this game. There are no easy picks. Could the Rush pull off the upset and beat the Wings? Sure they could, and I almost picked them to beat the Wings. But then I remembered last week’s game against the Rock. The Wings offense is starting to click, and their defense was outstanding.
ROC @ TOR	This will be a tough one for the Rock. They got spanked by the Wings last week so they’ll be angry. But Rochester pulled out a gutsy win last week without their top scorer and a bunch of other starters, and those guys are all back this week. I think Matt Roik will rebound from last week and the Rock will head into the All-Star game above .500 – unlike myself.
MIN @ WAS	Another tough one but coaching comes into play in this game, almost more than the players. Minnesota has been playing well of late but inexplicably fired coach Mike Lines yesterday. This game will be Joe Sullivan’s first as head coach, and also marks the return of Chris Hall to the Stealth bench. I think Hall’s return after fighting cancer will be a huge lift to the team, and might just turn their season around.
West @ East	I’ll make a couple of predictions on the All-Star game: (1) My younger son will be playing on his iPod at some point during the game, causing me to question buying him a ticket. (2) Getting out of the parking lot after the game will be a nightmare. (3) Over/under on goals scored: 35, and I’m taking the over.	?

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1

Week 2 – 2-2

Week 3 – 2-2

Week 4 – 2-4

Week 5 – 2-2

Week 6 – 1-3

Week 7 – 2-2

Game report: Philadelphia 14 @ Toronto 8

Posted on February 20, 2012 by Graeme

Sorry for the delay on the game report, dear reader, I know you have been on the edge of your seat since Saturday night thinking “For the love of Jim Veltman, when will he post it?!” You can blame my sister for having a baby yesterday. I tried to get her to reschedule so I could get this article done, but nooooooo. Some people think of nobody but themselves. Though I have to say that my brand new niece is pretty darned adorable.

Anyway, as you probably already know, the Philly Wings got redemption on Saturday for the beat-down the Rock gave them two weeks ago by beating the Toronto Rock 14-8. The game was pretty close for the first half, tied at 1, 2, 3, and 4 before Kevin Crowley scored twice within a minute to put the Wings up by 2 at the half. Johnny Mouradian’s halftime pep talk must have been more effective than Troy Cordingley’s, since Brendan Mundorf and Dan Dawson scored two more in the first two minutes of the second half to put the Wings up 8-4. The Rock scored a couple to get as close as 8-6, but then it was all Wings, as they scored two more in the third, and both times the Rock scored in the fourth, the Wings answered back a minute later. Another goal by Dawson chased Matt Roik for the first time in his Rock career, and then Drew Westervelt beat Pat Campbell to end the scoring.

Matt Roik was just as solid in the first half as in his previous games this year, but started to lose it in the third as the game got more and more out of hand. A couple of the later goals were a little softer than the ones we’ve seen him give up so far this year, but I certainly wouldn’t pin the loss squarely on him. The Rock offense looked similar to the offense in the first couple of games, i.e. mostly not there. Garrett Billings and the new guys (Rooney, Thenhaus, and Carey) definitely showed up to play, but Sanderson and Leblanc looked frustrated, and Colin Doyle was pretty much a non-factor in his return from injury.

As an aside and to take a page from Dave Barry’s book, Billings and the New Guys would be a good name for a rock band.

The Rock with Colin Doyle in the lineup are 1-3 with an average of 10 goals per game (and in the one win, Doyle got 0 points in less than two quarters before getting injured). The Rock without Doyle are 2-0 with an average of 14.5 goals per game. If you count the game where he got injured (and wasn’t a factor) as a game without him, it changes to 0-3 and 9 goals with Doyle, 3-0 and 14 goals without. Of course, that’s not to say “Doyle makes the team worse” – it’s not that simple – but it does make you wonder if Troy and the boys will be looking at other differences in how the offense was run before the next game.

The Rock took a lot of shots that hit Wings goalie Brandon Miller square in the chest or missed the net completely; in fact the Rock had three different breakaways (two from Mike Hobbins and one from Brendan Thenhaus) where the shooter missed the net. But in saying that the Rock took lousy shots, I don’t want to take anything away from the play of Brandon Miller, who was very solid in the Wings net. The Wings defense was absolutely stellar, especially in the second half. There was one play where Garrett Billings had the ball right in front of the Wings net for at least 15 seconds, and in that time he was covered so well that he had no opportunity to either shoot or pass and ended up having to just drop the ball when the shot clock ran out.

The Wings offense was pretty impressive. Brendan Mundorf scored five, including two on the power play, and Dan Dawson scored three and added seven assists. Kevin Crowley added another hattrick, and now has four in his six career games. But take a look at this comparison between the Wings offense and the Rock defense:

Rock defenders:

Codd, 5’8″
Bryan, Chapman, Sanderson, 5’9″
Merrill, 6’0″

Wings forwards:

Dawson, Westervelt, 6’5″
Crowley, Merrill (yes, mostly transition but he played up front a lot) 6’4″
Crotty, 6’2″

At one point, Dan Dawson ran by a Rock defender and I think he pulled the ol’ swim move, but it could be that his arm went over the head of the defender while he was running. It was hard to tell. Given that size difference, the fact that the Rock managed to hold the Wings to only 6 goals two weeks ago is doubly amazing.

The Rock host Rochester this Friday while the Wings play in Edmonton before the All-Star game on Saturday.

Other notes:

The Rock brought Jesse Gamble back from the practice roster when Marshall got hurt, and then didn’t play him.
I’ve said before that I am impressed at how Colin Doyle stands still during the anthems and even sings along to O Canada. As the camera panned down the Rock players during the anthem, I saw at least two others (one was Patrick Merrill, don’t remember who the other was) who were also singing along. Kudos to them.
For a while, I thought “Man, Dan Dawson is everywhere tonight!”, then realized that sometimes he wore a different number. Duh. Both he and his brother Paul Dawson just have “Dawson” on their jerseys, with no first initial.
I got a few looks from my fellow Rock fans when I actually applauded a goal by the Wings. Drew Westervelt scored a kind of “backwards Air Gait” in the second, where he dove out from behind the net and backhanded it in on the far side of Matt Roik. Outstanding goal. Of course, that kind of goal is a little easier when your arms are eight feet long.
On one play in the first, Billings grabbed the ball to try and avoid an over-and-back violation but stepped over the line. The ref blew the whistle and Billings put the ball down, but I guess he rolled it and as Brodie Merrill ran by and tried to pick it up on the fast break, he missed it because it was rolling. He stopped running and literally jumped up and down twice. The ref did give Billings a delay of game minor, and I agree that it was deserved given the new rule, but I was less than impressed with Merrill’s display. I’ve seen that kind of behaviour in my nine-year-old son sometimes, but he’s nine. There were a few other occasions where Merrill complained loudly to the refs, sometimes quite animatedly. I have heard other (non-Edmonton) fans in the past talk about Brodie Merrill’s antics and call him a whiner, but I’d never really noticed it myself. On Saturday I got to see it first-hand.
The Wings had at least three or four broken sticks. To the Philly Wings equipment manager: I’m pretty sure balsa wood sticks are not allowed in the NLL.

Week 7 picks

Posted on February 16, 2012 by Graeme

Statistics are funny. If I were to flip a coin to make my picks each week, odds are that I’d end the season around .500. What does it mean when the coin-flip method would give you a better record than me, five of the seven IL Indoor writers posting their picks, and three of the five In Lax We Trust writers? We all follow the league closely and we know the teams and players and what they can do. We’re not going to get everything right, of course, and there are going to be teams and players that play better or worse than you think they will. But shouldn’t we be able to do better than random chance at our game predictions? You might think so, but obviously, you’d be wrong.

So there was a big trade this week, which will affect two of the games below. Paul Rabil has struggled a little this year, like the rest of his former Stealth teammates, so will his change of scenery give him a boost? And will Athan Iannucci, in his first game of the year, give the Stealth’s offense the spark they so desperately need?

Record: 9-14 (.391)

Game	Comments	Pick
EDM @ CAL	Edmonton just got better by adding Paul Rabil (assuming he plays, and there are rumours that he won’t), but how long will it take him to learn the Rush system and be able to really contribute? Might take a couple of games, might take 5 or 10 minutes. Either way, Calgary is a formidable opponent, so I’m going to have to go with the Roughies here.
COL @ MIN	I don’t follow the NFL at all but I won an NFL pool a few years ago, when the Patriots were at their peak. One of my “strategies” was “always take the Patriots”, and it almost always paid off. The Mammoth are like that now. I like the direction the Swarm are going and after their two-win weekend, I’m sure they have a lot of confidence. I don’t think the Mammoth will go 16-0 this year, but I just can’t bring myself to bet against them yet.
WAS @ ROC	Recent circumstances (and I’m not talking about the Iannucci trade) make this a easier pick. Rochester will be without their leading scorer Cody Jamieson, as well as Jordan Hall, Travis Hill, Sid Smith, and Tyler Burton. Of course this doesn’t mean that they will lose, but it certainly doesn’t help. Iannucci will be pumped to play well enough to make people forget about the whole holdout thing.
PHI @ TOR	Toronto dominated Philadelphia prison-style (continuing with the Iannucci theme) in their last meeting, and they’ve had a week off, and Colin Doyle will likely be returning to action. Philly has since beaten the Bandits so I can’t see this being the cakewalk that the last game seemed to be, but I still think the Rock will take this one.

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1
Week 2 – 2-2
Week 3 – 2-2
Week 4 – 2-4
Week 5 – 2-2
Week 6 – 1-3

Week 5 picks

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Graeme

Here’s a quote from last week’s picks article: “This is the week I break the .500 barrier. I can just feel it.“

Yeah, well it looks like I can’t predict that either. I went 2-4 last week, and I feel bad that I picked my beloved Rock to lose in Calgary, but it was Buffalo going 0-2 that really screwed me up. But then again, none of the IL Indoor guys picked Buffalo to lose either game, and it’s a well-known fact that anyone who writes for IL Indoor must be really intelligent when it comes to lacrosse. Not to mention good-looking.

At 6-9 I’m tied with Shanny and ahead of Bob Chavez, Teddy Jenner, Paul Stewart, and Casey Vock. Not too bad.

Record: 6-9 (.400)

Game	Comments	Pick
WAS @ BUF	Tough one. Buffalo looked great in the first two games, lousy in the last two. Washington’s looked lousy all year. Can both teams lose this game? Washington will break out at some point this season, I’m quite sure, but I don’t think it’ll be against the Bandits.
EDM @ COL	Another tough one. The Rush kicked Washington all over the floor last weekend, but Colorado’s on too much of a roll to bet against them now.
TOR @ PHI	Still no Doyle or Manning for the Rock, and Philly is in first place in the East, but the Rock’s offense has begun to click, with Billings and Sanderson having big games last weekend. The Rock are the defending champs, and I think they might actually start looking like it pretty soon.
MIN @ ROC	Which Rochester team will we see? The one that scored 22 against Philadelphia, or the one that’s lost three straight? And which Minnesota team will we see? The one that we all expected, with too many rookies to really contend, or the one that scored 19 against the Bandits last weekend? How am I supposed to make a pick in this game when there are four different teams playing?

I really should stop saying “tough one” for these picks. With the parity everyone keeps talking about (for good reason), just about every pick is a tough one.

Campbell vs. Snider

Posted on January 31, 2012 by Graeme

By now, we all know about the fight that took place near the beginning of last Saturday’s Rock-Roughnecks game involving Geoff Snider and Pat Campbell. I mentioned this in my game review and said I’d get back to it later. Well, now it’s later. But I’ve looked over the replay again a number of times and I think I’ve changed my mind a little. Campbell’s move was still unwise and put the Rock at a disadvantage, but after watching the replay (the TSN feed was better than the one in the video I linked to in my game review) and hearing and reading interviews with other people about him, not to mention his own words describing what happened, I think I understand why he did what he did, and I think I’m OK with it.

Pat Campbell I’m pretty sure this is the first lacrosse fight I’ve ever seen involving one goalie but not two. Let’s start with the play as I saw it. Snider is behind the net with the ball. He gets double- and then triple-teamed by Rock defenders Rob Marshall, Phil Sanderson, and Ryan Sharp. He takes a hit to the face (Sanderson) then gets cross-checked from behind (Sharp), then takes another hit to the face (Sanderson again). Snider’s helmet comes off and he goes down. He then gets up rather upset (understandably), drops his gloves, and heads towards Sanderson. As he’s pulling Marshall out of the way, Campbell, who has not been involved until now, runs over to Snider and punches him in the face. The refs try to pull them apart but Snider pulls Campbell’s helmet off, then they separate and Campbell takes his own jersey and shoulder pads off. They’re just about to go at it when Snider trips over the pile of pads on the floor and falls. Campbell drops beside him and throws two huge punches before the refs break it up. That’s it.

It wasn’t much of a fight. I’m not sure Snider actually landed any real punches, but he was given five for fighting anyway. Campbell was given five for fighting, two for instigating, and a game misconduct. He first went to the penalty box and then to the dressing room through a sea of high-fives from his teammates. I was watching the game on TV and my twitter feed on the laptop at the same time, and there were lots of tweets about the fight, mostly positive. I know I’m in the minority when it comes to fighting – I don’t particularly like it, but most people do, and that’s fine. As long as it’s not a pre-determined thing or people who are primarily fighters are sent out just to fight, I’m OK with it. Snider had been hit illegally three times within about five seconds, and no penalties were being called, so I can’t blame him for wanting to fight. But Campbell wasn’t involved and the way I saw it originally, there was no reason for him to get involved unless he questioned Phil Sanderson’s ability to defend himself.

Campbell’s actions did put the Rock at a disadvantage, in a number of ways:

Campbell was ejected, so Matt Roik had to come in and play the rest of the game. If Roik had been injured during the game, the Rock would have been in deep trouble. I was going to say that Roik had minimal time to warm up, but this was only 4 minutes into the game, so his pre-game warm-ups were probably sufficient.
Calgary got a two-minute power-play.
The Rock lost Bill Greer for two minutes, since someone had to serve the penalty.

The first game of the NLL season featured the Roughnecks in Toronto, and during that game Snider had been chirping Roik incessantly, and it did look at one point like it would come to blows, but never did. There was some talk that the event on Saturday was somehow related to that, and it was even suggested that Campbell (who has a bit of a reputation) was given the start for that reason – not specifically to fight Snider, but just so that the Roughnecks might think twice about trying to get under the goalie’s skin. Maybe so, but I think the whole Snider-Roik thing was overblown and I doubt the Rock were really thinking about revenge for that minor incident three weeks later.

In a post-game interview, Campbell said “I saw his gloves come off and I knew he was ready to go. We are a team, a tough team and we don’t fight our own fights, we fight for each other“. I’ve since heard a number of interviews with people talking about what a great teammate Campbell is and how he would do anything for his teammates. It sounds like he was willing to fight Snider so that Flip didn’t have to, but not because he was questioning Sanderson’s ability. Maybe he figured that he stood a better chance against Snider than Flip did. Maybe he figured that sitting in the penalty box for five minutes himself wouldn’t hurt the team as much as having Sanderson in the box for five.

But the most likely explanation is that he didn’t figure anything. He didn’t think at all – just acted to defend his teammate. Not because the teammate couldn’t defend himself, but just because that’s what teammates do. I can’t fault him for that.

Game Review: Toronto 14 at Calgary 13

Posted on January 30, 2012 by Graeme

Let’s say you were going to write a movie that included a lacrosse game, and it was important to the plot that the game be close. How would you write it? It would have to include overtime. You could have the score tied nine different times. All four quarters end in a tie. Both teams have the same number of power play goals on the same number of power play opportunities. No team would lead by more than two at any time. Both teams have the same number of shots in two of the four quarters. Both backup goaltenders enter the game and play for significant periods of time. And then you’d have the unsung hero, the hard worker that doesn’t get all the accolades, score the OT winner, his first goal in two years. Well, you couldn’t put all those elements in, that would be too unrealistic.

And yet that’s what happened in the Rock’s second win of the weekend and Calgary’s second straight overtime loss. Rock defender Cam Woods scored on a pass from Mike Hobbins just over a minute into overtime, in a game that featured all of the above elements and more. There was even a fight, but I’ve never seen a fight involving a goalie that didn’t involve a second goalie. I’ve seen goalies shoving other players and even throwing the odd punch, but never a drop-the-gloves-take-the-jersey-and-pads-off kind of fight. I’ll get back to that later, but back to the game review for now.

This was the first game the Rock had played without either Blaine Manning or Colin Doyle in the lineup since the first game of the 2000 season. The question of who would step up in their absence was answered by another veteran, Josh Sanderson, who had nine points including a hat-trick. Garrett Billings continued where he left off last night, with 3 goals and 4 assists, giving him 14 points over the weekend. Not John Grant numbers, but not bad. Brendan Thenhaus made his Rock debut and scored a goal and two helpers. Pat Campbell started but only played 3 1/2 minutes, allowing 2 goals on 5 shots before he… but more on that later. Matt Roik finished the game from there, allowing 11 goals on 43 shots and for the fourth straight game, keeping his team in it. Three of the Rock’s goals, including the winner, were scored by defenders – Woods, Drew Petkoff, and Mike Hobbins all scored, and Hobbins also added three assists.

At the other end of the floor, Mike Poulin started but after allowing 5 goals, was pulled early in the second for Nick Rose. I didn’t think Poulin was playing that badly, but Rose ended up playing 25 minutes before Poulin came back in. Rose wasn’t bad either, but Poulin really played well in the fourth. Offensively, the Roughnecks were led by Curtis Dickson with 3 goals and 3 assists, and Shawn Evans, with 2 and 3. Four other Roughnecks had 4 or more points, so it was a well-balanced attack.

After a tough back-and-forth game with goals scattered throughout and ten goals in the third quarter alone, both defenses were very strong in the fourth quarter. This resulted in a ten-minute span with no goals scored and Calgary nursing a two-goal lead. But with less than two minutes left and Roik on the bench, Kasey Beirnes scored to cut the lead to one. Toronto kept the pressure on and when Mike Poulin left the crease to try to grab a loose ball behind the net, he was hit by two Rock players. When he rushed to get back in front of the net, he didn’t have time to get properly set up, and was a step or two in front of the goal as Garrett Billings blew a shot by him to tie the game with eleven seconds left. Geoff Snider won the resulting faceoff (Snider was 24-4 on faceoffs on the night) and Calgary managed to get a decent shot on Roik, who made the biggest stop of his season to send the game to OT.

If you were to poll every Rock fan watching that game and ask which Rock player was going to score the winner, Cam Woods would not likely make the top 10. I doubt Cam Woods himself would list Cam Woods in the top ten. But on a quick transition, Woods scored from Mike Hobbins to end the game and put the Rock at 2-2 on the season.

OK, I said I’d get back to the Campbell thing later, but that may be long so I think I will save it for a separate article. I know, dear reader, that you are shaken and upset by having to wait, so I will leave you with some more notes about this game, and then a video of the event in question. Check back in a couple of days or watch my twitter feed for the announcement.

Other game notes:

Drew Petkoff scored a nice goal in the second as he got a breakaway and ran from Rose’s left to his right looking for an opening. I thought (and Brian Shanahan said the same thing on the telecast) that he’d run too far and taken too long, but he managed to pull Rose off to the right just far enough to open a hole on the left side and scored there. Don’t know if that’s what he meant to do, but it was beautiful.
I’m not one to complain about officiating in general, but there were a number of questionable calls here. Two of the most blatant went against the Roughnecks: Scott Ranger got a “hitting from behind” penalty for giving Bruce Codd a little shove on the back – with his hand. Then near the end of the fourth, Cam Woods grabbed Curtis Dickson’s jersey and yanked him down. The Roughnecks got a penalty on the first one (and the Rock scored on the PP) and Toronto did not get a penalty on the second. That’s exactly backwards.
Questionable officiating notwithstanding, Ryan Sharp deserved every penalty he took in this game, and in the Rochester game as well. If he’s going to remain with the team, he’ll have to play smarter.

Game Review: Rochester 11 at Toronto 13

Posted on January 28, 2012 by Graeme

The Toronto Rock won last night, and they also lost. The win was big, but the loss might have been bigger.

The win was, of course, the game, a 13-11 come-from-behind victory over the new-look Knighthawks. The first half was a see-saw battle, with the score tied at 1, 2, 3, 4, and at half-time, 5. Rochester had yet another one-goal lead at the end of the third, then a three-goal lead in the fourth before Toronto decided that they should just win the damn game and reeled off six straight goals in eight minutes to take a 12-9 lead. Rochester refused to go quietly, scoring two more in the last minute and a half around an empty-net goal by Patrick Merrill but it wasn’t quite enough.

The loss was Colin Doyle, who hobbled off the floor in the second quarter and was not seen again. The word from the Rock is a “lower body injury” and TSN later reported a pulled hamstring and that he will not play tonight in Calgary. This will be the first NLL game Doyle has missed since the 2000 season, a streak of 188 consecutive games. This ties him with former teammate Steve Toll for the NLL “iron man” record. Part of me is hoping the Rock put him out there tomorrow, even if it’s just for one shift, so he can set the record. They likely won’t and I can’t say I blame them; playing around with your captain’s health (not to mention scratching someone healthy so Doyle can play for 30 seconds) for the sake of a record is a bit silly. If Doyle’s injury is serious and he does miss a number of games, that will be a huge loss for the Rock who are already without Blaine Manning.

Rochester scored the first goal of the game on the first shot of the game, a minute and a half in. Cody Jamieson’s first of four on the night was a relatively weak shot from a mile away that beat Roik. After ten minutes, Roik had been beaten four times, though had only allowed that one goal – two shots hit posts (a trend that would continue all night for the Knighthawks) and one got through and trickled towards the net but Sandy Chapman managed to stop it before it went in. That was a weird play, actually – it happened with 9:00 left in the first, and Rochester coach Mike Hasen threw the challenge flag with 8:31 left. By my count, that’s 29 seconds. According to the 2012 rule book:

The challenging club must throw the flag within twenty seconds of the play being challenged.

Despite Troy Cordingley gently reminding the ref of this rule, the play was reviewed but it wasn’t even close so the no-goal call stood. This ended up working in the Rock’s favour, since the KHawks almost scored a goal early in the second on a play that was closer, but Hasen had already wasted his first-half challenge. (After watching the replay on TV, that goal wasn’t all that close either.)

Only three goals were scored in the third, as the Knighthawks took a 7-5 lead before Ryan Sharp scored a shorthanded goal to bring the Rock within one. The first two goals of the fourth put the Knighthawks up by 3 before the Rock’s third power play goal began the six-goal run. The run also included the Rock’s fourth power play goal – the Rock were 4 for 6 on the power play, while the Knighthawks were only 1 for 5.

Both defenses were pretty solid on the night, though the Rock had some trouble with Cody Jamieson. Jamieson ended up with 4 goals, 4 assists, and 20 shots to lead all players. Stephen Keogh played pretty well but Johnny Powless was great, including a highlight-reel goal in the third. Matt Vinc was not outstanding but made a number of great saves. He did look pretty rattled when the Rock scored six in a row in the fourth. At the other end, Roik made his share of great stops as well, though as I said the first goal was a softie. “He’d like to have that one back” says Mr. Cliché Commentator – luckily Dave Randorf is not Mr. Cliché Commentator and correctly said that Roik really should have make that stop. That was the only real softie though. As he did in the first two games, Roik played well enough to keep the team in it, only this time the offense decided to show up. Drew Petkoff missed part of last year because of injury, and had a strong game in his return.

It was very nice to see the Rock bump their intensity level to come back in the fourth despite missing the leadership of Doyle and Manning. But there is a lot of veteran leadership on this team, so while losing Doyle will definitely hurt, it’s not devastating from a leadership point of view.

Other notes:

We almost had one of each type of goal: even strength (most of them), 5 power play goals, two short-handed, one empty net, Cody Jamieson hit the post on a penalty shot, and Matt Roik tried a long shot on an empty net that, I believe, would have made him the first goalie to score a goal in Rock history. That penalty shot happened because the Rock were hit with a too-many-men penalty in the last two minutes of the game, though the reason wasn’t announced (just “The Knighthawks have been awarded a penalty shot”) and a number of people at the game were confused, myself included.
The costume budget for the Toronto Rock Cheerleaders must have been drastically cut, though they kept the same number of people on the squad.
Toronto’s eighth goal was a weird one: Play in the Toronto end, Toronto ~~defender~~ forward Dan Carey knocked a pass out of the air, grabbed the loose ball and ran up the floor, then passed to ~~forward~~ defender Stephen Hoar who shot it by Vinc. Why Carey was back on D, I’m not sure, (who ever heard of an offensive player playing defense?) but it worked out rather well. Stephen Leblanc was also playing defense on that shift.
Stephen Leblanc’s goal in the second (his first of the year) was almost identical to Cody Jamieson’s second of the game in the first. Both cut inside from the goalie’s left and dove across the crease, scoring on the far side.
Garrett Billings did his best Blaine Manning impression (he’s already got the hair nailed) in the third, when he cut across the front of the crease, in traffic, and switched hands to shoot left-handed. Didn’t score, but a nice play.
The Rock took a too-many-men penalty with a minute left in the third, when Brad Self had a breakaway. It’s not unusual for a team to send a defender out early to try to prevent the breakaway – if the guy scores anyway, the penalty is negated and you lose nothing. If he doesn’t score, you count your blessings and take the two minute penalty. But in this case, Self was already beyond the bench when they sent the defenders out, so there was no point.
If the nets were an inch wider and an inch taller, the Knighthawks might have scored 20 goals. We counted ten posts hit by the ‘Hawks and around five by the Rock. Brad Self hit at least four.
Jamie Rooney made his Rock debut, and after a go-ahead goal in the first and a beautiful game-tying goal in the fourth, Rock fans have decided that he can stay.

Week 4 picks

Posted on January 27, 2012 by Graeme

For the second straight week, I went 2-2 with my picks. After three weeks, I’m still under .500 but getting closer. Now I’m a math guy, so I know that as long as I keep having .500 weeks, I can never reach .500 overall. This is the week I break the .500 barrier. I can just feel it.

Record: 4-5 (.444)

Game	Comments	Pick
ROC @ TOR	Rochester has almost never won during the regular season in Toronto – which means precisely nothing. The Knighthawks played a strong game against Buffalo last week and demolished the Wings the week before, so there’s no reason to believe they can’t come into the ACC and beat the Rock. But after starting the season 0-2, the champs are hungry for a win, and they’ll want to get it before the home crowd. The offense is poised to break out and despite losing Manning, I think this is the game where they do it.
PHI @ BUF	After wins over Toronto and Rochester, the Bandits have looked strong and their confidence level has to be very high. Then again, Philly beat the Stealth in OT last week, and Dan Dawson hasn’t really hit his stride yet. I’m picking the Bandits, but I don’t think it’ll be a blowout.
BUF @ MIN	I think Buffalo’s just too strong for the Swarm, particularly if they beat Philly on Friday night. The only way Minnesota stands a chance on Saturday is if (a) Buffalo gets slaughtered by the Wings on Friday and their confidence get shattered, or (b) the Bandits consider it an easy win and don’t work their tails off. Darris Kilgour won’t let either of those things happen. And if either one does happen, I wouldn’t want to be in the dressing room after that game.
ROC @ COL	I’m still not 100% convinced that Colorado is for real, and I am sure that John Grant has to come back down to earth sometime. But even if he does, Adam Jones looks like he’s ready to take over. Despite Vinc vs. Levis, I think this will be another high-scoring game, with the Knighthawks coming out on top.
TOR @ CAL	If Toronto loses on Friday night, this is a no-brainer – Calgary in a landslide, and the Rock are in deep trouble. But if the Rock can beat Rochester, this is going to be much closer. I still think Calgary is the team to beat in the West, so I’m picking the Roughies here.
EDM @ WAS	Toughest pick of the week. Edmonton didn’t have a bad game against Colorado last weekend, but playing against the Grant/Jones/Prout combo has been difficult so far this year. The Stealth just lost Jeff Zywicki, and Ratcliff and Duch aren’t tearing up the floor like last year. Hmmm… offense isn’t clicking and they lost one of their stars to injury – sounds like the Rock, doesn’t it?