The 2007
Panthers took the field for the first time last night against
Although we
weren't keeping score it was interesting to see how
both teams responded to runs by the other team during the course of the
scrimmage. We jumped out early with 4 quick
goals as our starters showed a lot of poise for it being their first time
playing together. Skidmore settled down and ended up scoring the next 3 goals, of which two were on man-up. Once they
went on a little run you could see our guys
tighten up a bit which led to some sloppy turnovers and mental errors on our
part. We settled down and ended finishing the scrimmage off strong at
both ends of the field. At the end of
the day it was great to get everyone involved and to put our young guys in some
situations where they were under pressure.
Some performances worth
noting were turned in by Nick Bastis who
was (2,1) in the scrimmage and looks to be ready for a
big year. Mike Stone has separated himself as our top option in the
midfield and finished (1,2) on the day.
Mike is our fastest middie, he has a great shot on
the run and best of all, he
competes. We were all pleasantly surprised to see Dave Campbell
(no relation) finish with 2 goals. Dave injured
his knee last January and missed the entire 2006 season. This year he'll split face off duties with Peter Mellen
and play a major role as one of our short stick defensive middies.
Finally, James Guay who also missed the 2006 season
showed he is going to be an outstanding close defenseman for us this
year. He has the ability to put the ball on the ground with some hard, well timed checks and then also is fantastic on ground
balls.
We have a
lot of work to do but there were a lot of positives to
be taken away from last night. It looks like we're
going to have some warmer weather for practice this week and hopefully
will be much further along when we go against