First off, let me apologize for not writing my Monday blog looking back at what happened in ECAC Hockey over the weekend. It’s winter break for the area schools, so I have been spending time with my 7-year-old son, Steven. He has more energy than I had at his age. I don’t know where he gets it from.
Every Wednesday, after he gets his homework done, we head over to Union so that I can get the interviews to write my weekend advance. With no school, I took him over to RPI, where he hangs out with equipment manager Dana McGuane’s son while I talk to coach Seth Appert. Steven seems to enjoy it. He’s also learning to skate to play hockey with the Schenectady Youth Hockey Association. And he has improved so much since he started. I guess I better learn how to skate again to keep up with him.
I promise to I will have my weekend review on Monday. In the meantime, with Steven in tow, here is what I learned from Wednesday’s practices, as RPI and Union get ready for their final home games of the regular season this weekend when they host Clarkson and St. Lawrence.
— RPI still has faint hopes of getting home ice in the first round of the ECAC Hockey tournament. With eight games left, the Engineers are seven points behind eighth-place Colgate for the final home-ice berth.
But RPI coach Seth Appert is realistic. He isn’t worried about home ice.
“We haven’t talked about it. We’re not going to get it. I have confidence in our team, in that we’re going to get going, and play better hockey and that we can put ourselves in position to win these last four. But I have zero confidence that Colgate is going to lose all four with how good they’re playing.”
RPI is 0-4-1 in its last five games and 1-14-1 in the last 16. The Engineers’ only win during that stretch was Jan. 26 at St. Lawrence, their opponent on Friday.
Appert wants to see his players get out of their doldrums.
“I think there’s too many guys in the room that feel sorry for themselves,” Appert said. “Maybe they want somebody else to pull them out of the problems. That’s where you have to have the inner resolve, and you have to care about your teammates so much that you’re not going to let them down.”
— Over at Union, the Dutchmen are coming off the 8-0 setback at Colgate last Saturday.
It doesn’t seem like that loss has affected the Dutchmen too much. They don’t take away points because you lost by a certain amount of goals.
They are focused on what is at stake this weekend. The Dutchmen need a tie or a St. Lawrence loss to clinch home in the ECACH tournament for the fifth time in six years.
But the players won’t be satisfied with just home ice in the first round. They are still in the hunt for a first-round bye.
The Dutchmen, who are in a three-way tie for fifth with Harvard and Yale, a just a point behind Cornell for the final bye spot. Union is two points behind third-place Quinnipiac, four in back of second-place Princeton and six behind league-leading Clarkson, its opponent tonight.
“Our goal is to get into the top four,” Union defenseman Michael Beynon said. “It would be kind of disappointing if we finished in eighth.”
Union coach Nate Leaman said the flu bug that his gripped the team for several weeks still hasn’t gone away.
Chris Potts, who missed last weekend’s games with the flu, returned to practice Wednesday. His status for the weekend is questionable.
That’s all for now. I’ll be on “Big Board Radio Sports with Rodger Wyland” on WOFX-AM (980) at 11:05 a.m. Thursday to discuss this weekend’s games. Clarkson play-by-play announcer Bob Ahfeld will be the guest at the top of the segment. I hope you to get a chance to listen.
