Friday, April 03, 2009

Boston 14 Toronto 13

Some comments on tonight's game:

  • Watson was a little shaky at the beginning but settled down, and made some very nice stops in the second half. Cosmo was great all night. It seemed that Toronto kept trying to go five-hole on him all night, but there just wasn't a five-hole. That's probably why they asked for the goalie equipment check.
  • Most games this season (the home games, anyway), the Rock have started out strong and then slowed down. They played a full 60 strong minutes in the last game, and tonight, the Rock's best quarter was the third, but the 4th was pretty strong too. Overall, other than refusing to shoot the damn ball at times, they played pretty well.
  • Like Rochester's Mac Allen in the last game, another bad moustache. "Boston penalty to #12, Jon Durno, two minutes for unruly facial hair."
  • After the last goal, I was reminded of the 2001 NLL Championship game in Toronto. The other team (Philadelphia in 2001, Boston tonight) is up by two goals, but the Rock is putting on great pressure. Toronto scores a goal to bring them within one, and I immediately look at the clock to see how much time is left. In 2001, about 1.3 seconds. Tonight, 0.9. Just not enough time and the Rock lose by one.
  • Nice to see Cosmo come out and congratulate Dan Ladouceur.
  • Jason Clark is new to the Rock, and obviously hasn't read the Rock 2009 playbook. A couple of times when he got the ball near the net, he turned and shot at the net. He doesn't yet know that the way Rock do things in 2009 is to pass the ball around ten or fifteen times, ignoring decent shooting opportunities, before (a) shooting directly at the goalie's chest, (b) dropping a pass, or (c) shooting and missing the net completely. I'm sure by the next game, he will have cleaned up his act a little and gotten with the program.
  • There were a couple of goal reviews, all of which were quite obvious on the replay. I thought for sure that McGlone was in the crease on his goal, but replay showed clearly that he was still in the air when the ball went in.
  • Rob Marshall is trying so hard to be Steve Toll, but he just can't score. I like him though, he works hard.
  • Cosmo twice stopped play when his team needed it by having the trainer come out to look at his equipment. Another skill he learned from Whipper while he was in Toronto.

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