jhu06 wrote: ↑Fri Aug 11, 2023 10:01 am
Crawley's growth from year 1 to year 2 is a big deal and they need him to develop a more consistent offense to take pressure off the losses of narewski/mazzone/hawley. We need more games where we're jumping out on people going up 4-5 goals early and less of having to rally late. If it's a 4th quarter to win this year I think we're screwed because you don't have that leadership and skill in the middle of the field.
Another horrible take - Where do we start?
First - you have zero idea about the leadership issue - What you know is that Mazzone had talent and a very good ground ball skill - that is unquestioned. And again - while you are almost making me sound anti - Narewski or anti Hawley nothing could be further from the truth - the fact remains Hopkins was under 50% for face-offs the entire season. Narewski had not one but two patellar tendon repairs and probably should not have been playing lacrosse and Hawley did show great sacrifice in being out there only for wing play and playing as hard as he did. Of course if he didn't play wings he doesn't play or else they would have had him out there as an SSDM. He garnered 31 ground balls which is 6.3% of the 492 face-offs - obviously he influenced other positive out comes for Hopkins but the cold hard fact is he is replaceable in terms of skill. He was a captain so clearly valued for his leadership - I'll give you that.
You are going to have 57 to 58 names on the roster - close to 20 brand new - Smith had 32 ground balls/Brown had 21 as a freshmen/Raposo had 14 ground balls. While Hawley's biggest contribution may have been to save some running for some of the SSDMs - if we can't find someone to play wing and pick up 30 ground balls and help fight for others - then we are in trouble. I don't think we are in trouble. The face-off crew is obviously a bit of a questionmark as Callahan took a a step back from the year prior and Lane/Sheppard are unknown quantities.
BTW - you do understand that the players your boy Stevens was referring to in his take that "role players" helped make the difference with Johns Hopkins are all the players you seem to loathe?
One thing would seem fairly predictable - with the schedule likely to include alot of the usual suspects - 4-5 goal early leads are not something you can count on at all. Crawley's priorites would seem to be:
1. Team chemistry with alot of veterans and some talented newcomers - even if there is no Degnon - you can name 14-15 players that obviously want to play and if you subtract Angekus/Melendez and Collison as givens than you are essentially saying you have 10-12 or so players fighting for 6 spots.
2. EMO - the conspicuous weak link in the Crawley offensive chain - 34% - statistically 4 percentage points worse than the much aligned 2002 offense - should be unacceptable with the passers and shooters at Hopkins disposal - especially when the teams you want to defeat for the gold tropjy can often employ an EMO operating into the 50's sometimes even the 60th percentile. 1-4 EMO in Happy Valley - score one more goal and you could have very well have had Penn State's seed and path to Philly which was very doable compared to having to go through Notre Dame.
3. Marquis' name keeps rising on this board. Right now he is a player without a home except maybe on EMO and he is the type of player - obviously talented - that the vultures would circle if he stands on the sideline for most of the season. You never know.
4. Planning for the future vs the state of the 24 season - several of the players inherently contained within the numbers above exhaust their eligibility at the end of next year - so IF Milliman/Crawley were to play the vets almost exclusuvely - which they could easily do (especially if the Degnon thing appears) - then they are looking at maybe Melendez - Collison - probably English and a whole host of others who haven't played meaningful minutes for '25. Optimally you would like to have a good mix so everyone's engaged and you are still successful in '24. Very related to point 1.
Speaking of Degnon - I wonder if Hopkins has another medical appeal up their sleeve next year - Scott Smith played in the first Maryland game and first Penn State game of the '21 season so he never played past the 13th of March - Hope? Boy you would hate to lose him over a mop up face-off against Maryland and no stats - zero's across the board against Penn State.