There are few, if any, easy games in the American Hockey League, but some are tougher than others. Like the one the Laval Rocket will play on Wednesday at Place Bell.
Jean-François Houle’s men will return to their stronghold by welcoming the Hershey Bears, the crème de la crème of the circuit.
Reigning Calder Cup champions, the Bears seem determined to repeat this feat this season. After 50 games, they have 39 victories and 80 points, 11 more than the Milwaukee Admirals, who have however played five games less and who have just won their last 17 games.
The Bears are also accustomed to hot streaks. Wednesday evening, they will show up in Laval with eight wins in their last 10 outings. Earlier this season, they had two streaks of nine wins, and another of six.
In their only matchup this season, on December 16, the Bears beat the Rocket 7-1 in Hershey. The Laval team only obtained 15 shots and allowed 35.
“I watch the videotapes and they are very organized, very structured, well directed. They have a lot of good players. They have experience. They have good goaltending, good defense. They won the cup last year, and several good players are back. It’s a machine. They don’t make a lot of mistakes,” Houle said.
No other team in the American League comes close to the Bears, particularly in terms of goals conceded. The Washington Capitals’ farm club has only given up 107 goals, the same number as the Admirals, despite the gap of five games between the two clubs. The Coachella Valley Firebirds are third with 126 goals allowed.
The contrast is even more striking when we compare it with the Rocket, whose young team ranks last in the American League with 174 goals conceded in 48 games.
In short, Rocket players will not have much room for maneuver. And Houle is well aware of this.
“You have to play your best game. You don’t have to make a lot of mistakes, you have to play well defensively, you have to stay disciplined,” he explained.
This only visit of the Bears to Laval also comes at a time when the Rocket is trying to get rid of the fatigue caused by a tough sequence of three games in as many days, on the weekend, in as many cities in the United States.
This is also what explains why the Rocket players spent less than 30 minutes on the ice Tuesday morning, the day after a full day off which followed a hike of approximately 500 km on Sunday evening. , between Bridgeport and Laval.
“To stretch our legs a little, we had a short training session of 20-25 minutes today (Tuesday). It was more of a recovery day. The guys went into the hot tub and received treatments. Tomorrow we focus on Hershey. The matches that have passed have passed, and we look forward. »
The Rocket will play this match without the services of forward Jan Mysak. Suffering an upper-body injury Sunday, Mysak will require further medical evaluation, the team said Tuesday.
A quality effort
Even if he wants to look ahead, Houle still agreed to talk about the weekend’s matches, during which the Rocket collected three points out of a possible six.
“I am happy with the effort of the players. It wasn’t an easy weekend, against good teams and with a lot of travel. I liked our focus. I liked our competitiveness in all three games. The guys are competing these days. They give everything they have,” he stressed.
This journey started well with a 5-2 victory in Hartford on Friday, then took a turn for the worse starting in the second period of Saturday’s duel against the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, against whom the Rocket lost 6 -3.
We played well during our first four periods at the end of the week. It was important to take the lead, which we did in the first game. We took advantage of our good chances to score and we played well defensively.
Rocket head coach Jean-François Houle
Against Wilkes-Barre, the Rocket led 1-0 after the first period before allowing three goals in the first two minutes of the middle period.
Houle reacted by calling for a time out, and after speaking to his players, we could see him clapping his hands, as if to send a message of encouragement to his troop, who suddenly had to overcome a setback by 3-1.
“It was a timeout to change the momentum. My message was to tell the guys that what had just happened had happened, that we had to stay focused, that there was still a lot of time left in the match, that we should not give up,” explained Houle. .
“I think it worked. We stopped the bleeding and were able to get within a goal with two minutes left. Their last two goals were scored into an empty net,” recalled Houle.
Sunday against the Bridgeport Islanders, the Laval team led 1-0 with about five minutes remaining, but lost 2-1 in overtime.
“We had quality chances at the end of the match to make the score 2-0. The effort was there. The guys found a little energy to finish the match,” he summarized.
reference: www.lapresse.ca