Sunday, December 19th

Coming off a big win in Bossier-Shreveport last Saturday night, we had a long week leading into a rough weekend. We were off Sunday, and Monday was an optional practice. We got back to work Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to get ready for the weekend’s games.

On Friday, we travelled to Allen and we had a really good first period – but not as good a start as we would have liked. Coming out in the second period, we gave up a couple of power play goals that let the Americans get back in the game and get the lead on us. For me personally, I feel like that was partly my fault. I’m one of the penalty killers and I was in the penalty box for both of those goals, so that hurt us. I try my best to stay out of the box but I do find a way to get sent there occasionally. We had a couple of guys on the penalty kill that haven’t played that role regularly and that could have be a contributor as well. Unfortunately, as a team, we didn’t play the way we needed to play for the rest of the game. If we played the way that we did during the first period, I’d say we probably would have won that game. Obviously, it was a disappointment.

Allen has a very good team and I think we have a very good team too. In the first period, we showed that we could all but dominate the period and thought we were off to a good start but they ended up scoring a goal late in the period which helped give them a little momentum which obviously, we didn’t want to do. For some reason we just didn’t come out and play the same way in the second and third periods. The Americans have a very talented offense and if you give them chances to score, they’re going to score.

Allen and Bossier-Shreveport are two of the best teams in the league along with Colorado. We beat Colorado pretty easily and we beat Bossier last weekend. When we play our game, we can compete with anybody, but for whatever reason, we haven’t played a full 60 minutes in any game we’ve played against Allen this season. We play them six more times this season and we’ve got to find a way to take some points from them.

We had a meeting on Saturday morning and then started getting ready for the game against Odessa on Saturday night. Once again, we didn’t have the start that we wanted to - we were down 4-0 after the first period and that’s a hard score to come back from. We battled hard and in the second and third period, we played really well. If it was possible to put a few more minutes on the clock, I’d say we might have tied that game and have a chance to win it.

It seemed like we were getting a lot of questionable penalty calls against us and that’s very frustrating for both the players and the coach. There’s nothing you can do about it – it stinks and it’s frustrating but you just have to find a way to overcome it. If we get a penalty, we have to try and kill it and go back to work and try to leave the refs alone and not complain to them. It seems to make things worse more often than better when you complain.

We’ve shown that we can compete and win against some of the better teams in the league but we’ve got to find a way to be more consistent as a team. Game in and game out, we’ve got to play the exact same way. If and when we do that, we’re going to get on a roll and start putting some wins together. We had a meeting after the game last night and we talked about things that we need to do and one of the things we talked about the most was consistency and guys being ready.

We’re playing in Tulsa on Tuesday and then we have a few days off for Christmas break. It’s a big game for us going in there after losing a couple and we need to find a way to get the two points. It’s also good to go into Christmas break after a win. Tulsa’s a hot team right now, so we need to go in and put our best effort together and we need to play a full 60 minutes. If we do play a full 60 minutes, I think we’ll come out with the points.