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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2008
 Day
2 at training camp and no
Zach Bogosian again. Apparently
his hip flexor is causing him problems and they felt it was best for
him not to skate.
First off is the "team" that has Havelid, Bobo,
Pavelic, Sterling, Hainsey, White,
Slater, Boulton, and Klee.
They warmed up with basic skating and passing drills which
originated with 2 D men taking a dump in behind their net and
passing up the zone to the forwards who were waiting for the pass.
After that the guys did the simple take the puck down the ice and
shoot on net drill. Again, looked like a warm-up drill to me.
Williams continues to show impressive skating and a very hard shot
every time I see him on the ice.
Here is a short video of shooting on net
against Pavelic.
Next drill was a one on one drill with taking the puck into the
offensive zone and shooting on net.
Next was a 5 man drill...3 forwards taking puck on net vs. 2
defensemen. Action from the drill would continue until score or D
men could clear the zone.
Here is a short video clip of a few lines
coming in to shoot on Pavelic.
Darren Elliot attended practice/training camp today.
 Talked
to
Don Waddell for a few minutes
today. He said Zach should skate tomorrow and that it is better to
be safe than sorry with that type of thing. He said he did read the
piece that Schultz wrote after his visit to the camp
yesterday. I have not read the piece so I won't comment on what Don
said about his feelings on the article. I asked Don if Anderson
was going to let Kovy loose or if it was going to be more of
a Hartley focus on plus minus. He said he thought that Anderson
would let Kovy have some freedom but that he required defensive
responsibility, and that the whole team would be required to be
defensively responsible. We talked about a few other things but
since this is a practice blog I’ll just leave it at the above
comments. I do appreciate Don talking to me for as long as he did
and the candor he showed with his comments. He made some very good
points about Kovy's plus/minus which taught me a lot about how to
look at that statistic.
Next drill was a variation of the previous drill where the puck
would be dumped into the defensive zone and then taken up the ice 2
on 1 with a shot attempt. Todd White just blew by Paul
Postma and drove to the net. Todd was never even touched by
Postma during the drive...that is how fast he was skating.
After that was a drill where 2 players would pass the puck between
the two of them and then go 1 on 1 with a shot attempt on net.
Hainsey easily prevented Slater from taking a shot on net.
Here is a video clip which includes Hainsey,
Klee, Williams, and Valabik during the drill.
Next was a variation of the above drill but it was a 2 on 2 drill.
Following that was a drill where a player would pass the puck from
behind the net to a player skating in front of the net for a quick
shot. Pavelic continues to show that he as a very fast glove hand as
I did not see too may get by him high glove side.
 Next
session started on time. Apparently the players were instructed not
to sign autographs between the 1st and 2nd session, I am assuming
because they need to stay on schedule.
Slava, however, did stop to
sign many autographs between the two sessions which was very much
appreciated by the many fans who had lined up waiting for the
players to come off the ice.
First drill was a basic 5 man drill where the puck was dumped in
behind the net and the 2 D men would get the puck and pass it to the
forwards who would take it up ice and shoot on net.
Next was a drill where the player would take the puck into the zone
and shoot on net. X beat Kari low stick side and then
skated around with his arms in the air to show his excitement about
scoring.
After that was a passing drill at center ice and the player would
take the puck in and shoot on net.
This is a video of X, Espo, Little,
and Slava shooting on net. Notice that after Slava beats
Kari he yells out like he usually does.
Next was a speed drill where a forward would shoot down the wing and
a D man would try to defend.
Here is a video. During the
drill (and video) Kovy shoots on Kari and we could not tell if it
went into the net or not. Crusher blew by X and scored
against Carrozzi with a backhand high stick side.
After that was a drill with 3 forwards trying to shoot and score
against 2 defensemen. X leveled Slava during the drill and the crowd
seemed to all be watching at that time. Also, Toby picked the
puck off of Riley Holzapfel during this turn and then got
back to break up a pass attempt in front of the net.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 20, 2008
Good to be back at a real
practice/training camp and to have the season starting in a few
weeks. Everyone here in attendance is excited and just sat through a
junior Thrasher hockey game waiting for camp to start. The guys are
going to be split into two groups and will practice simultaneously
on both ice surfaces.
Of course I left the house this morning without the video camera so
look for tomorrow's update after camp to have video clips.
Guys came out on the ice right on time, actually 10 minutes before
scheduled start time, which was nice to see. On the regular sheet
was Kari, Kovy, Slava, X, Espo,
Toby, Christensen, Little, Reasoner, and
Paquette (so by matter of subtraction you can deduce who was
on the other side). Coach Anderson was on the other sheet and
I believe the coaches from CHI were on the regular sheet with the
players listed above. First drill basic pass from own zone across
ice and player would take puck down and shoot on net.
Kari had on some new white pads which are different than the new
white pads he was trying to break in last year. He has not worn the
new helmet yet though (at least not that I have seen thus far this
year).
Next drill has a 3 player drill with 2 forwards and 1D man. Players
would skate around cones on ice and then go 2 on 1 and try to shoot
on net.
Slava appears to have changed from
Warrior sticks (which are all I have ever seen him use) to a new
model of Easton. It will be interesting to see if he uses the Easton
during the regular season games.
Next was a 3 man drill...again 2 forwards and 1 D man...D man shoot
from the point and the 2 forwards would try to deflect shot into
net. Then the D man would attempt to defend against the 2 forwards
skating 2 on 1 the other way. They then morphed that drill into a 2
on 2 version of the first drill. During the drill it appeared to me
that Little was skating faster and with more confidence when driving
to the net and also that Kovy's passing to the open player in front
of the net, from the wing, is better than I have seen in the past.
After that was a 3 on 2 drill with more passing between forwards and
trying to take puck into offensive zone and shoot. There does not
appear to be any particular line combinations because, for example,
Crusher was not skating with any other expected roster players that
I could see. To end the drill Matt Siddall took a wicked slap
shot from around the faceoff circle to beat Kari high glove side.
Shot rang off upper net pole and into the net. Everyone in
attendance was watching the shot and yelled when they heard the shot
hit the pole and go into the net.
Next was a drill where 2 players would skate around gloves on the
ice and take 2 successive shots on net. First time through Slava
missed the net on Kari and as he was skating back to the line he was
shaking his head in disgust. Next time around he beat Kari high
glove side and yelled out, as usual, in excitement about beating
Kari on a shot.
After 50 minutes the players came off the ice and the crew
resurfaced the sheet. Slava was talking to the police officer who
was watching the locker room door and said "You should see my dog,
big black German shepherd, OMG." It was funny to hear him talk like
that.
After the break the players switched sheets (so that Kovy and group
were on the other sheet).
First drill after break was the basic take the puck down the wing
and shoot on net drill. Zach did not skate today because he
"tweaked" his calf. It is not considered to be anything serious.
After that was a drill where the players skated around center ice
with the puck and then took into offensive zone to shoot on net.
Next was a drill where the players had to skate around a glove on
the ice, skating backward, and then get in position to defend
against a player skating into the zone and attempting to shoot on
net.
The next drill was a 1 on 1 drill where the two opposing players
would skate around cones in one zone and then face off 1 on 1 with
the forward trying to score. Kulda went up against Williams
and Williams did not get a shot off. Bobo defended very well
against the person was up against. Then they did the same drill but
went 2 on 1.
After that was a 2 on 1 drill....pretty typical take puck from
defensive zone into other zone and shoot.
Next was a 5 man drill where the puck was dumped in behind the net
and taken out via pass between the 5 man unit. Pavelic was the star
of this drill. He first made a great save on his knees and then
followed that up with a great high glove side save to take a goal
from Larsen.
I asked the Mod for the
atlantathrashers.com site why
Niclas Lasu was not invited. He said none of the European
players come for training camp.
After the scheduled practice time the players left the ice but the
goalies came back out after a few minutes for a goalies only
practice. |
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