Goalie Choice

Is anyone else concerned that Schafer is going to give Marr extra playing time because he's a senior, even though McKee appears to be the better goalie (much like he did with Underhill during Lenny's freshman year)?

JH

Schafer will do whatever is in the long term interests of the team. That may mean throwing extra minutes to a senior in order to reinforce the message that those who contribute over a long period and work hard will be rewarded, in order to boost morale and improve overall performance. OTOH, he may feel McKee isn't ready for a full load or that Marr has leadership qualities that will benefit the team. Or practices may demonstrate that Marr's a good goalie.

Unless Marr improves significantly over the next few weeks and/or McKee isn't as good as we are making him out to be, I predict Marr to start on Fridays and McKee on Saturdays for the time being. I think things will change (or enough evidence will have mounted) by the BG/OSU weekend to choose one over the other, though.

With regard to Underhill and LeNeveu two seasons ago, though, I think alternating two great goalies was the thing to do since neither one proved himself to be drastically worse than the other. And while LeNeveu had the slightly better numbers by the end of the regular season, I trusted Schafer in choosing Underhill for the postseason since he had more experience going for him.

I don't really think this is at all like Underhill-Lenveu two years ago. First of all, Underhill was one of the better goalies in the league (if not the country), and had solid experience over three years. Marr, on the other hand, has played in all of four games to this point -- hardly the kind of experience that should earn him any preferential "senior" treatment. It should be a wide open competition for playing time this year, and I could easily see Schafer going with the freshman.

what is the story about Chabot? Is he that far out of the running?

[Q]what is the story about Chabot? Is he that far out of the running?[/Q]
Yeah, that was pretty much gonna be my comment. He was highly-touted and I'm kinda surprised to see him taking the 3rd seat so readily (in Schafer's mind I mean, not that he should fight it). I don't remember him being bothered by his play in the Red/White, though to be honest I wasn't paying incredibly close attention to him.

If we bring in another frosh next year, and McKee and the new guy split time, I wouldn't be surprised to see a Gartman-esque departure. I certainly hope not, but I'd understand if Louis got frustrated.

(P.S. I mean he *does* have that 1.000 save percentage )



Post Edited (10-26-03 12:04)

I was wondering if perhaps Chabot was injured. There isn't a really compelling explanation for not giving him at least a few minutes in an exhibition game. After all, last year against York, Lenny, Marr, and Chabot all saw some time (with Lenny playing 2 periods and Marr/Chabot splitting the third).

i thought his performance @ red-white was compelling enough not to play him

[Q]i thought his performance @ red-white was compelling enough not to play him[Q]


Wow. That is pretty harsh and to be able to snap judge a player's talent after one game! Having been involved with sports as both a player and a coach, I know it's not possible to be your best every time you play no matter who you are. Schafer will have the benefit of watching these guys every day and I'll trust his judgement to pick the right guys.

sdellman wrote:

Wow. That is pretty harsh and to be able to snap judge a player's talent after one game! Having been involved with sports as both a player and a coach, I know it's not possible to be your best every time you play no matter who you are. Schafer will have the benefit of watching these guys every day and I'll trust his judgement to pick the right guys.

You're absolutely right, it's all up to Schafer and we should trust him. But the fact that Chabot didn't even get time in net last night sends a pretty strong message to the fans, don't you think? (Unless Chabot was critically injured, but I don't think that was the case, since I believe he was dressed.)

I saw Chabot nursing a hamstring injury earlier in the week. I suspect that had he been 100%, the goalies each would have played one period.

Chabot was hanging out in section E last night. He said he was injured.

Adam Brown '03 wrote:

Chabot was hanging out in section E last night. He said he was injured.

Whoops, my mistake.

Nevertheless, I'm sticking to my guns about the Marr/McKee combo for now.