Jan 16, 2016 | GeoffRead | 504 views
Hawks Lose 5-1 to West D4
The Hawks suffered some key breakdowns in their own zone and their emerging rivals, West London D4, made them pay with some opportunistic scoring as they triumphed 5-1 in a key West on West match up. Coach Geoff Read pointed to some poor positioning on the break out as well as some at times passive play in their own end as the keys to the Hawks' defeat.
Whereas in their last match against D4 the Hawks as a team did an excellent job keeping D4's sharpshooters to the outside, in this game Adam Clarke was gifted with a breakaway and he and several other D4 players also got into prime shooting positions in front of the Hawks net, as goalie Zach Read did his best but did not get the help he needed to shut the D4 snipers down.
There were some bright spots for the Hawks. Callum Knapp - the player of the game - had one of his strongest two-way games of the year, routinely outmuscling the D4 defencemen on the forecheck. Knapp was finally rewarded in the dying minutes of the game when, after out-hustling a D4 defenceman for the puck he made a nifty pass out front to Theo Enns who buried a nice wrist-shot past goalie Nicholas Lansard-James (who had an outstanding game in net for D4). Enns' goal was also indicative of a stronger third period from the Hawks and gives them something to build off of for next week.
Lansard-James played very well, but it's also true the Hawks did not get a lot of second chances as the D4 defence, buoyed by the play of sometime defenceman Matt Hodgins, did a good job of boxing the smaller Hawks forwards out.