Penn State Starting Lineup
Bailey-Glen-Gardiner
Loik-Holstrom-Brooks
Longo-McDonough-Olczyk
Friedman-Steinour-Saad
Jensen-Sweetland
Lordo-Varley
Juha-O'Brien
Musico in between the pipes
So to give you some pregame Penn State Hockey info obtained straight
from bench boss Guy Gadowsky yesterday after the Head Coach Press Conference at Consol Energy Center that featured Robert Morris Head Coach Derek Schooley, Ohio State Associate Head Coach Steve Rohlik and Gadowsky…
- Top defenseman, freshman Mark Yanis (broken ankle),
has not skated all week and will not skate this weekend in Pittsburgh. The initial goal was to have him make his return to the lineup for the Three Rivers Classic, but that never ended up becoming even close to a reality (due to the progress he was making). But he did say his possible return to the blueline is January 11-12 at home vs the US 18U
Developmental Team (but for better confirmation to talk with the team doctor and medical staff). He’s been out of the lineup since the November 3rd 4-2 victory against
Buffalo State where he suffered the brutal injury. The big bodied, 6'3" Yanis, was a strong presense on the Penn State blueline for the seven games he appeared in before going down with the broken ankle. Paired with fellow freshman Luke Juha to make for what was easily their best D pairing with a great balance of offensive and defense skills between them. He not only had two goals and two assists and was a plus-3, but contributed in all facets of the game seeing time on both the powerplay and penalty kill for Gadowsky and Co., but was a strong presense down low, gritty as evidence by his 12 penalty minutes in 7 games, and used his big frame to his advantage. You typical defensive-defenseman. Gadowsky mentioned that it will be nice to have Yanis' big shot on the powerplay once he returns to the lineup.
- No specifics because of the short number of his players in Pittsburgh at the time I talked to him, but he told me there will be some changes to the powerplay
- Also talked very in depth with him about his powerplay, which right now is only clicking at lowly eight percent (5-for-60) on the season despite many opportunities and looks at the net. The goals will eventually sneak in for them at some point. Also did not get any specifics for the same reason before. This is what he had to say:
“We have A LOT to work on and we still have a ton to work on
the foundation before we start looking at the powerplay. We’re disappointed with
our powerplay SUCCESS RATE, but there are things about it that we like that we’ve
been working at to get as basic of a foundation set as we can. And we’re doing that
basically with a very young team that you get a bunch of different pieces to
the puzzle. We don’t exactly have everyone on this team that’s going to be on
our powerplay yet. So it’s a work in progress still. Really, you’re correct that
we’re not thrilled with it at all, but its not an area we spend a lot of time
on by design. We’ve got a lot of other problems too (smiles)! But its something that’s
going to come along its just not at our forefront right now and to spend a lot of
time on it maybe in the coming the personnel is going to be different. We are
pretty much doing things by design right now, but I’m not all together disappointed
with some of the aspects to our powerplay to be honest with you because we’ve
had some really good chances [on the powerplay this season]. I’d [definitely]
like to see us improve on our success rate and maybe this weekend could be a
start to that”
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