[JD Scott]
Saturday, March 10, 2018
#6 Ohio State 3, #11 Michigan 2 (OT)
1st period
Myer goal
OSU 1 UM 0 PPG 16:02 Assists: Miller & Joshua
One theoretical advantage to Michigan’s propensity for crowding below the top of the faceoff circle on the penalty kill is an increased likelihood of blocked shots, and that’s what happens here. Miller gets his shot stopped but the puck pops up and back to him. He gloves it, drops it, and retreats to the blue line. He has Myer open in the opposite corner and swings it to him.
Myer starts skating toward the faceoff dot and Winborg, who’s stationed between the two faceoff circles, responds by getting his stick out and taking away the passing lane to the skater cutting through the slot to the front of the net. That leaves Luke Martin to step up on Myer—mostly, at least. He doesn’t want to come all the way to wall and get walked or have Myer fire a pass behind him to an open skater down low, so he tries to split the difference and take away the pass while being in position to block the shot. Problem is he’s a hair too far to Myer’s right. Martin tries to block it by dropping to a knee and pushing to his right once he sees that Myer is really going to take the shot, but the puck gets through.
Lavigne can see the shot the whole way, so it’s bad in the sense that he probably should have been able to track this better. On the other hand, it’s a puck that’s on Lavigne in an instant and Joshua is right next to him; as David pointed out when I asked him about this one, Lavigne was probably expecting it to be deflected off of Joshua, who somehow turned and leapt out of the way.
[After THE JUMP: Cooper Mar-whoa-dy (I’m sorry I’ll see myself out)]
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