Dunc Walsh was just happy it was over. In what proved to be a rare off-night for the Concord boys’ hockey team on Wednesday, the longtime head coach was focused more on what lies ahead rather than what just happened.
“The biggest thing about our team is when we grind it out and play hard, do the little things and make smart plays, we’re okay,” said Walsh after the Tide fell to first-place Hanover, 4-0, in a Division I clash at Everett Arena. “But tonight, there wasn’t a whole lot of positives except for when it ended.
“I just didn’t see it coming,” Walsh said. “We didn’t play well. (Hanover) is very good, are very well coached and we expect that every time. They completely dominated the game from start to finish.”
Matched up against the defending champion Marauders, Concord (11-3) knew it was in for a big test before the puck dropped, but still had no answers for Hanover (12-2) from the first period on.
The Tide fell behind 1-0 in the opening 56 seconds, surrendered another goal right at the end of the first, and didn’t put a single puck on net in a woeful second period.
“The first goal we didn’t cover and it was kind of a simple play where their defenseman just threw it on net from the point and the guy standing in the net just tipped it in uncovered,” Walsh said. “The second was a power-play goal where we ran around and overplayed. Anything we did tonight didn’t go well for us and that happens occasionally.”
The contest didn’t get much better for Concord in a second period Walsh called “insane.”
Hanover outshot Concord, 9-0, in the period and upped its lead to three goals when Cam Woods found the back of the net off a rebound.
Hanover’s Charlie Plottner rounded out the scoring in the third period with a power-play goal.
While solid offensively, the Tide isn’t built to play from behind. Concord lacks a dynamic goal scorer and relies a lot on its power play to generate scoring chances, which can lead to outings like Wednesday’s every once in awhile.
“We have 22 power-play goals out of 53 regular-season goals. That’s almost 40 percent and that’s kind of scary because a game like tonight, we got one power play and it wasn’t a good one. We never got it set up,” Walsh said. “We have a bunch of guys with four, five, six goals, and that’s fine, we grind it out. But you get behind early and it’s hard for us to come back because goals come hard and Hanover is a very good team that just kind of smothered us tonight.”
Still, Concord is in good shape with the tournament looming. The Tide has wins over some of the top teams (Pinkerton, Exeter, Trinity), and put up a fight in its previous two losses against the best D-I has to offer in a 3-1 loss to Pinkerton on Jan. 2 and a 2-1 defeat to Bedford on Jan. 30.
“My assessment is that we play hard, but tonight we didn’t,” Walsh said. “The biggest difference between tonight and all those games is we didn’t show up.”
Walsh will find out a lot more about his team this weekend as Concord hits the road for two pivotal matchups – at Bishop Guertin on Saturday and a trip to Hanover on Sunday for a rematch.
“Huge weekend for us mentally just trying to get us back to playing well,” Walsh said. “Whether we win or lose, we got to go into this weekend and play well and feel like we have a chance going into the tournament.”
(Jay McAree can be reached at 369-3371, jmcaree@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @JayMcAree.)
Souhegan 41, Bow 38
Key players: Souhegan – Jeff Boehm Bow – Matt Lamy (12 points)
Highlights: After three solid quarters with the lead, Bow struggled to score in the final frame. Souhegan’s pressure late in the game proved to be the difference as the Falcons fell short of the upset.
Coach’s quote: “We had a great game plan and played solid defense all game. We turned the ball over and couldn’t score in the fourth. Tough way to lose.” – Bow’s Frank Moreno
Records: Souhegan 10-4; Bow 3-11