Rookie Training Camp - Day Two

[Carla Muller]

Day two was less dramatic and harder to follow due to two factors: (1) No scheduled scrimmage; and (2) During half of the drills, you needed x-ray vision to know the players since the only way to identify players was the number on their helmet unless you could recognize them by sight – no easy feat since many are new faces … at least to me. On Saturday I had a better shot due to the slower speed of the drills than Sunday’s go-around. The drills on Day Two were almost universally a variation between on three on two’s followed by three on two’s with the defensemen under pressure. On the drills with the defensemen under pressure, the forwards played with the third guy high and the first guy forechecking.

The exception would be the morning started with break-away drills with two on ones and one on ones. The final morning drill of the first half was five on five play pressuring on each end of the ice. I would describe the morning’s first drill as practice, practice and practice with speed, speed and speed. The forwards were again separated by colors for each line which near every time had each line remaining intact for the exercise with two exceptions. Justin Azevedo in his mustard yellow gear did not participate. Line Purple exchanged colors with Line White. Why? Beats me… oops! Otherwise, here is the breakdown of forward lines:

Line Gray:Wayne Simmonds Trevor Lewis Scott Parse
Line White:Dwight King Bryan Cameron Andrei Loktionov
Line Purple:Richard Clune David Meckler Marc-Andre Cliche
Line Green:Geordie Wudrick Bud Holloway Matt Filler
Line Red: Vladimir Dravecky Oscar Moller Trevor Lewis

Defensemen: Thomas Hickey, Davis Drewiske, Alec Martinez, Josh Kidd, Mike D’Orazio, Colton Teubert, Drew Doughty, Andre Campbell.

First Morning Drill Notables:

• Doughty was the only defenseman I noticed who stopped the break-away during the one on one drill and cleared his defensive zone;
• Simmonds got two clanks to the pipe on his successive break-away shots and skated with hustle and determination the entire day;
• Bryan Cameron got a shot on goal barely on his break-away since the shot lacked much mustard on it;
• Doughty and Teubert were paired together on the first half drills as they were paired together during Saturday’s scrimmage;

Team Breakdowns for Late Morning Drills:

Like Saturday, the players returned for the second half with numbered jerseys in purple and white with the exception of the netminders in black jerseys without numbers. Note to Kings: Why is it exactly that the players cannot be in numbered jerseys the entire time rather than just the second half of the morning forcing one to squint on players’ numbered helmets rather than the players themselves? But, I digress…

Team Purple:

Hickey, Loktionov, Holloway, Cameron, Meckler, Dravecky, Lewis, Parse, Kidd, Voynov, Doughty, Campbell.

Team White:

Drewiske, Martinez, Clune, Cliche, D’Orazio, King, Fillier, Teubert, Campbell, Wudrick, Legault.

Second Drill Notables:

The first portions of the second drills were further five on two drills behind each blue line. The majority of time was spent on power play and penalty killing with Team Purple always up a man and Team White exclusively on the penalty kill. Here are some random highlights that caught my eye:

• Hickey had a take away against Cliche with Hickey not only getting possession but forcing Cliche to the ice despite the fact that Hickey has 2 less inches and 8 pounds less on the forward;
• Lewis had one nice moment where he drove to the net with the puck but did not score;
• Kidd and Hickey remained paired for Team Purple and manned the point for the entire Power Play drill of 20 minutes;
• Voynov and Doughty were similarly paired and positioned for Team Purple;
• Doughty was the only one to score a goal on the man advantage and received applause from the crowd at the time;
• When Doughty scored, the others on the ice with him were Simmonds, Loktionov, Dravecky, Voynov;
• Drewiske single-handedly cleared the zone while on the kill;
• Kidd tried to check but got the brunt of it hitting the boards when he missed (ouch) but later started a second surge of offense by keeping the puck in the offensive zone from the blue line;
• Cameron showed some hunger for the puck when he repeatedly sticked the ice during one shift when he was open;
• Loktionov checked Holloway (almost no checking took place on Sunday compared to Saturday);
• D’Orazio successfully cleared the zone on his own from inside his defensive zone;
• Wudrick and Legault while on the kill took possession and created a two on one the other way where Legault shot wide which was the only odd man rush short-handed of the day;
• Hickey bobbled with the puck from the point twice and lost possession only one of the two times but I also watched him talking to his teammate on where to direct their play;
• Loktionov won two draws against Clune;
• Legault played with a lot of hustle on the PK;
• Moller won a draw against Fillier and then followed that win with good puck cycling;
• Moller and Holloway fought for the puck along the boards but Cameron came out of that scrum with possession;
• Dravecky attempted a pass to Doughty that was miles away from him and Team Purple lost possession;
• Voynov made a sweet pass to Simmonds who drove it right to the net;

I hope tomorrow Team White gets a full period on the Power Play and Team Purple on the Penalty Kill. From Saturday to Sunday, the players who showed the most on both days would be Doughty, Loktionov, Voynov, Simmonds and to a lesser degree Hickey. Clune showed more hustle Saturday over Sunday. Teubert showed less Sunday but in fairness he spent most of Sunday on the kill or defending 3 on 2s and 3 on 2s with pressure so there were less opportunities to stand out or play physical.

Back to work for me tomorrow, but I will be there both days next weekend. Stop by and say hi!

Carla Muller

Carla.hockeygal@att.net