I have to start by apologizing that this blog took me this long to get out. I am not going to lie, it has been a long couple weeks since the end of the season. I believe that we had the team that could have gone a long way this year. We had a lot of pieces that gave me that confidence. We had leadership, depth and goaltending which are three very important things. With that said, the most important thing that we had was a tight-knit family that believed in each other. That is what makes the end of this season so tough.
The one thing that I am taking from the end of this season and more specifically how this season ended, is that I never want to feel this way again. That playoff loss to Augsburg has to fuel this team to never let this feeling get ahold of us again. Personally, I have decided to hit the recruiting trail hard these past two weeks in order to move on and I am happy to say that we have gotten two commitments recently that I am very excited about. I also feel that we have more commitments that are very close. I can tell you that I feel the future is bright for Johnnie Hockey.
With those things said and now behind us, I want to keep things positive and inform you of how special this season was for Johnnie Hockey. First, we recorded the best regular-season win percentage (.680, 16-7-2 record) since 2005-06. In the past 12 years, SJU has only posted 16 wins twice. We also had the best non-conference record that we have had in a long time. Second, we scored 86 goals this year and only gave up 60 for a +26 goal differential. In 12 years, SJU has only had a +20 goal differential or better twice.
So what helped us have this success? First, we were very strong on special teams. We had the third-best combined special teams in the country. We had the #top play power lay in the MIAC at 32.7% and the top penalty kill in the MIAC at 86.4%. This combined to give us the conference’s best combined special teams with a +9 goal differential in league play. Second, was the depth of our team. We had 3 guys with more than 20 points and, even more impressively, we had 14 guys on the team with more than 10 points. To put this in perspective, Augsburg was the next closest with 11 players with more than 10 points. Third, was our goaltending. We had a great competition at the position all year and finished with sophomore Andrew Lindgren leading the MIAC in goals against average, winning percentage, and was second in save percentage. These three things were important to our success.
It was a great season for Johnnie Hockey that will unfortunately be remembered for a very tough ending. I give full credit to the players on this team for their hard work and effort throughout the season. These young men show up every day ready to work. They wanted nothing more than to represent the Johnnie Hockey community in a positive way. I also need to mention the strong leadership provided by the senior class. Sam Dockry, Tyler Dunagan, Huba Sekesi and Sam Valerius all brought their own leadership styles to this team over the past four years and all were extremely important to this program.
Thanks for your support and I look forward to keeping you updated in the next few weeks on everything from our senior banquet to our upcoming trip to Japan.
