Trojans vs. 49ers October 6, 2011

It was another loss for the USC Trojans as they fell for a second time to the Long Beach State 49ers last night 5-0.

The first period looked extremely promising, as the Trojans came out looking like they were playing to win. There was a fighting energy that permeated throughout the entire arena that gave everyone hope that this game would end in USC’s favor. SC’s starting goalie, Alex Caravaggio, was solid in net. He looked calm and confident as Long Beach kept getting pucks to the net. There were some fantastic checks as SC battled for the puck. Unfortunately, after a scoreless first period, Long Beach scored with two minutes and nine seconds left to the period. It was at this moment the energy on SC’s bench changed and never recovered.

Three minutes into the second period, Long Beach scored again making the score 2-0. The energy continued to drop and the team was just not able to recover the game. Forward Anthony Dragatto said, “We were outplayed. We were out-hustled, and we got out-shot. We were not confident with the puck especially at the blue line.” This was extremely apparent throughout the rest of the game, as the team continued to allow three more goals to be scored.

Defenseman Dante Caravaggio feels that the lines have yet to find their scoring rhythm, “I’d say our lines have been slow to develop chemistry against these tough opponents (SDSU, CSUF and CSULB all nationally ranked last year), but our intensity is constantly improving. If we keep things simple, we’ll start scoring. Alex is one of the best goaltenders on the west coast, but we have to score to win games.”

The score is a perfect reflection of what went wrong. The team was shut out because they failed to get the puck to the net. The fight for the puck that they showed in the first fifteen minutes of the first period completely disappeared after Long Beach scored one goal. The goalie is only able to do so much, and the rest of the work falls on the team to keep the puck in the opponent’s zone and eventually in their net. If A. Caravaggio, who last year was voted to the All PAC 8 First Team as the league’s best goalie, had not played the way he did, the score could have been a lot worse.

The Trojans will hopefully find more of a scoring rhythm tonight as they take on Washington State University at The Rinks in Anaheim, California tonight at 8:30pm, and tomorrow night at 7:30pm.