Subject: USA U-18 Team

The loss today was too bad but expected against an u20 national team. The team kept up in shots, faceoffs, and penalties; there were no power play goals given up on three penalties, though there was one short handed goal against. Nobody was injured or in camp, so the roster should be more or less representative of the team that will play in the world championships.

My initial impressions of the other division II teams seem to be holding as the teams improve.

Next week will be against a fairly comparable team from Belarus.

We managed to remain undefeated against u18 teams by beating Belarus yesterday in a shootout. Primo Dankert was out with an injury and Clifford Lorenz was out for camp. We gave up 5 penalties; there are a few players who could stand to improve on their technique-agressiveness ratios. Luckily, the penalty kill has been extremely effective up to this point.

So far, all games against u18 opponents have been against teams in division 1 and in the top division. This shows that the U.S. is definitely good enough to play in the top division. It's only a matter of living up to its potential in important games.

I just pulled a good right defender, but I know I don't have the facilities to make what he can be. I Is anyone interested in him?

http://hockey.powerplaymanager.com/en/player.html?data=15772375-bradley-dubay

He Has 90Def - 67Sho - 83Pas - 72Tec - 91Agr

CL is 6/6 and avg quality is 75

I don't plan to buy or sell any more players in the near future and have a free market scout use. I used a margin of error of 10 for qualities and 50 for OR for 15 year-olds with perfect CL:

1) ~21m; (97-68-84-80-85); 236 (unlikely).
2) 1 at ~8m.
3) 2 at ~5m.
4) 1 at ~4m.
5) 1 at ~3m.
6) 3 at ~2m.
7) 5 at ~1m.
8) 2 at ~750k.
9) 4 at 250k.
10) Remainder at (10-70k).

His return will be limited by the low OR (which basically translates into a significant penalty for all of the qualities). He may improve faster than many players with similar OR, but he won't be a better player until he catches up to 15 year olds that start between 350-450 using equivalent facilities.

Thanks for letting me know. I could use at least an extra million right now.

Daron McKinney , Leroy Brackett , and Merle Dwyer are in camp for a week.

I seem not to have logged on between when you made this post and the game. I changed the lineup after reading this, but it was already 1:28.

We received our first loss of the season (not against a u20 team) against Denmark. We won on tactics and outshot them by a significant margin but gave up the game winning goal with 5 minutes left. We won the possession battle, kept penalties down, and still didn't give up any power play goals (though were only 1/5 with the advantage).

Statistically the team is progressing well, though a few players have decided to suddenly put more emphasis on shooting, causing offensive growth to stagnate a bit.

Only the second line RD was out for camp (though the third line LW was supposed to be out of the lineup too).

The next too weeks are important as they are a prelude to the world championships. Bosnia in particular, who we play next week, has emerged as a dark horse contender in division II.

*the next two weeks are important

the STL Saints guys are in camp for the next nat game. take care of "buidness" without us

It's not a big deal, I posted it late because I didn't think of it myself in time. They'll be done with camp by the next game, so no need to worry about them then either.

The U.S. u18 team managed a close win against Division II rival Bosnia and Herzegovina. It was closer than I would have liked against a division rival, requiring the shootout to determine a winner. Even so, their low shooting and offense should be easily exploited if the U.S. u18 team can keep shot totals high and score at least 2 or 3 goals.

The most notable facts from the game were the 55% offensive zone time advantage and three penalties taken. Despite taking up to the borderline of an excessive amount of penalties, the penalty killing unit continues to be perfect (while the power play unit has given away two SH's against the u20 teams).

Only two starters missed the game, 1LW Witherspoon and 4RW Willman. Both will be back next week.

Anyone with thoughts or comments should let me know.

I am in the process of scouting all of the United States 17 year-olds with at least 600 OR (maybe a little less if the player has good qualities and facilities) and good facilities. I currently have scouted or have queued all of the eligible players currently or initially on teams in I.1 and II.1. I will upload all of the players to the database at the end of the season.

It would be helpful if someone with spare queue space could do the same for 16 year olds (though probably too broad, perhaps 450 OR might be a good threshold). If multiple people are interested, then each person could cover a division.

This will ensure that all remotely eligible players will be scouted and can be updated. When I started at the beginning of the season, only about half of the current team was in the database (about half were recent), including many of the best players on the team (particularly those not currently playing for a U.S. team).