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North Bay Battalion 2022-23 Off-Season Thread (Part 2)

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Very disappointed in last nights game.
I hope some of these players will start playing with a little more care and heart if moving on to the next level. If not, they will not succeed. Anyways very unfortunate to lose against Peterborough, they shouldn’t have won in my opinion, we were the better team. Congrats to them regardless.
 
Your goalie was better, and talent overall yes maybe but you have to play to win every game. As you said, talent can only take you so far, then its heart and soul. Blocking shots, playing to win, not just to score. It was a great series, couple of bounces and different result.
 
In the 8 seasons with completed playoffs the Battalion have been in North Bay, only 2 teams in the 20 team league have made it to a Conference final 4 times, or 50%. Those 2 teams are, wait for it, the Erie Otters (impressively in consecutive years), and your North Bay Battalion. Sure, there has only been 1 final appearance without a title. And you can make a very valid case that HAM & GUE, with 2 Conference titles each, followed by 2 league titles each, had much more significant achievements. But for a team that has received at least its fair share of criticism over the years, from style of coaching and play to draft results to arena to attendance, I find these results to be quite outstanding. The first 2 years and the last 2 years the organization provided us with entertaining and competitive teams that went deep. Some (or many) consider anything less than a championship to be a failure. I am not in that camp. Well done, Battalion.

For the record, and all were decided on home ice:

’14 OSH – W (6)
’15 OSH – L (6)
’22 HAM – L (4)
’23 PBO - L (7)
 
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I didn't get my all-green final, but NB had a terrific season.
For your HB friends in London, please do tell...

If there's one area where the Petes can be exploited it's...
 
2023 said:
Very disappointed in last nights game.
I hope some of these players will start playing with a little more care and heart if moving on to the next level. If not, they will not succeed. Anyways very unfortunate to lose against Peterborough, they shouldn’t have won in my opinion, we were the better team. Congrats to them regardless.
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Very tight series. The only game anyone can truly say one team was better than the other is game 5. All 6 games were anyones the team that dug deepest won.
 
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nelli27 said:
I didn't get my all-green final, but NB had a terrific season.
For your HB friends in London, please do tell...

If there's one area where the Petes can be exploited it's...
Click to expand...
Their depth. Purdeller gone with a blown out knee, their captain Spearing likely gone for the series after taking a puck to the face (I was at the ER when he came in last night - the kid was a mess to say the least.)...is Stillman even close to 100%? They're playing short and are coming off an absolute classic of a 7 game series where Peterborough and North Bay just beat the crap out of each other. Heart in buckets, but do they have enough in their collective gas tank? I hope they do - it would be kind of nice to see a smaller market team (and we all know the OHL couldn't give a damn about smaller markets...:cf:) take it to the OHL's Golden Boys in London and win it all.
 
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Patricia said:
Their depth. Purdeller gone with a blown out knee, their captain Spearing likely gone for the series after taking a puck to the face (I was at the ER when he came in last night - the kid was a mess to say the least.)...is Stillman even close to 100%? They're playing short and are coming off an absolute classic of a 7 game series where Peterborough and North Bay just beat the crap out of each other. Heart in buckets, but do they have enough in their collective gas tank? I hope they do - it would be kind of nice to see a smaller market team (and we all know the OHL couldn't give a damn about smaller markets...:cf:) take it to the OHL's Golden Boys in London and win it all.
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Thank you, well for 80% of your post! Lol!
 
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A shame that a rare full house had to go home disappointed. After the season they had most fans
expected a happier outcome. They managed five goals on the road to win game four - followed by
six goals at home to take game five - and that was followed by an epic two-game collapse. We have
all summer now to try and figure out where it all went kaflooey. You have to admire how the Petes
eliminated both the first place 67s and the second place Battalion. Whatever their secret sauce is,
we could use some. Must also be frustrating for Mr. Abbott who has come close a few times but still
no cigar.
 
An end to an exciting season and playoff. 6 shots on goal in the 3rd period, which included a power play chance, just didn't cut in in a game with everything on the line. This team just refused to shoot the puck...
 
Samee987 said:
An end to an exciting season and playoff. 6 shots on goal in the 3rd period, which included a power play chance, just didn't cut in in a game with everything on the line. This team just refused to shoot the puck...
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Yelling shoot is so cliche but it couldn't have been more true on this play off run.
 
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hardclimate said:
A shame that a rare full house had to go home disappointed. After the season they had most fans
expected a happier outcome. They managed five goals on the road to win game four - followed by
six goals at home to take game five - and that was followed by an epic two-game collapse. We have
all summer now to try and figure out where it all went kaflooey. You have to admire how the Petes
eliminated both the first place 67s and the second place Battalion. Whatever their secret sauce is,
we could use some. Must also be frustrating for Mr. Abbott who has come close a few times but still
no cigar.
Click to expand...
The "secret sauce" to me has a pretty simple recipe. I think we need more players like Liam Arnsby and Pasquale Zito . Maybe not your team's top point producers, but play a 200 ft, game with hussle to burn and don't mind at all if the game gets physical....in fact, they go in there with the intent to take the body at every opportunity. Depending on what is next for Ty Nelson - I'd say the team's #1 needs right now are the defence in front of Dom DiVincentiis and generating/finishing more quality scoring plays - they go hand in hand. Was DDV tired? Maybe; no one knows for sure. But getting outshot badly in many games (while playing pretty much ALL the minutes during this run) will eventually wear someone down - and Dom is one tough, scrappy kid putting the team on his back like that. Better solution for future success is to address the defence - this team is going to have offence in buckets next year *again*. Don't put all their eggs in the offensive "basket"; limiting the other team's shots and chances need to count for something too (as does relying on DDV *too much* to be the team's defensive saviour). That being said....

1. I'm looking at the team's roster right now, and there are A LOT of potential OA candidates. I'd look into (if they want to come back) keeping Liam Arnsby, Pasquale Zito and Paul Christopoulos.

2.) If we're playing "Armchair GM" right now (which is kinda fun....:thumbu: ) - if you are Adam Dennis, do you a.) Keep BOTH your stars (Nelson and Di Vincentiis), empty the tank and go "all in" one more year or do you b.) Pull off a big deal with one of them (either one could fetch a small suitcase of picks, maybe a quality player too, at this point...) take your chances and think longer term?

Any thoughts on this from the rest of the crew here?

SeniorJuniorFan said:
Fully agreed re: Pasquale Zito. In a dark corner of my mind I awarded series MVP to PBO's Gauvreau.
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We needed him bad - a heart and soul guy like that who has the room? You could tell - what little energy they had was a little *less* without him around. I hope he decides to (and the team offers him a slot) come back for an overage season and he gets a chance to finish writing the story the way he deserves.
 
I don't think defense was an issue in the last series. 18 goals against in 7 games is 2.57 GA/game. That's pretty darn good TEAM defense....not just DD31. A lot of the shots given up were not from dangerous areas. And the fact we were outshot in many games is becuz our shooters wouldn't shot. We had it all this year. Goaltending/Dmen/Offense and top teams being eliminated early. 1 period away from advancing. With Zito, we win that series. I like zito arnsby & christopolous as O/A,s but big names will be moving at the trade deadline for sure.
 
Defence and goaltending should be the team strength next season. It should be strong enough to keep the Battalion near the top of the east again next season imo. Six ‘04 born players plus OAs that lost consecutive conference finals will be tough to beat.
I think the most likely to return as OAs and kept are Arnsby, Tarasevich, Ertel, and Christopolous; and most likely to return and traded are Hislop, and Brzustowski.
At some point Robertson and one of Rismond or Turley; or, DiVincentiis and Christopolous are likely to be dealt.
 
Tough game 7 for my boy Lukin on the first and third Peterborough goals. That along with missing Zito were huge factors in game 7.
Not to take anything away from the Petes as they earned that win all while losing 2 players for the game in the first period. The one thing I did notice during the game that I feel was significant, length of shift. Every player in white were committed to short, hard shifts and due to that they were far more energized than our players who stay on the ice waaaaaay too long. The other key are where we were dominated was shot blocks. I’d bet we were out blocked 5-1, at least.
Wilson got them to buy in and it’s working. Well done Peterborough and good luck.
 
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Petes fan coming in peace
I was impressed with NB and loved their work ethic -who were your OA players this year ?
 
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