November 16, 2018 at 1:28 p.m.
Team preview: RHS boys' hockey
Hodag hockey seeks to build on success
Team preview: RHS boys' hockey
With most of last year's prominent players back, coach M.J. Laggis and the Hodags have the bar set high this season and the buzzword around the team is improvement.
"We've got to keep getting better. I think a trademark of our team is we keep improving throughout the year. I think that's something we do a lot of and we've got to do that this year," he said Thursday night following the team's preseason scrimmage at Wausau East/Merrill.
It won't take long for the Hodags to see where they stack up. The team opens Great Northern Conference play against Northland Pines at the Eagle River Sports Arena Nov. 27. It's one of only two games the Hodags will have away from the Rhinelander Ice Arena until the calendar flips to 2019, but it will be a big one against the prohibitive conference favorites.
"We're going to see how your bread gets buttered right there," Laggis said. "It's an opportunity for us to use it as an honest to goodness measuring stick and say, 'Let's get better. Let's not (just) beat people we should beat, but let's beat them and start challenging people that are better than us.'"
The Hodags return their top five goal scorers, but will be missing one of them early on in the season. Senior Freddy Wisner, who led the team with 17 goals and 34 total points last year, sustained a knee injury late in the soccer season, underwent surgery and is expected to miss the first few weeks of the season.
Also back from last year's squad are a trio of underclassmen in junior Abe Laggis (12 goals, 18 assists), sophomore Harlan Wojtusik (15 g, 5 a) and sophomore Conor Pequet (6 g, 4 a) who played together on a line during Thursday's scrimmage and accounted for all four of Rhinelander's goals in the exhibition.
"They're trying to get in a rhythm and that's a line, down the stretch, I want to use a little bit," coach Laggis said. "It will be big getting Freddy Wisner back because he brings a dynamic to our lineup."
Seniors Bridger Flory (11 g, 10 a) and Brandon Kolasa (5 g, 8 a) also return.
Junior Danny Zuiker, who scored the game-winner in overtime to defeat Mosinee 5-4 last season in the regional semifinals, is back and will anchor the defense, along with senior Sam Tjugum. Behind them, the Hodags are thin on experience along the blue line.
"Danny Zuiker and Sam Tjugum are really carrying the load right now. We're trying to find some more help back there," Laggis said. "JC Adams is a sophomore that is really stepping up. I've been very happy with Konnor Kennedy. He's been doing some good things. There's a lot of things he has to improve on and those are the things we coach on the ice. Alex Hedberg, we won't have him for five games. We just have some holes and we've got to get the whole group to improve."
Those players will be responsible for limiting the action in front of junior netminder Seth Stafford, who was 16-10-0 last year with four shutouts, a 3.25 goals against average and a .850 save percentage.
"I thought he made some good saves and he kept his composure nice," Laggis said of how Stafford performed Thursday in Merrill. "That's something to build on with him. We want to see him have a huge season."
The Hodags finished fourth in the Great Northern Conference last season and are hoping to finish in the top half of the conference again. Behind Northland Pines, there's plenty of parity, Laggis said.
"I see Pines No. 1 and, between Antigo, Mosinee, Waupaca and us I see a knot where it's going to come down to who plays better hockey," he said. "A top three spot in that conference is a great goal for us, but we're not close to it yet. We're a long way away. I think a playoff win and having a chance at a second one and maybe getting the job done would be huge here."
There's another new dynamic in play with the GNC this year, as the format of how it crowns its conference champion has changed. Teams will play a seven-game single round-robin schedule that will make up 50 percent of the standings. The other 50 percent will be determined by a three-round conference tournament that will begin Jan. 24 and conclude Feb. 2 in Antigo.
"I just don't know how it's going to play out," Laggis said. "I envision after the first rounds there we're all playing on a Saturday in Antigo, seeing what each other has and watching the battle for someone to win a conference tournament. I think it's going to be awfully exciting and it's going to bring an interesting dynamic to our conference. I'm excited to try it. I know other conferences that have tried it enjoy it and have had a lot of fun with it. I'm hoping ours is the same."
East/Merrill scrimmage
The Hodags overcame a slow start in the dress rehearsal Thursday, unofficially defeating East/Merrill 4-1 in a scrimmage at the Smith Center in Merrill.
The Bluejacks scored the first goal, but it was all Rhinelander after that in an event that was broken into two, 30-minute running clock halves.
The Hodags' top line of Abe Laggis, Wojtusik and Pequet did all of the damage during the event. In the first 30-minute session, Wojtusik scored on a slapshot from the bottom of the right face-off circle and Laggis put the Hodags ahead 2-1 with just more than a minute to play in the segment on a shot from the top of the left circle that just snuck underneath the crossbar.
Laggis facilitated both of Rhinelander's goals in the second segment, setting up Wojtusik on the doorstep for his second score of the night midway through the second segment. Laggis then found Pequet open in the slot for a score on a one-timer with roughly four minutes remaining.
"I thought we were doing some good things but, overall, I just didn't feel that we had any tempo or any rhythm," coach Laggis said. "I thought in the second scrimmage we looked a lot better. We need to finish, that's for sure. We're not doing that very well, but a couple nice passes and goals there between Abe and Conor and Abe and Harlan."
The scrimmage was originally scheduled for two varsity and two JV sessions, but the second JV session was called off, which drew Laggis' ire.
"I thought our JV played their guts out and played great and our agreement was we were going to have another JV scrimmage afterward and they just stopped, mid-course, (saying) 'we're done,'" he said. "That's pretty ridiculous and not fair to our JV kids to get shorted a scrimmage."
The Hodags will open the regular season Tuesday at home against Chequamegon/Phillips.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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