Pregame Chat With Coach McConnell--Week Five

Photo Credit: MJB Images

STEEL: This is the first meeting with Cedar Rapids this season.  Cedar Rapids’ head coach Mark Carlson consistently comes to the Edge Ice Arena with a team prepped and ready to go. What adjustments have you made during the week to get set for the RoughRiders?

McConnell: “We don’t necessarily make too many adjustments based on Cedar Rapids.  We spent the last week fine tuning some of our deficiencies in our game. So, we are hoping that the adjustments that we make are going to take away some of their systematic hockey.  We are really hoping that we can come in play a better game, because I think Cedar Rapids is a great team. They play a systematic game and so do we.  It’s basically going to come down to who is going to execute their system better tonight.”

STEEL: The RoughRiders as a club have a +42 on-ice rating this season, which includes nine of their players tallying five points or more.  What do you tell your players going into the game in order to neutralize Cedar’s firepower?

McConnell: “ As a far as neutralizing Cedar Rapids, we have to do a good job of finding out where their guys are in our own zone.  We must make sure we mark their guys and really take away their time and space in our own end.  If we can do that and get their defenseman to turn and get back and play defense, then we hope we can neutralize their team by possessing the puck a little bit more and getting pucks below their goaline.  As a team, we need to execute better than we have the last few weeks.”