Assistant coach Joe Doyle pinch hit for Air Force coach Frank Serratore, who was battling flight delays on the recruiting trail, at Monday’s weekly press conference.
The No. 18 Falcons play host to Bentley in a best-of-3 Atlantic Hockey quarterfinal series this weekend. Here are some highlights of the press conference that add some insight into AFA’s mindset and approach heading into the series.
On having a first-round bye in the AHC tournament:
Our guys are in a good spot. The off week was really healthy, not only for our players but our coaches. Get away from it a little bit, get rested, get refocused, it was just a lot of mental energy expended in that run toward the end, chasing the regular-season championship.
On Air Force’s second-half surge:
I didn’t realize it until that time off last week, looking at what we had done since just before Christmas, our last 20 games we lost just three games including that last one to Sacred Heart. We were 15-3-2 over that stretch. Some really good road sweeps over teams. From about the time where there were four weeks left in the regular season it came down to where it was a two-horse race for the regular-season championship. With our guys we approached them as elimination games for our guys, and they responsed with wins or ties right up until that last game.
The tone of practice last week and the approach to Bentley:
This last week off has been good for everybody. We’re ready to get back after it. We had three really, really good practices last week. Guys were focused. Their physical energy was strong. We were as sharp and as crisp as we’ve been all year. … We still have something to prove. We won a lot of regular-season games this season, but we still finished second, and that’s not good enough for us. Our guys feel that. That something to prove mentality and attitude showed in our practices last week. I’m sure we’re going to see that this week and carry that on to our best-of-3 series against Bentley.
We’re excited about whoever is coming in because we get to play them on our ice. Any of the four teams we could have potentially played are all good hockey teams and pose certain challenges.
Bentley’s a very well-coached hockey team. They have some high end guys, but we won three of four games against them so our guys should be confident. If you look at that last 20-game stretch, we were a very good hockey team down the stretch. So whoever was going to come in here was going to pose some challenges, but if we have a good week of practice and do what we’re capable of, we like our challenges.
Frank will be back with all of his energy to get us going, coaches and the players. The week away for everyone was healthy.
The value of chasing AHC’s regular-season championship:
It’s a new season. It’s win or go home. The thing is that’s been the last four weeks chasing that regular-season championship. It’s how we approached each week. That was the elephant in the room – “Hey, if we lose and Canisius keeps winning, they’re going to be in the driver’s seat.” So I think going through that process with our guys where they played a lot of games that were elimination games is going to help us. … Don’t think Bentley, coming off winning an overtime game in their best-of-3 series, isn’t riding high right now and is going to be thinking they can come in here and get it done. But our guys know that and they’ll be ready.