The Kent State University Golden Flashes have completed nearly two-thirds of their regular season games and that line of demarcation is significant.

     While during the first semester of the 2019-2020 season this youthful Golden Flashes roster was finding its way both as collegiate students and hockey players, head coach Jim Underwood is ready for his team to mature a bit this semester and not only find their way for the remainder of this season but also begin to the lay the groundwork of leadership for future seasons.

     “It is to the point now that we are looking for our freshmen to no longer use that ‘we are Freshmen’ excuse declared the Kent state coach. “They need to take that next step and take on younger veteran roles and the same thing with our sophomores. They need to become our new leaders of the team. We can’t hang our hat on we’re young anymore.”

     The Golden Flashes returned from their three-week holiday break and opened the 2020 portion of the campaign with a long road trip to DeKalb, Illinois and sweep of the Northern Illinois Huskies (4-2, 4-2)

      “We understood that Northern Illinois would be in the same boat as us-coming back from a long break-so you couldn’t have asked for a better situation going into your first two games of the new year,” said Underwood.

       Kent has been limited to an average of 2.5 goals per game this season, and the January focus has been to develop a net front presence.

      “One of our focuses has been the ‘hot spot’ in front of the net,” explained Underwood. “We are trying to generate more traffic in the goaltenders’ eyes. We are struggling at times to score goals. A couple of our goals over that weekend were a direct result of players being net front.”

      The Golden Flashes followed up the trip to Northern Illinois with a shorter road trip series against John Carroll University.

      While the trip to Gilmour Academy to face off against John Carroll was convenient, the results were not.  The Blue Streaks handed the Golden Flashes a pair of losses (4-2, 3-2) as Kent State again struggled to find the back of the net.

     Kent State is on the road at Davenport University (Grand Rapids, Michigan) this weekend and has a daunting challenge to pick up at least three of a possible six points in the series in hopes of qualifying for the Great Lake Collegiate Hockey League (GLCHL) post-season playoffs.

BlueLineNotes:

> The Kent State University A.C.H.A. D-III team continues to improve and draw interest from potential players. “You couldn’t ask for a better start to a brand-new program,” Underwood assessed. “Zack Nowak and Miles Radosevic (D-III coaches) have done a phenomenal job teaching and coaching these young men. Not only are they developing hockey players on the ice, but they are developing young men off the ice.”

> Kent State will play seven of their first 10 games in 2020 and 12 of 16 games remaining on their schedule on the road.

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