The Buffalo Bandits will look to get a win in their home opener against the Edmonton Rush. The Bandits played last night against the New England Black Wolves, in a game which saw the offense and special teams struggle, leading to a bitter 12-8 loss. They’ll have to make some big changes if they want to beat the Rush, a team that is probably the better of the two (Edmonton and New England).
In order for the Bandits to win this one, they have to take a lesson from last night’s game. You can’t take bad penalties (given, some calls just didn’t go their way, but the majority were bad penalties), especially when you’re already down by a few. The Bandits took 12 penalties which proved costly with the Black Wolves getting four goals in that time.
The powerplay unit also just has to get better. Against New England they only capitalized on two of seven powerplay opportunities, even including a major penalty and some five on threes.
This Edmonton team is much better offensively than New England; if they get as many powerplay opportunities as New England had, they WILL convert on the majority of them, and the Bandits will suffer those consequences.
The Bandits will look to players like Mark Steenhuis, John Tavares, and Dhane Smith to come up big on special teams.
The Rush are coming off a season which saw them go 16-2. They dominated just about every team they played and nearly went undefeated. I think they have what it takes to have similar numbers in 2015 if guys like Mark Matthews and Corey Small play consistently, and help bolster the offense. If these guys don’t get shut down by the Buffalo defense, they could very well come away with the win in this game.
Buffalo does not have a lot going for them in this game. This is the second game of their back to back to open the season, they just lost the night prior in a sloppy game, I think what they need to truly improve from that loss against the Black Wolves is a whole week with a practice and some time. I say Edmonton wins this one 15-10.
