While team captains Kyle Harrison and Marcus Holman, along with Peter Baum, Brian Karalunas, Tom Schreiber and Dana Wilber are coming back to the Buckeye state from Houston, let’s step back and take a look at Ohio as they head into the final six games of the regular season.
First off, the Machine were one of the hottest teams in the league heading into the all-star break, having won their last four games.
Their 5-3 record has them tied with Rochester for second place in the league, behind undefeated New York. Barring an epic collapse, the Lizards are very likely to finish where they are right now.
With the exception of Charlotte and Florida, the rest of the league (Boston, Chesapeake, and Denver) are all 4-4. This will certainly make for an exciting second half.
The Machine’s schedule to close out will be a tough one, as they will face Boston and Rochester twice, and will host Chesapeake and New York.
Four of those six games will be at Selby Stadium in Delaware, Ohio.
Offensively, they are averaging 13.5 goals per game. Not too shabby considering that they have kept up the numbers despite Peter Baum being sidelined with an injury for the previous three games.
Schreiber leads the way points-wise with 14 goals and a team-leading 19 assists while Holman leads the team with 22 goals to go along with four assists.
Steele Stanwick has been an assist extraordinaire this season, as the former Virginia Cavalier is second on the team with 15 and he has five goals as well.
Peter Baum has 13 goals and five assists in the five games that he’s played in.
On the defensive side of things, Ohio has been impressive during the stretch prior to all-star festivities.
The Machine limited their opponents to 12 or fewer goals in each of those games, which is exactly what they’re averaging on the season. Only Rochester and New York are better defensively on paper.
That defense, led by Karalunas and Wilber, have been fundamentally sound. They play true to their systems and haven’t seemed to be overwhelmed at any point this season, save for maybe the New York loss on opening day and the Florida loss on May 9.
They, along with goaltender Brian Phipps do exactly what they are supposed to do, which is giving their offense a chance in each and every game.
Speaking of Phipps, his numbers aren’t stellar, but he has played a major role.
His .545 save percentage is sixth (out of nine) in the league but he is only one of two netminders that have played in every single minute of their respective team’s games.
On occasion, he’ll come up with big saves during key stretches of games where his team isn’t in a good flow.
When it comes to faceoffs, Greg Puskuldjian has been excellent from the x. His 54 percent win rate is among the best in the league, and he will need to continue to be exactly that for the Machine to have success.
Of the six games where he has been the go-to with faceoffs this season, Puskuldjian has won more than 50 percent of the draws four times, with one other game leaving him at exactly 50 percent.
Eric O’Brien is a capable backup, but look for Puskuldjian to carry the weight for the remainder of the year.
And finally, from the special teams side of things, the Machine powerplay is in the middle of the pack, with a 32.1 converstion rate.
However, their penalty killing needs some work. The man-down unit has killed off only 70.8 percent of their penalties, second worst in the league.
The Machine have been excellent over the past month and the second half will tell how things pan out as five teams are all separated by one game.
