Sockers Hope They’re Not Slowed by Wait Problem : MISL: The empty time between their Game 3 playoff victory over St. Louis and tonight’s Game 4 could either help or hinder.
The yawns are beginning to outnumber the smiles.
After defeating St. Louis, 4-1, Tuesday to take a 2-1 lead in the best-of-five Western Division semifinals, the Sockers haven’t done much more than sit around and wait for Game 4, which is tonight at 5:05 in St. Louis Arena.
“I think we’re getting a little bit stale here,” said midfielder Branko Segota while slumped in a chair in the hotel lobby. “There’s nothing to do. You can’t keep busy.”
The agenda has been thin. Players have worn a path between the hotel, the pasta restaurant down the block and the nearest movie theater. Anything to kill time.
“You try to find things to do instead of sitting in your hotel room for eight, ten, twelve hours,” defender George Fernandez said.
What remains to be seen is whether the Sockers will benefit from the rest or slip to a lower level of intensity. Certainly, four days to regroup should be a plus for St. Louis, a veteran team. Experience is nice, but it tends to work better after a good night’s sleep. Neither team got much rest before Tuesday’s game because Game 2 was Monday in San Diego.
That the Sockers can eliminate the Storm with a victory tonight isn’t necessarily a good sign. It would be too simple. Keep in mind, the Sockers took a 2-1 lead in their best-of-seven semifinal series with Dallas last year and wound up losing the next two before wrapping it up with two victories at home. Then, in the championship series against Baltimore, the Sockers had a 3-1 lead with a chance to win the title at home but lost, and they lost again in Baltimore before hanging on by a thread to win Game 7.
Nobody has ever been able to figure when, why and how this team gets motivated. Inspiration for Tuesday’s victory came in part from captain Brian Quinn, who spoke before the game and told the team to start strong and win the first half. That worked once.
“But if he says that (tonight),” goalie Victor Nogueira said, “it won’t have the same impact because he said it last time. It has to be something different.”
This team gets bored easily, and not just while sitting in the hotel room deciding between “The Flintstones” and “Leave it to Beaver.” Maybe winning seven championships in eight seasons has led the Sockers, if only subconsciously, to be at their best only when their best is required. Tonight, it isn’t.
So will the Sockers be ready? Or is it time to go into the tank for a game and return to win it more dramatically in San Diego on Tuesday?
“It’s hard to say,” Socker Coach Ron Newman said. “We’re rested. I’m not so sure that a long stay like this in somebody else’s city is good.”
To continue winning, the Sockers still need more from Segota. He scored timely goals in the first and third games but, with just four points in the series, is off to his worst start in nine playoff appearances.
Quinn leads the team with five playoff points and was sharpest in Game 3, despite scoring both of his goals in Game 2. When Quinn is in the lineup, the Sockers play a more elegant game and seem to have better scoring opportunities.
Newman isn’t letting on who will start in goal, though he said he has made up his mind. Based on his past decisions, it is a good bet that it will be Zoltan Toth, who has both victories in this series. Toth has started over Victor Nogueira in six of the past eight games. In big games, Newman has traditionally gone back to the goalie who was strong in the preceding game. Toth was superb Tuesday.
Minor concerns include forward Wes Wade, who came down with a touch of the flu Friday, and defender Cacho, still feeling soreness in his leg after missing the last three games of the regular season with a left knee strain. Both are expected to play.
By all rights, this should be a tight and physical game, considering goalkeeping for both teams has been excellent and each team has committed a somewhat amazing 78 fouls in the series.
The Sockers are 11-7 since trading Zoran Karic for Paul Wright, and they have appeared confident since the start of the playoffs. But they aren’t counting St. Louis out.
“They’re not going to roll over and die,” Fernandez said. “No team does that. No human being does that if they have any kind of pride.”
Series Notes
Perry Van Derbeck scored with 43 seconds left as Wichita defeated Kansas City, 4-3, to keep the Wings alive in their Eastern Division semifinal. Kansas City leads the series, 2-1; Game 4 is tonight in Wichita. . . . Tonight’s Sockers-Storm game will be broadcast on XTRA (690) starting at 4:55. . . . Responding to comments made by the Storm earlier this season that this was the worst Socker team in history, Branko Segota said: “I think it’s not fair for them to say that because they’re a new franchise, and half of them don’t know the Sockers. The guys who have played us don’t know anything but getting crushed.”