 As you head to beaver's men's hockey games this season, you might want to grab a roster. No more Mike Bitzer, no more Fitzgerald triplets, and a whole bunch of new faces that need to step up. It's a youthful team for the beavers this year as underclassmen make up the majority and nine newcomers have added some excitement into the locker room. You know you see that many freshmen coming in and I think what it presents is like opportunity. So you know whenever there's a challenge we see it as opportunity and we're looking forward to that. Maybe more than anything the competition amongst the team I think is going to be really good so hopefully that can bring out the best in in everyone. Coach Saratori has named two co-captains and three assistant captains which he says is both unprecedented and by design. When you have a young group you want to have a leadership group that maybe all these guys can identify with they can identify with somebody in that room. I think it's important to have a bigger leadership group when you have a young group like us. The team's experience lies on the blue line as five upperclassmen who saw significant playing time return. You see our our defensive core and I think that's the you know the base of our team just with the senior seniority and you know the amount of games played. There's versatility we are it's a good skating core we've got some good defenders we've got some guys who can generate some offense. The biggest question is who will be in net as returners Jack Bergar and Henry Johnson and newcomer sophomore Zach Triscoll will all be vying for the job. You know Jack and Hank coming back I think they've they both had good summers they look great and then you know Driscoll coming in he's looked great as well so your guess is about as good as mine right now who's gonna play they I think they're all bringing out the best of each other at all. We're not sitting there making a lot of decisions right now because practice is very difficult to a certain degree they need to get in they need to get in games. You know someone's gonna step up and they're all gonna step up in different times and you know it's gonna be interesting to see how it plays out. And Serratory says the goalies will each get a period as the team begins its season on Saturday for an exhibition contest. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland news please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.