Last week, the Rapid City Rush started the 2023-24 season off on the right foot, going 2-0 on the road against the Iowa Heartlanders. Now, they are preparing for their home opening weekend on October 27th and 28th against one of their Mountain Division opponents, the Kansas City Mavericks.
Last Week Against the Heartlanders
While the season is still very young, the Rush have already seen many improvements from last season. Against the Heartlanders, the team played physically and were not as afraid to hit other guys as they seemed to be last season. On top of that, shots on goal seemed to be more accurate for the Rush. The Rush players were not having as many shots completely missing the net or going straight to the stomach of the goalie like they did last season. While their shots are more accurate, they were outshot in both games by the Heartlanders, 26-36 in Thursday’s game and 26-28 in Friday’s game. This obviously did not cause any issues in the games for the Rush, as they did take four out of a possible four points on the weekend, but this could potentially create issues later in the season when playing other teams.
One of the other big positives that came from the games against Iowa was puck possessions and puck control. There were points during the game that it seemed a little shaky. This should get better throughout the season as the Rush have a fairly young team, which brings some growing pains with it. However, in overtime, the Rush absolutely dominated puck possession as they did not let the Heartlanders actually gain possession of the puck at the 1:20 mark of OT.
The Rush did have some issues with penalties, though, in the two games, as they had five infractions Thursday night to Iowa’s one. While they did spend some time in the box, the Rush were able to kill off four of the five penalties on Thursday night. The Rush were a bit better on Friday night as they only had three infractions compared to Iowa’s five, and they were able to kill off all of their penalties Friday night. While this is not too big of an issue now, if the Rush do not watch themselves and start taking more penalties, it could become an issue later down the road.
The good news is the Rush seem to have a pretty good goalie tandem to start the season in Connor Murphy and Matt Radomsky. Both goalies were spectacular this weekend, helping their team take the sweep, and both of them look like they could cause problems for other teams later in the season. On Thursday night, Radomsky made 34 saves on 36 shots, which helped his team to a 4-2 victory. On Friday night, Murphy made 25 saves on 28 shots, which helped his team to a 4-3 overtime win.
AHL Time
One of the guys who really stood out to me over the weekend against Iowa was Jarrod Gourley, who has now been called up to Rapid City’s AHL affiliate, the Calgary Wranglers. While the 24-year-old defenseman has only played two games with the Rush, he has really helped the team in that little amount of time. Through his two games played, Gourley has two goals. He has two penalty minutes and a plus/minus of +3. The loss of Gourley could really affect the Rush as not only has he been a force offensively but also defensively and physically. Gourley is one of the players who doesn’t seem scared to finish his checks and lay a hit when needed. This is something the Rush were missing last season and could start missing a little bit with Gourley now in the AHL.
This Weekend
The Rush are off to a hot start heading into this weekend, being 2-0, but so is their opponent, the Kansas City Mavericks. The Mavericks have started their season 3-0 and seem to be pretty hot right now. The Mavericks have played all three games against the Wichita Thunder, where they won the first game 6-2, won the second game 4-2, and won the third game 3-2. Both of Kansas City’s goaltenders seem to be on point right now. I think this matchup against Kansas City should be a fun one, as I think one or both of the games may come down to which team wants to win more and which team makes the least amount of mistakes.
