\n\t\t<\/aside>\n\u201cHe scores, and he scores in the most important area of the ice,\u201d Wolverines coach Brandon Naurato said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s not by accident. He\u2019s put a lot of time in the past one to two years of working on scoring, and happy for him that he\u2019s putting it back in.\u201d<\/p>\n
The first of Horcoff\u2019s two goals was a perfect example of what he meant by \u201csticking to the plan\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
On the power play, he positioned himself on the fringe of the right faceoff circle. Freshman defenseman Henry Mews, from the point, dinked the puck over to senior forward T.J. Hughes, who held onto the puck looking for an opening as Horcoff dropped himself a little deeper into the circle. Hughes found sophomore forward Michael Hage, who immediately spotted Horcoff and slid him the puck \u2014 and Horcoff only needed a touch to slot home for Michigan\u2019s opening goal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
By carefully positioning himself and dropping back in when he saw an opening, Horcoff followed \u201cthe plan\u201d to a tee. He gave his teammates the space to build an attack, and delivered when called upon for the finish.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s scored a lot of goals so far this season from that spot, and he\u2019s dangerous from there,\u201d Mews said. \u201cHe\u2019s got a very accurate shot. He gets it off quick. And we definitely look for him all the time. Teams are gonna start pre-scouting that too. He\u2019s dynamite from that spot.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\t\t<\/aside>\n\u00a0Much like dynamite, Horcoff\u2019s second goal, also on the power play, was an explosion of power. A far cry from the well-worked team move that culminated in his first, Horcoff simply let it rip for a thundering strike after receiving a pass from Hughes, doubling the Wolverines\u2019 lead.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The execution may have been a little bit more stylish this time around. But \u201cthe plan\u201d, which was keeping things simple and putting the puck in the back of the net, was very much the same.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cOur power play, we have so many different options, different looks,\u201d Mews said. \u201cAnd he\u2019s a big part down there. He\u2019s a big frame in front of the net.\u201d<\/p>\n
For a hockey player, the idea of \u201cthe plan\u201d changes from shift to shift. Sometimes, it\u2019s waiting in the slot for a puck to bounce your way. Other times, it\u2019s picking up a loose puck on a breakaway and taking matters into your own hands.\u00a0<\/p>\n
And tonight, Horcoff, called upon both to finish a team move and produce a magic moment of his own, experienced that. But in both cases, he did what was asked of him, stuck to \u201cthe plan\u201d, and found the back of the net \u2014 ensuring that on Halloween night, the only ghost haunting Notre Dame was the sight of Horcoff wheeling away to the boards in celebration, twice.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\t\t<\/aside>\n\n\t\t<\/aside>\n
Related articles<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Will Horcoff repeated one phrase after the No. 2 Michigan hockey team\u2019s 5-2 victory over Notre Dame on Halloween night.\u00a0 \u201cJust stick to the plan,\u201d Horcoff said.\u00a0 For the sophomore forward, \u201cthe plan\u201d has always been to score goals. He\u2019s done a great job executing so far this season. No Wolverines\u2019 skater has found the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3437,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[3483,3488,2086,3482,251,3489],"class_list":{"0":"post-3436","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-dame","9":"tag-goals","10":"tag-horcoff","11":"tag-notre","12":"tag-plan","13":"tag-sticks"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3436"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3436\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3438,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3436\/revisions\/3438"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}