I'm a humble person. I'm usually not one to pump my own tires, but I've gotten some good compliments from my teammates in the past week, and I'm going to share with my blogosphere because I'm proud of how much I'm learning and how much I'm improving. Last week, after a scrimmage I had a few people come up to me and tell me that they can't ever get around me. They said, "I can get around you, but I can't get around you." What I think that means is that I always get enough of either the puck or the body that they can't get a good scoring chance or even a shot on goal. That tells me I've really improved. Almost every day now, our coach tells our defensive corps how much better we've gotten since the start of the year. We've made the drills a lot harder for the forwards; our coach is no longer saying that the forwards are outperforming us in drills. It's the other way around. Personally, I just feel so much more confident in my ability to take odd-man rushes and 1-on-1's than I did at the beginning of the year. I really believe that no one can get around me, so no one does. I've learned that defense is a mindset, and I have a pretty strong mind when I want to have one.
Another compliment I got was one that has to do with an off-ice talent I have. One of my friends on the team told me that I "just know how to make other people happy." That really meant a lot to me because I do try to be a good person in all facets of my life--except for on the ice this year--and it's good to hear when people notice and share what they think. It's just another example of me learning about myself throughout this process. In these two years of junior hockey, I've learned countless things about the kind of person I am that will only help me in the future.
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