How to play crease

[Titanoh]

Hi,
My creaseman is leaving to go to New York on our last game. Both the other defenders (right wing man, and a sub who isn't to good) have no clue how to play crease, and aren't great at playing D (no offense to them), so I guess Im stuck with playing crease. I've tried crease before (I'm a left wing), but I wouldn't say Im great at it. We play a zone (3-3 box), and Im wondering how I should play crease. If you could please just give me basic overview of how to play crease (like how far to go out, etc). We have 1 good line of middies, the rest are just mediocre, so Im kind of going to be holding our D together.
Thank you,
Titanoh

[CtLaxin]

If you are playing a lockoff crease it pretty simple just lockhim off andmake sure he doesnt get the ball. If not you want to get in front of the man on the crease and have your stick on the man and following so 1. you can slide 2. know where your man is going. Thats at leastwhat we are told to do

[rgriego]

i think the hardest part is timing you slide.go too early and you can get back doored.go too late and he gets the shot off. sometimes you get hit and have to eat the shot. make sure you can hit,get hit and be able to get out of traffic with the ball. best is to stand a couple feet in front of crease, when you go to play the X attackman(guy behind goal) go play him behind crease so you not fighting your movement with the goalies. i say dont play him out moe than 5 feet from crease cause if you get beat it screws up the defense a lot.

[deucewildness]

don't get caught watching the ball but at the same time you gotta be ready to slide......always be on the man, if you hear cutter check his stick.......and try to be between him and goal. just some basics I can think of off the top of my head