AJS

Re Rizzo: In general, do I feel in most situations would an extra year of Juniors be beneficial to a player, absolutely. I don't necessarily disagree with delaying Rizzo a year, especially given he's currently a Senior in HS. It's VERY, VERY important though that the lines of communication are open and clear between Rizzo and the UND coaches. What happened with Donovan earlier this year has left me a very cautious of these type of situations. Rizzo is still a high end player and even with injuries early, still put together a year better than most of our recent Forward recruits. Will be interesting to follow, there's no need to get excited right now, but another Donovan situation would be a major black eye for Berry.

I'm really hoping this can be a win / win for the University. Kennedy comes in, makes the tough (unpopular to some) decisions and sets up the University for the future. The future President will be able to come in with a much better situation than Kennedy stepped into.

My $.02. Kennedy stepped into a tough situation, the road he took to the final outcome of some of his decisions was rocky at best. Cutting sports is the perfect example. The final outcome of those decisions, was always what was best long term for the University. I can't emphasis enough how although unpopular to some, what he did is going to be so valuable going forward. He wasn't the perfect President and he had his flaws for sure, but overall, the University is in a much, much better place because he made the tough decisions. Side note: Remember that weird tough guy routine Schlossman and Miller did when Kennedy first started and he was on a bus tour of the state and didn't return their calls (or give them quotes) as soon as they wanted? It was really embarrassing for them, but that kind of set the tone for at least his relationship with the Herald. It's really too bad, they never seemed to really give him a chance.

Pinto has really been consistent this year, 8 goals in his past 8 games (only one two goal game). Current stat line is 28 goals 28 assists 56 points in 53 games (13th in the USHL). Held off the score sheet 14 times this year.

Any predictions for early departures for the NCHC teams still left playing? There are a lot of high end Sophomore D-man that are possibilities, Mitchell with Denver and Duluth has three that I could see.

I know some don't like how the college landscape has changed over the years with the young verbals, but as someone who really enjoys college hockey recruiting, I personally love it. I like watching a recruit develop, seeing how they progress from year to year. These three '04 players are a perfect example, see how the perform this summer at the US Development Camp, how they progress next year in high school, Ausmus and Spicer as Sophomores and Panzer as a Freshman. Then as others have said, potential NTDP Camp. It's fun to follow.

The Bantam Elite League is a collection of the best Bantam players in ND, MN and Wisconsin. Ausmus, Panzer and Spicer were All-Bantam Elite First Team players and Spicer was the MVP (per Youth Hockey Hub) last year. Currently, very highly regarded from this region. I say this region, because I'm not sure how they stack against the rest of the country, this summer at the USA Player Development camps (first year for the 04's) will give a great insight where they're currently at for that birth year. Moore, don't really know a lot about him, excited for Schlossman's article on his commitment. The big thing that sticks out currently is he's projected in the mid-80s for this years draft.

This one really has to hurt for the Huskies. I always say there's a hypothetical cliff that will Seniors / Early Departures a team can fall off of from how they did this year. It'll be interesting for next year. The Huskies lose their entire Top line as well as their Top D-Pair, their 2nd line Center, but they still return (as of now) 3 players who scored more than UNDs top returning scorer and then two more before you get to a bunch up with UNDs other returning scorers. Clearly they will take a pretty large step back, but should still be a really solid team.

No more speculation is needed. This defensive pipeline is so impressive. Next year is set. Looking ahead the following year UND will lose two Seniors and most likely JBD. Eligible would be Bast, Kleven, Miller and Reid (Sanderson? he has one of those July B-days, so not sure if he's currently a Sophomore or Junior). So many great players.

Very intriguing. It's time for Berry to really make the hard decisions with this forward group for the good of the program. Michaud is a guy that can instantly speed up the progression of the forward group. It's obviously a very delicate situation right now, because with only 3 Seniors leaving and 5 already coming in, there's already a numbers issue. The hard decisions isn't so much in the who, that's pretty obvious, it's how it's potentially handled. Based on the short history we've seen, I'm not optimistic Berry will make the hard decisions, but we'll see. The defense and goaltending is already set for this team and those two groups are National Championship caliber units.

Obviously, where did I say they weren't?

Good to hear @siouxforce19 / @skateshattrick! This isn't a knock at all, but given Bast is just a Senior this year, another year of Juniors will be a benefit all around for both him and UND. As I think it would have for Frisch as well. Where we stand though, Frisch coming in next year and Bast being delayed one year is the optimal situation.

Now Bowers is expected to sign as well for BU. What an absolute nightmare of an off-season (after a nightmare of a season) for BU. I've never seen something like this from a team that finished as poorly as they did.

I know there's a real long line of players that switch commitments. I have a more basic very broad question. How many of the commitments that switch actual poaching type situations and not either players deciding to decommit on their own and open up their recruiting (Donovan / Boeser) or the University decides that player is no longer a good fit (Mitchell Mattson), or is it pretty common place for every school (usually be "bigger" named schools) to still be putting out feelers seeing if guys would be interested in switching?

Absolutely. This is far from a rare situation, but this particular one will be very interesting to see play out. One one hand, it's a great place to be having two quality guys that could step in, but there's only one spot. The coaches will know better than anybody who they feel is most ready and trust the relationships they have. I'm more interested than anything what goes into a decision like this. If they feel player A is slightly more ready than player B, but they feel player B would be more likely to seek other options, do they go with B? Very important to add that who knows if either A or B would seek other options.

I went back to read his most recent article about Poolman staying as I remembered Frisch being apart of the article. "the Fighting Hawks will likely bring defenseman and former Moorhead High player Ethan Frisch to campus in the fall to fill Shaw’s void." Likely kind of left it open to some speculation. Honestly, the only reason I brought it up was @The Exiled One post a couple days ago. I immediately thought Randklev, but now that has me second guessing. I know it's just a rumor, but where there's smoke.

It will be interesting to see who the lone freshman d-man is next year, by all accounts it'd be a real coin flip between Bast / Frisch. Both appear to be more than ready step in.

Kawaguchi - Blaisdell - Pinto Mismash - Rizzo - Adams Hain - Senden - Smith Caulfield - Weatherby - Bowen Hoff - Keane - Albrechdt (Sp) - Yon - Johnson Just like the last couple of years, I actually like the forward group on paper. We'll see if it finally translates. Mix and match the high end freshman with the experienced forwards with talent until it works. Like most, I have high expectations for this Freshman class, give them a lot of ice time and a chance to acclimate. The most important part is they are bringing talent, which this forward group lacked last year.

I also have a very novice look at each season, going over the roster turnover by position, how each group performed last year, ect.. Especially for Football, assuming that injuries notwithstanding that a player should become better each year with more development / strength / reps. I gave a pretty detailed breakdown of the defense a couple weeks back. The back seven only lost 3 players, spread pretty evenly that contributed last year. Two starters (CB, OLB) and a depth ILB. That's about as good as it gets. DE lost one starter also. Big question is at NG. Touching on the OL. They basically had 7 guys who contributed and could be classified as "starters". Six of them return next year. It'd be my assumption that the group should be stronger next year having six players with experience. Five of those were underclassman last year as well. There's been a couple of other names thrown out there as well, who should be able to add to the depth.

Which IMO would be a mistake. Look at the NTDP camp going on right now, most are already committed and are currently the best players in the country in that age group. Can and will that change? Definitely, some will drop off and others will ascend. You'll still see a fair amount of those kids as the best in two years. To me, the recruiting philosophy should be going after the best 15 / 16 year old recruits and monitor from there. It's much easier to part ways with a recruit that didn't materialize and like you mentioned, there's a lot of them, then it is to find the next game changer at a later date. To be honest, it's kind of how things have been. It's been brought up ad nauseam, but it's true. I'm convinced this is a one class mess that was kind of a perfect storm. Misstep that had local players with the combination of Berry's nice guy personality and couldn't make the tough decisions to make changes when he should have.

From his expectation going into this year, he seems to have slipped, but really, he's put up pretty decent numbers this year. Blaisdell has gotten more attention (and will be a fantastic player), but Rizzo has had pretty comparable numbers. Seem to be different players, similar size wise, but Blaisdell seems to be more of a scorer, Rizzo a playmaker. Put them on the same line next year!

Poolman returning really is big news. The defensive unit was really good last year and will be even better next year. They should be lights out good, like sure fire Top 3 in the country good. They lose Shaw, who I thought was terrific last year, very underrated. When you have that deep of a core of guys and only lose one, that's about as good as you can ask for. Why the excitement for next year? Two separate true "Top Pairs" - Mix and match Poolman, Kierstad, JBD, Bast (Tychonick) - There's no real drop off Top End Talent: Poolman, JBD, Kierstad have a chance to be All-Conference in some aspect Upperclassman: The Top 7 will finally have more upperclassman (4) than underclassman (3) Depth: Besides the five I named above, Peski is really solid. A great 6th / 7th defenseman Huge Strides: As far as draft status, the two guys who should make huge jumps are JBD / Tychonick. JBD was really solid all year (as you should expect from a 1st rounder), but Tychonick was night and day better the 2nd half half of the season. Both were 18 year old Freshman last year. We all know Defense / Goaltending wasn't the problem last year, but what's in place for '19/'20 is really, really exciting. It's national championship type caliber stuff. I also realize that's just half the battle, but it's a great start.

Tell USCHO, they created the list.