CAUNDfan

Okay, get ready to snicker at my ignorance! #1) What makes a player a "Letterwinner" and what does this do for a person? #2) Is there a listing somewhere of scholarships awarded? I'd be curious to know how Blais allocated things after last season and given that Bayda left early. Thank you in advance for your help.

I'm with you on that, Speez. Last season was a brutal lesson for the freshmen and the rest of the team, too. I can only hope that they are working that much harder in the offseason because of it. If this team plays to it's potential, it could be better than Minnesota or anyone else. However, the balance of players is still lopsidedly young. We're going to have to have 3 or 4 Soph's with "break-out" seasons in order to do really well. My predictions for "break-out" soph's: McMahon Fournier Massen?? Other players with big y-o-y improvement in scoring (hopefully): Lundbohm Spiewak Notermann R. Hale Pretty much all of these things have to occur for the Sioux to challenge, but hey...why not!

The overall record pondered above includes a 16-9-3 WCHA record, which is not at all unacheivable.

Having looked at the schedule, I got 'em pegged to go about 25-10-3 next season, with a dominating season afterward in 2003-2004. Thoughts?

Great response! Reasons to believe: The only 2 offensive freshmen will be Parise & Genoway Goaltending can only get better! Defense will rattle some skulls - I think 4 of our guys are potential NHL defensemen. Blais knows how to get a team into championship form - last year was simply too overwhelmingly against him with all the freshmen and the other WCHA teams being so darn good. Go Sioux

UND does not have a lot of upperclass players. With the departure of Bayda, the slate is wide-open for a leader on offense. So, who is going to step it up and be the top scoring upperclassman?

Taylor & Smail together were magic. How many times during a season did the fans have the treat of seeing the two of them breaking in all alone on goal, passing back and forth three or four times before burrying the puck? That was the best! I guess I'm saying that UND should have had some representation from the '80 era, but when they are only picking 50 players, this always happens.

Other "fluff" to chew on... Year Players with ... 40+ 20+ Top Goaltender Avg '99-'00 5 9 .927 '00-'01 4 10 .918 '01-'02 2 7 .902

UND's forwards by class (estimated '02 regular players): 2001 2002 Sr 0 2 So/Jr 6 7 Fr 6 3 (Genoway = "Freshman") The Sioux will have much more consistency with 3 fewer players in the bottom group and two actual seniors vs. zero last season. Losing Bayda was a blow, but not a "lethal" one.

Yes, Speez, it was a lousy vacation. Not that I'd expect to carry great karma around with all the negativity I've been spewing on these boards! Anyway, I got sick on day 2 of a week long trip. Yuck. I expect a lot from UND's hockey program. Sometimes, when I see the postings on this board, there seems to be an aweful lot of "don't expect too much." P.S. Didn't mean to take your posting out of context, Dagies. I just used it to spring into a wider comment.

Parise looks like a Panzer type player while Hirsch sounds more like a B. Lundbohm kind of guy. Either will probably do pretty well in college, but I'd put my money on Parise. Having people say you are the best to ever play in a tournament that has seen many future pro's is quite a compliment.

Spiewak & Notermann each had 28 pts last season.

I'm with you on both topics, although the latter has actually led me to lash out on the boards. Fournier has done pretty well for a freshman, considering he's been sick/injured half the time. In fact, none of the freshmen have been horrible, but I'm sure Blais expected SOMEBODY (besides Bochenski) to get 20 pts. None of the others are going to get there.

Obviously the biggest difference is Panzer, Roche, Lundbohm, Dorey & Goehring. That's a no-brainer. With a few more veterans (not cut), the role-playing spots would have been just a little more consistent. Maybe enough so that we could have finished 4th or 5th. I think Blais let his head get a little big after the last few years, thinking that he could bring the team around by Christmas, that's all. Still glad he is our coach, though. As for Fylling, he'll probably have to compete with R. Connelly and D. Faul for playing time. Also, Palmiscno and MacMahon may not see too much time if Parise & Genoway are good enough to play regularly. My guess is the guys who get single digit points this season will be shuffled in and out next season until someone proves he can contribute points. We've got good depth (even better next season), but they have come along a bit slower than I wanted to see. Let's hope they have breakout soph years! And, oh yeah...beat the Pioneers.

In hindsight, the article and quotes from Blais were overstating the emphasis UND is putting on defense. Blais wants the team to pay more attention to play away from the puck, but during the GLI they were aggresive offensively and it worked well. One of the most surprising stats so far is that NOONE has broken into double figures in goals scored. That sucks. What this team really needs is to find a balance with a solid checking and coverage game that also puts emphasis on team speed and lots of shots. Perhaps the top line of Bayda-Skarp-Massen will finally be the answer. Go Sioux

Making predictions that someone will leave early before they arrive is way premature. First, we just hope he can play well at the college level. Then, we hope to keep him for 4 years. Go Sioux.

That is one of the reasons we love to hate the Gophers. The fans have always had a bit of an attitude that I noticed even as a kid. I would remember 100 of them or so sitting in a sea of green at the old REA and mocking our goaltender. I'm surprised there wern't major fights in the stands sometimes. We used to love it when the Badger fans would come to town. They would bring their band, dress in goofy red & white clothing and dance around to the Budweiser song. They were great. We love to hate UofM partly for the sheer hostility their fans have always had towards us. Go Sioux.

Can't wait to see whether Siembida can step into a college uniform and take the leading role right away. If so, that would be huge for this team. Tomorrow will likely be a goaltending dual, so I hope Siembida is ready! He's going up against the best, if MSU wins tonight. However, MSU was anything but impressive offensively last season vs UND. They kept trying to pass the puck 100 feet to the corner of the blue line! It never worked and it is not the kind of puck movement that wins championships. Go Sioux.

I can't get the xl93 link to work. Whats up with that?

It would be great if Kollar could miraculously turn things around. His problems aren't talent-related. He seems to have lost his puck-vision and confidence somehow. Brandt played well in three straight starts. The job is his to lose now. Siembida will give him great competition. I don't know why exactly, but suddenly I'm feeling pretty optimistic about the rest of the season. Its not logical, but I get the feeling their worst problems are behind them and that maybe Blais is getting the young kids to follow his defensive plans a little better. We shall see...

Yes, Schneeks got beat big time by a fast skater who snuck by him on the outside. If it were one-on-one or an odd-man rush, that would have been more acceptable, but Schneeks had help. I bet he'd give anything to have that chance again. I was at the game and saw him laid out, face down in front of the Sioux bench afterwards, mortified by what happened. Teammates were trying to console him. At that point, I knew he would train hard in the Summer and have his best season now. So far, so good. Schneeks is one of the only players on the team living up to his potential. Go Sioux

This team MUST tighten up defensively. That is all Blais is saying, IMO. The freshmen can't be counted on to score consistently, so this team has to start with solid defense and use that to control the puck toward the offensive zone. UND can't be a team of individuals all trying to score goals. There has been too much of that in the first half. The leaders of the USHL need to learn that the college level requires a much more solid team effort that includes more of a checking and puck-control focus. To that end, I agree that Blais should change the team's focus. Go Sioux.

The one guy who is doing quite well is Schneekloth. He is jumping into the offense when available and it is paying off for him. He is challenging for top scorer for crying out loud! That doesn't say much for our offensive players. As I mentioned on USCHO, the youth excuse is real - the average experience level of those who play most games is 1.9 (LESS than Soph year). However, that means the juniors should be the clear leaders out there. I'm not really seeing that happen to the extent it should. Bayda, Lundbohm, Spiewak, Notermann, & Skarperud all need to take more responsibility for leading this team. SOMEBODY needs to step forward and give this team some consistency on offense. Go Sioux.

Who out there is satisfied with the performance of the upperclassmen this season? I haven't seen all the games, but the ones I have seen have all been losses and in those games the upperclass offensive players were MIA. They did not establish any offensive threat. To me, next to goaltending, this is the biggest disappointment of the season. None of the upperclass offensive players have had the kind of year that demonstrates leadership and growth. In fact, Schneekloth is in the running to be the top scorer on the team! When a defenseman who has not been known as a scorer is pushing the top of the scoring list, your offense is in trouble. Having said that, I hope they can turn things around in the second half. We can't rely on the freshmen, even if they are a very talented group. We need Bayda or someone else (Skarperud?) to step it up another notch. Go Sioux.