atxsioux

The 2 super regionals is my thought as well for the time being. (Teams 1-8 hosting would be the best but it's unfortunately not as likely currently.) I don't think I've heard 2 super regionals mentioned really at all though? I don't understand it. It would 100% be an improvement over the current system for attendance. The one difficulty possibly would be having those NHL teams give up their arena near the end of the season during crunch time games. Maybe that's where they are running into issues behind the scenes...

Credit to Pandolfo I guess for putting up with Eiserman. He has next to 0 hockey sense.

I thought the scheduling was a typo for Saturday but this MSU vs Penn State game is actually 6PM puck drop tonight, then followed by a 1PM puck drop on Saturday. A little surprised both teams didn't try and move game 1 to Thursday night to give some recovery time. Playing on minimal rest outdoors in 0 degree temps isn't exactly ideal.

https://www.collegehockeynews.com/news/amp/2026/01/28_Oklahoma-State-Meets-With.php Welp, based on above they don’t have any concrete donor… NCHC seems interested if they ever did get hockey though.

NCHC makes sense from a geography standpoint if they do actually become D-1 down the line. Will believe it once a shovel is in the ground for the arena.

They just extended him recently so his days actually arent limitted currently haha.

Him having the family ties with Schneider likely was writing on the wall for any schools outside of UND and Minnesota schools to be considered for finalists. Would be the same story for us with a kid from Boston with family ties to BU/BC.

Think Schloss had 1 scout tell him that he thought Thoreson was the best D-man on the U-17 roster as well.

Crazy how down the program was last year and this year. Looks like it's rebounding though next year. He was one of the rare cases where there was maybe a fair argument to leave. Most years I think it would be crazy to leave.

Depends on what mock draft you look at but as of present day a good chunk of North American players projected to go in the 1st round are either playing NCAA or already committed to an NCAA school. (and that doesn't include Mathis Preston, Carels, Ethen Belchetz, Ryan Lin, Daxon Rudolph etc) I think this summer will finally be the writing on the wall moment. If around 80 to 90% of North American players picked in the 1st round all have NCAA ties they'll come to the realization of the new reality. (especially considering there might be 0 USNTDP players picked in the 1st round)

Alot of the CHL teams just don't even understand the NCAA recruiting rules present day either. Some CHL coaches were shocked that teams were recruiting some of the 16 year olds on their team (Obviously like we all know once it's January of your sophomore year, contact can begin)

^^^ Scott Wheeler with The Athletic did an article recently and there's still alot of animosity present day between some Major Junior teams and the NCAA. Based on the way some CHL teams are acting it's caused alot of players to be fearful to announce their commitment (More or less a direct quote from an NCAA coach) So that leads to the silent commitment.

I'll throw out a guess that the silent CHL commits are Carels and Preston. (Also Suvanto would be a nice 2C to fill in for Rickwood...)

What are we thinking for the attendance split? I'm Thinking 60% UND fans if not more...

Ludtke almost looked like he was point shaving with his giveaway

Glancing at the U-17 roster I think he might be the youngest player by a couple of months as well so he's got alot or runway to keep developing. Played the 1st half of the year as a 15 year old which is pretty crazy.

ESPN showing the MSU and BU game along with the PC vs BC last night is encouraging. They are slowly showing more of a commitment to hockey in general it seems. The CHL opening is good as well. Majority of the best players in North America will all be playing in the NCAA now so more stars to market + can market it to NHL fans that want to watch their prospects. In the case where you live out of market from your NHL team you can watch NHL and college all on 1 app which is super convenient as well. UND would still get their TV money from Midco so from how I see it they aren’t as dependent on the NCHC tv money as other teams in the conference may be.

Meanwhile in BU. Pandolfo didn’t have enough time to list out how many passengers his team had in his post game presser lol

Want to call out Zellers as well for consistently being a puck hound out there last night. Awesome stick lift strip to turn it over and get it down to Swanson so he could set up that 1st goal to Rickwood.

Tulk is legit for Wisco based on watching last night. He's got a super quick release.

Seems like the timeline would be start skating middle of February and then 2-3 weeks of getting somewhat caught up to game shape. So maybe we see him during the NCHC playoffs…

He didn't have the best performance at the WJC this year. Seemed to be not squaring up 100% correctly to shooters at times when he gave up his goals. Granted that seems like something that could be corrected with practice.

The upcoming series with them will be interesting. In the past few years they haven't been very tough to play against (much different from their past NCAA teams). The Saturday game when we beat them 5-1 they looked similar to how they did the last few years. Maybe they can change that narrative we'll see.

Them losing almost every game 5-1 seems unsustainable lol. Kinda why I’m thinking they’ll snag a few wins to mess with top teams NPI

Michigan state is going to need alot more out of Nilson, Lindstrom, and Vansaghi in the 2nd half if they want to be a true contender. Their D-core doesn't really have a standout offensive guy that can stress you from the points so maybe that's made them a little easier to defend in the O-zone.