Rick

When his playing days ended with the Washington Capitals he stayed in the Washington DC area. He was with a construction company. He even worked on some White House projects. Last time I was out to see him he was living close by Chesapeake Bay. He would have been at the REA for a game/reunion last winter but I believe he had to cancel because of Gordy Hangslebens situation. I haven't seen Hank for a while, but he was a very good friend in college. He signed with the New England Whalers after his junior year and when they made the playoffs he flew me and Gordy out to Hartford to see the games. He always makes it back for hunting season and hopefully he'll be back for a game this winter.

The reason I mentioned Chorney was because of the timing. It's 3 weeks before schools starts and I suspect Chorney knows the system quite well. He recently sold his company so he's "unemployed". He's done quite well for himself, so maybe we could get him "on-the-cheap". He could give back to UND with an in-kind intrim position for the winter. This would give Hak the opportunity to fill the position for the winter. Chorney probably wouldn't be interested in spending a lot of time on the road and there's quite a bit of recruiting to be done in August, so he could promote Kober so he could hit the recruiting trail. Then they could concentrate on filling the position next spring. Another possibility could be John Marks. He also has a lake home in the area. I believe he was the head coach of a IHL team on the East Coast, but I think that gig came to an end recently.

I'd rather get someone who can continue developing defensemen like Brad did and like Scott Sandelin did before that. I think the perfect candidate has a son playing for the Sioux right now. I suspect he could come on short notice and was a pretty good defenseman for the Sioux himself. He also played in the NHL for several years. His son will be a sophomore this year and (most likely) be with the Sioux for a couple more years. I say we start a Marc Chorney rally.

I saw this in Charlie Walters Pioneer Press column on Thursday........ "Word is Iowa will pay Montana $600,000 to play football in Iowa City on Labor Day weekend and the Gophers will pay North Dakota State $30,000 for their Oct. 21 game in the Metrodome." Is this the big guaranteed payday we've been hearing about? Will $30k pay the expenses? To cut down on expenses, I heard the SU football players were asked to have their parents form carpools and drive their kids to the game. That way they can save on meals also. A month or two ago I saw Gene Taylor on the tube talking about how the Gophers were after them to play a second game in Mpls. Now I know why. They could have gotten a larger guarantee from Montana Tech. Didn't the Bison and the Orediggers tear up the gridiron last year in Fargo? Can you imagine the conversation between Joel Maturi and Glenn Mason after they hang up the phones to Taylor? Maturi: See Glenn, I told you they'd do it. Mason: I can't believe they'll come down here and let me slap them around for 3 hours for a few bucks. Maturi: I really think if we would have pressed them they would have paid us to come down here and play. Mason: Do you think we could get a second game out of them? Maturi: All I have to do is call them and pretend like I'm really excited about getting the might Bison on our schedule. Maturi: If you think this is good, you should see the deal I'm working on for the Women's Basketball schedule with them.

I would say two to three years. It takes goaltenders longer to develop and Eddie wants him to take it slow. I believe Eddie was a 20 y/o when he started with the Sioux. It seems like it's important for forwards and defensemen to get their pro career started as early as possible because they're typically done playing by the time they're 30, but it's probably better for goaltenders to develop and dominate at each level before moving up. My guess is that Anthony Grieco will be a junior at UND when Belfour is a freshman. He might even wait till Grieco is a senior.

I thought I saw him at the end of the June camp also. Although the physique was very similar, the guy I saw had a slight limp. Turns out it was PCM. Apparently the limp was the result of his camera hitting his leg as he was trying to shoot pictures in the womens locker room.

I really hope there are some other options out there besides the Mid-Con when UND makes the move. It

PCM gets an extra two minutes for being the instigator. That's not surprising though because if you turn his initials around you get MCP....aka Mike C. Prpich.

Yes, now contrast that to what Kessel has been saying and it's easy to see why Toews is at North Dakota and why Kessel is at Minnesota: Kessel is hopeful he can play for the Bruins in the fall.

Yes, I just had this verified also. They thought it would be about $1MM. But it turned out she left $11MM to UND.

I say.....head to the lake and get past the pelicans and you'll find the answer.

Ahh Scott....we were talking about the students here, not the professors.

The Sicatoka is making more and more sense all the time. Heard on th radio today that the Minnesota State High School League voted to get rid of one sport and add another one. The MSHSL voted to discontinue Dance Line as a high school sport and to sanction Lacrosse. It might be the perfect time for UND to take a look at this sport. With this development, how long will it be before the UofM adds mens and womens lacrosse? The Sioux should establish their program before the Minnesota schools make the move.

We have.

#1Hakfan is trying to steer you towards a cold trail.

It rarely happens. But Chucko was a 1st round draft choice, and now, after two years of development with the Gophers, he'd probably be a mid to late round draft pick today. Calgary has been very unhappy with his development. They were putting pressure on him to leave after the first semester. NHL teams can't afford to have their first round draft pick fall off the radar screen like Chucko has the last two years. If you remember, tDon won the big recruiting battle (roll eyes here) over Michigan State with Peter Kennedy, and then it came down to UND and Minnesota for Chucko. After Chucko had his recruiting visit to Minnesota and was taken to Blarney's, he decided that was the place for him. After a special trip out to BC, he couldn't even look the coaches in the eye and let them know that he wasn't coming to UND. He waited for them to get back on the plane and then called the hockey office so he could leave it on a voicemail. It's the best recruiting battles that Michigan State and North Dakota have ever lost. It will be interesting to see who drafts Erik Johnson, and if they'll allow him to "develop" with tDon?

It all depends what you're contending for. We ate at the Red Light Restaraunt which is fairly close to the United Center. Now, the people who were going into the establishment next door to the Red Light were "contenders".....you should've seen them.

Those of us who went to the Chicago Blackhawks vs. Edmonton Oilers game last Friday night at the United Center will probably disagree you. You're judging Smaby based on one mistake in one game. Tampa Bay is judging him on the other 128 games he's played for UND. Since they were trying to get him signed last year, they must like what they see. If Matt Smaby was going to the Blackhawks, he'd be their top defenseman right now. Without mentioning names, there are defensemen on Chicago's team that would have a difficult time making the Sioux roster. There's a couple that have size and can hit, but The Sicatoka has better foot speed than most of them. Edmonton has a lot better defensemen than Chicago. Guys like Pronger, Spacek, Staios and Bergeron are making it difficult for Matt Greene to crack the Edmonton line-up. We had a chance to talk with Greene and he's working hard and trying to take advantage of every opportunity, but it's going to be difficult to play ahead of any of these guys this year. It all depends on which organization you're with, and if Matt Greene was with Chicago right now, he'd be in their line-up every night. Bochenski didn't get a lot of playing time last Friday. He played a regular five on five shift the first two periods, but didn't see much ice in the third period. He was on a line with Mark Cullen, but Bo didn't get any power play or penalty kill time. I was surprised that Mark played a regular shift, played the penalty kill, played on four on four situations and also got some power play time. He is adjusting well to the NHL. While The Sicatoka was bragging about his foot-speed [as compared to the Chicago defensemen] but Cullen would walk him like he's a 4th line Pee Wee.

Yes, but let's limit this discussion to hockey reporting. Whether it's the Love Boat issue or anything else, what you do outside the realm of Sioux Hockey is of no concern to us.

After we lost twice at The Ralph to St. Cloud the end of January, the Sioux were 15-1 odds at the Flamingo Hilton. St. Cloud was something like 60-1, and Wisconsin was 2-1. We placed bets on all three. With the way Goepfert was playing I figured it was worth a $10 bet.

I think the reason for that is that he started out the year with 13 freshmen on the roster and 10 of them played a regular shift. With that many freshmen playing, it's going to take a while to get the right combinations. If all he would have had to do is insert Toews, Oshie and Duncan in with 9 veterans. And then insert Lee and Chorney in with 4 other veteran defensemen; he would have breezed through the season. But he had to insert Toews, Oshie, Duncan, Kozek, Watkins and Miller

Actually, what I was getting at there was......Blaiser was winning conference championships and national championships in the same year. It's very difficult to do, but Blaiser did it twice and Gino did it two or three times. The Gophers aren't able to do it. Lucia said a couple years ago that he didn't want to wear his Gophers down trying to win the conference championship because it's too difficult to win both in the same year. Blaisers philosophy was you go out and win, every game, regardless of regular season or post season. Hak's philosophy is a lot like Blaisers (although he probably wants them on a more even keel throughout the season), and if he doesn't lose too many players to the pro's next month, he'll have a good chance of winning everything next year. He's did a remarkable job of making it to the National Championship game in his first year as a head coach last year. This year he has a boatload of freshmen and he has them playing like juniors and seniors right now.....another remarkable achievement. If he only loses his seniors along with Smaby and Stafford (that's a lot to lose) to the pro's, I think he'll have a good chance to win everything again next season.

I thought they might have learned their lesson after last year. They had the same attitude after UND came into St. Paul and Matt Greene, Matt Jones, Smaby and Andy Scheider pushed them all over the Xcel ice. That game didn't mean anything. Then they came into this years Final 5 and St. Cloud runs them up and down the ice like they're an underachieving JV team. So, you figure they will come out with fire in their eyes and take out two years of frustration on Bucky. So what do they do? They let the Badgers slap them around the rink and they don't even get a sniff of the goal. A few years ago, tDon always said the regular season was meaningless. He didn't want to wear his Gophers out during the season so they would have some gas left in the tank for the playoffs. Of course, he was saying that as Blaiser was winning most of the regular season championships. So now, tDon makes a run for the regular season championship and then they get their season handed to them by the Holy Cross Crusaders. tDon better go back to his old philosophy. At least when Blaiser was winning all those regular season championships, he also was winning national championships. What the Sioux coaches have done the last two years is remarkable. Last year they took a team with limited offensive skills and rode them to the national championship game on the strength of their defensemen. This year they're taking a team with 4 freshmen, one soph, and one junior defensemen, along with 6 freshmen forwards back to the Frozen Four. How many times do you hear the word "underachiever" and Gopher Hockey in the same sentance. It's rare that you hear that same term used in the same sentance with the Fighting Sioux Hockey. Bob Norton had them pegged. But you would have thought after he embarrassed them on national TV, they would have taken out their anger on their next opponent. What did they do? They let the Holy Cross Crusaders prove Bob Norton was right. Isn't it great being a Sioux fan?

MafiaMan, I saw you were slipping the ESPN camera woman spare twenties to get your picture up on the jumbo tron. ;-) It looked like it worked though because your face was on-screen more than "cow-bell guy". ;-)