ND Pride

I agree, lets stick to the thread we have been using.

Grafton 7-0 over North (2-0 after one period, 4-0 after two) - maybe 3-4 power play goals and two more goals scored within a few seconds of the power play finishing. Campbells play well - Kringstad made a couple of outstanding saves. South beats Red River 2-1. South with one power play goal in the first period and an even strength goal in the second.

Does anyone plan to go to the South/Red River game tonight or the North/Grafton game. How about a game report? Anyone want to venture any predictions on the outcomes?

I have been saying it all along. The Bismarck schools are down and many of the other programs have holes in their lineups. It will be interesting to see if the coaches are able to move any of these teams up to a higher level as the season goes on. You can carry the comparative score stuff too far but just as an exercise here is what we have - Shanley beats Central; Central beats Minot; Minot beats Williston by a big margin, both Bismarck schools are blown out by east opponents. We have to keep in mind this is early in the season. the next few weeks should be interesting. I am going to revise my rankings for the east and west on Saturday and Sunday.

Minot beat Williston 9-4 last night out west. Looks like Minot is the clear favorite, for now, as the top team in the West. Should be an interesting day in the east tomorrow. I am sure there will be a lot of talk on this board after the South/RR game. I hope both teams play well and have quality refs.

Great and thanks for the link. The only problem is that the site, and online rule book, is only available to subscribers. So really, the link does not do anyone any good - without a membership password. If you have access to the site how about reading it and enlightening all of us on their statement on the conditions that lead to the awarding of a penalty shot.

ND high school hockey does not use the USA Rule Book. ND hockey use the National Federation of State High School hockey rule book. http://www.nfhs.org/ScriptContent/Index.cfm . Looking at the USA rule book does not do anybody any good.

The rule states that a player must have 3 steps to be a pentaly shot rather than a tripping call.

If a player has three steps, the defender would need an 8 foot stick to trip him...

The above post is about a month old but it was included in a post today so I am going to make a comment on how issues with refs might be handled this year. I certainly hope the the referee-in-chief or the referee schedulers work hard to make sure that refs do not do games in which their own kids are playing or let them ref games where they have a position at the school. These situations can create a conflict of interest or appearance of a conflict of interest. This holds for all schools whether we are talking about South, Bismarck, Red River, North, Minot, etc. etc. Then we will be less likely to have the type of situation that generates the conversations on this board typified by the comment above and others like it. Interesting statistical observation though, in the game in question referenced above by soohockey, each team had one penalty in the first period - an interference on each side - a rather quiet game from a penalty standpoint. At that point the visiting team led 1-0. After the second period it was 2-0 and the penalty count was 4 in that period for the visitors and 3 for the home team. In the third period the penalty situation was 5 called on the visitors and three on the home team. Two power play goals were scored by the home team and then a final even strength goal. It is difficult to draw conclusions from these things - a person really needs a game tape to do it. Stating the the home team had two penalties called on them does not necessarily mean that the calls were balanced. Those two penalties were called against the most penalized player on the home team (44 minutes on the season). There are some penalties that are so obvious that they have to be called by an self-respecting ref. In any case, whatever this means, the sport would be better served by the assignment of officials without obvious ties to teams playing.

I have to agree with those who caution about drawing conclusions too early in the season. It was interesting to speculate pre-season on who the top teams would be but now that things are starting up there is a lot more objective evidence upon which to draw conclusions. I saw Red River play Shanley and I was impressed with Shanley's hustle and, at times, puck movement. They worked hard to stay in the game and succeeded for awhile. Red River looked fairly good for an first game situation. I would be careful about minimizing how Red River will perform as I think they are a dangerous team with good size, good speed, and good coaching. I have not seen Grafton since last year but it should be interesting when they play Red River. Hopefully Red River will be in Fargo tomorrow and Grafton on Thursday and more conclusions can be drawn from game performance.

Yes, it should be interesting to see the two teams projected to be the top two in the state play. I hope I can get a clear cell phone connection to keep up with the action period by period. After watching Red River on Saturday night it should be interesting to see how they stack up against Grafton. Grafton will be in Fargo on Thursday. I'm thinking Red River and Grafton could be a fairly equal match up as the GF team has done a reasonable job of reloading. We will have to wait and see how they match up on the ice.

Williston beat Dickinson 8-1 on Saturday night. Should be interesting when Williston and Minot play this week.

Interesting night of hockey. Red River breaks a tight 3-2 game open to win by 8-3 over a fiesty Shanley squad. South crushes Bismarck High 9-0 and West Fargo reportedly was beating Bismarck Century by a large margin. One of the highlights of the game was Shanley senior defenseman Marc Harrie's penalty shot. It looked effortless as the penalty shot closed the gap to 3-1. Red River had some good size and speed and moved the puck well. There were a lot of penalties on both sides. On Friday night Devils Lake beat Century 6-0 and Dickinson beat Wahpeton 8-2. Minot beat Mandan 6-0 earlier in the week. Another Saturday night score - Central, after losing to Shanley the other day, beats Minot 2-1. West Fargo finished up 10-1 over Bismarck Century.

Here is a guess on this situation. Bismarck Century will be a struggling team this year. Last year they were 11-14-1 and only have one player returning who scored in double digits last year. It is a down year for them and maybe Dickinson is in an upswing. Leiss is 6', 180 so he has good size and last year had 10g 9a for 19 points - not a lot for the West Region but he did put some pucks in the net. He had 2 goals and 4 assists in the BC game - sometimes you need a little luck even when you are good. I would be more interested in how he plays against Minot and Williston and any East teams they run into.

Thanks for the schedule info Wilbur. Should be an interesting couple of weeks. Will be interesting to see how Williston and Minot match up when they get together as well as the games with the east that you mentioned. On Sid Crosby - anyone interested can get the DVD by going to www.hdhockey.tv/newest.php They have several on Crosby including "Becoming Sidney Crosby" It is a one hour special and has some great stuff. It costs $27.99 and I suppose there is shipping as well. Some interesting games this weekend in the east as Red River travels to Shanley and Century plays West Fargo, not to mention South's trip to Bismarck.

Crosby87 (great screen name by the way) - you ought to order the DVD "The Making of Sydney Crosby" it is great. Anyway, I know probably all of the top 88 birthyear players in the state and many of the 87s, and a few 89s. I do not want to sound disrespectful of the west because there are some great kids out there and great parents/fans as well. Just the same, here is what I see. There are ups and downs in programs and teams and the Bismarck schools are in a downturn - not sure how long it will last (maybe only a year or two) but this group of seniors struggled in bantams when they were 2nd year players. Both Bismarck teams were short on quality players - they have quality players but not enough of them. Last year's cohort of Bismarck seniors had a lot of strength (to some extent so did Mandan - with Bair and Montplaisir, etc). There are not enough quality players to allow the Bismarck teams to field 2 or 3 competitive lines (unless the coaches can create some major improvement over the season). Bismarck High was typically one of the better teams but this year both Bismarck teams will struggle to have .500 seasons - that's my guess. Combine that with the fact that Fargo South is exceptionally strong this year. They have a large number of players who are USA Hockey National Festival level kids and several other kids played Elite I and Elite II this fall as well. They are deeper than any team in the state at this time. If they are not successful it will be because of coaching and team chemistry. However, there are a lot of kids on that team that are good friends and I expect that they will bond together strongly. South is the team this year - now they have to handle the pressure of their own expectations as well as the expectations of their fans. They will be wearing the target this year as the team to beat. I wish them luck - a great bunch of kids. Regarding the gap between east and west - I think it is wide - how wide is hard to say because I believe that, with the exception of South and Grafton, the east is down as well. Shanley beat Central - and this is not the kind of team Shanley had a couple of years ago when they had some big strong players - several of whom are now in juniors (Graalum, Fylling, etc). The best in the west will be Williston and Minot and we do not get to see them enough to judge how good they are - this is especially true for Williston. The best we can do is look at comparative scores and try and evaluate teams based on that - which can be a practice of questionable validity. Bottom line - with little exposure to Williston and Minot it will be hard to judge them compared to the east. On the question of Bismarck High vs South - it will be a significant difference in goals. It could be 5-1, 7-2 something on that order. You hate to predict these things as it is best to respect your opponent. Last year Bismarck upset South - but they had more quality players then too. Ultimately, I don't think we will know too much about how the best of the west (Williston and Minot) compare to the east until state tourney time or at least until some of the EDC teams play Minot - I think Grafton and the two GF teams will play them later in the season. In about two weeks we will know a lot more when we get scores from 4-5 games to evaluate. I hope all the players from all teams have a great season and exceed fan expectations.

This is a great site and we appreciate your work.

One addition to your player review - Jake Statstad is playing for the Dubuque Thunderbirds of the MJHL (Junior "B"). In researching these things sometimes you need to look over a longer time frame to get a better trend line. There are a lot of variables involved such as community hockey culture, as you mentioned, and also quality of coaching, quality of youth development program, etc. Look at the difference between Fargo and Moorhead for example or Grafton and Wahpeton. This could be a major research project for someone.

Interesting night of hockey with Dickinson beating Century 9-3 and Shanley taking out Central 5-4 in OT. North bombed Wahpeton 14-3 and Minot shut out Mandan 6-0. Jamestown also beat Devils Lake 6-3. Should be interesting after each of the teams get 3-4 games under their belts. I expect South to dominate Bismarck High this weekend and, as I said before, West Fargo should beat Century on Saturday as well.

Cleary, based on past performance as a d-man Erick should be projected up there among the forwards. Out of the west maybe Andy Dittus of Minot. Maybe also Jon Greicar out of GF Central. The days of speculation are coming to an end and we can judge the top players from on-ice performance.

Congrats to Paul Weisgarber, Erick Galt and Jordy Christian of the Great Plains Elite League team. All three were named to one of two post season Minnesota Elite league (all-star) teams that will compete in the National Invitational Tournament this weekend. Jeff Foss of Moorhead was named as an alternate. The team (Team White) plays the Pittsburgh Hornets on Friday at 5:15.

Haas - I have a few posts in this thread on the west. Check out post #s 123, 124,125, 128 as well as 135 and 136. Others have discussed the west as well - check out 5, 13, 15, 74, 77, 78, 97 and 225. This thread is getting to look like a book.

I would like to add my support to soohockey15's comments. Listing the names of kids in a negative context, whether it is a critique of their play, or something else is poor form, to put it mildly.

As a mental exercise consider the following scenarios all involving actual situations of referee error: 1. Five seconds left in the game and one team scores a goal on a slapshot but the puck hits the pipe in the back of the net and comes out. The ref, racing to keep up with the play, is partially screened and incorrectly calls no goal. The team that scored the incorrectly disallowed goal loses 1-0. Did the official have an impact on the direction of the game? 2. Thirty seconds left in the game and a player shoots the puck on a breakaway but it is apparently stopped on the line under the goalie's pads. The ref sees the goalie move forward and believes the goalie pulled the puck back over the line (no goal). He awards the attacking team a goal. The attacking team wins the game 3-2. Did the official have an impact on the direction of the game? 3. Early in the first period an attacking forward falls near the crease as he moves past the goal. The ref, who has a bad angle on the play, sees the goalie move his stick and incorrectly calls him for tripping. The attacking team is awarded a power play opportunity but does not score. Did the official change the direction of the game? It has been claimed that officials do not score goals and in the sense of shooting the puck with a stick they do not score goals. However, the interpretation of an official legitimizes a goal and sometimes, not very often, they credit a goal that is indeed not a goal and disallow goals that are legitimate scores. If refs did not make errors there would be no motivation to have replays. We can see that at the highest level the growth of replays has been significant. That growth tells us that there is error and that the hockey establishment wants to minimize/eliminate it. Anyone who has done any work as an official can tell you that getting the proper position on a play is sometimes very very difficult. They typically do the best they can but the speed of the game often puts impossible demands on them. I think the first two scenarios above show that an official can change the direction of a game. There are situations where a team does not have time to recover from an incorrect call. When the call involves a misinterpretation of a goal (allow or disallow) the impact is direct. When the ref makes an incorrect penalty call the impact is indirect - the team receiving the penalty can still defend against it and the team with the advantage still has to have the skill (or sometimes luck) to take the advantage and score. Some of the discussion in this thread has grossly oversimplified the impact of officials. The impact depends on the nature of the situation, the point of the game, and the type of call made. Five more days before high school hockey begins.