sagard

I just can't stand Gilbert. Very few others in the world know him and it's a great quote and exposure for UND. --- Hakstol appears to be held to the same standard and Berenson and Lucia as a Gopher. The only way he gets is with a 35-5-2 national championship season. Guys who pull teams up from out of nowhere seem to get more votes than guys who put great teams together every year, but maybe that is how it should be.

Too bad the author of that is the biggest feline I have ever met. He has seen a lot of college hockey though.

I really hope they do too. They are facing the same choices that Kessel, Vanek, Toews after their freshmen seasons. Vanek and Toews came back for at least their sophomore years, Kessel went to the NHL.

I won't mind seeing those three again. Toews I'm tired of. I don't need to see him in the WCHA or WJC.

If Duncan were to leave at this point because some team upped there ante significantly, I hope you all wouldn't be too tough on him. He of all the players is the only one who isn't pretty much gauranteed a shot at the next level. Toews, Lee, Chorney, Oshie, Finley are all going to get a shot at some point whether or not they stay healthy or perform well next year at UND. The same is not true for Duncan. He gets hurt or for some reason can't get anything going next year, he is going to have to really grind through the minors to prove his worth. I'm truly impressed with the commitments from Oshie and Chorney, but Duncan impresses me the most. If he turned down nice bonus offers and a AHL roster spot to return to UND, you all should be getting Duncan name plates for your jerseys.

MSU has been surprisingly good the last 10 years. They had great (trap/Miller) teams that couldn't get it done at the beginning of that 10 year snap shot. I think the rankings were pretty solid, to put the Gophers higher you have to place too much emphasis on the Championship game which we all know is pretty much a tossup.

I'd be done, but I have it in HD. Some of those defensemen are going to have logged an hour of ice time.

I can't put '05 DU and '07 MSU in with a pure defense first counter attack teams of '04 DU and '06 UW. The '05 DU team was brilliant. They had big time skill guys and got great goaltending. The '07 MSU team drew three straight defense first teams (which made MSU look boring), until they faced BC. They (with UND's help) wore down BC and really had the edge after the first period in my opinion.

We haven't had a decent Vanek/Parise clash in a long time. Let's go Sabres and Devils.

Even JMFJ left after his sophomore year didn't he? Almost all top ten NHL picks are one or two years and gone. I really do like the scenerio where Toews just says screw the Black Hawks and plays his four years and becomes a free agent. In reality I'd guess if Toews made that intention clear to the Black Hawks he'd get traded and sign after next year, but at least that gets him one more year in the WCHA. Not that I'll miss him a bunch.

Teams gotta do what they gotta do. I'll take less frequent championships with the Gophers existing systems if that is what it comes to, but I don't think it will. Taking a my memory we have a 12 year sample we have: 1996 Michigan/CC 1997 Sioux/BU 1998 Michigan/BC 1999 Maine/UNH 2000 UND/BC 2001 BC/UND 2002 UM/Maine 2003 UM/UNH 2004 DU/Maine 2005 DU/UND 2006 UW/BC 2007 MSU/BC Really the only teams that seemed to be defense first was the '04 DU, '04 Maine, '06 UW. I can't put '05 DU and '07 (though some might) with those others. MSU really took over the game in the second period with better physical play and potentially with BC wearing down from their huge effort vs. the Sioux. Plenty of systems teams get beat every year. Cornell, UW, and potentially Notre Dame this year are examples of defense first teams that pretty much get knocked out early. Really to survive the single elims of the NCAA tourney you need to be good at offense, good at defense and get great goalie play when you need it.

Chorney was at the back end of a long shift when he wrung the puck around the boards. Hindsight says dumping it softly into a corner or trying to carry into the zone would have been a better play, but it's hard to say. Rooney read what followed better than Lee or Chorney and got what was basically the clincher. Lamoureux losing his balance on the 4th goal hurt too. It looked like the Vanelli no goal in the regional, but there wasn't anyone near him. He did play great all game and certainly gave the Sioux a great chance to win.

I have no recollection of the first two times the Gophers and Sioux played, so I just have to assume they didn't occur.

Your not the only team wishing they could get a best of three. ------------ I re-watched the Rooney play several times to try to figure out what happened. It looks like Lee comes on for Bina as Chorney is carrying the puck up ice. Chorney rings the boards and the four forwards head in deep. Lee goes hard to get all the way across ice to cover the right point. Chorney goes hard to pinch at the left point. Rooney is basically covering the area where Chorney is skating hard to get to. The goalie makes a great play (somewhat high risk) picking the puck off the boards around three feet in the air. He then makes another smooth play to get the puck off the boards and to the side of the net allowing Boyle to have a clear shooting lane and space to work with. Boyle sends it down. Rooney reads it and breaks away from Chorney whose momentum was taking him the wrong way and obviously beats Lee back for the same reason. It really was a great three way play by Schnieder, Boyle and Rooney. I have no idea why they didn't give assists to Boyle and Schnieder.

Now why'd you have to go ruin his rant?

The Elliott fans can console themselves with their title, I'd be worried about the Cornell geeks.

Yep for two weeks I was thinking this was going to be easy for UND (and how easy it would have been for the Gophs.) After watching that game BC could have been up two or three going into the third. Lamoureux was at his best and BC caught a bunch of iron.

This guy is hardcore.

I don't know anything about him, but having a upper classmen help replace the guys who leave early instead of just freshmen seems like a good idea.

All I heard was "blah blah BC blah blah BC blah blah blah."

I was thinking their roughly 0.500 record since '99, but most teams would take 8-11 vs. the Sioux everyday of the week.

I never expect BC to beat UND, but somehow they manage it more often than most. With the exception of the '99 game the team I usually want to win this matchup loses. Things were looking really good for you guys this year (due to my bitterness over the Gophers) until I heard Melrose spouting off the other night. Now I really don't know who I'm going to be rooting for. I guess thats why they play the games.

No offense to Ehn, but I don't think he is going to get the votes. So it comes down to Brown and Duncan. With Elliott, and the two Cornell guys getting no love I don't see how Brown will get it either.

Don't worry about it Dave. Nobody is going to think any better or any worse of Sioux fans because of what gets posted here. Most have formed opinions long ago. The wierd thing I find is people are willing to give Red a pass, if Lucia ever spoke such words I think we'd have the longest thread in ss.com history.

Dan's hockey show was pretty good. I heard at least a half hour of it. There are plenty of Gophs fans who need to be mocked. I suspect he does truly realize it ain't that easy to beat UND in a regional and that Air Force played pretty tough, but he had a prime chance to needle people and he took it. The others I mentioned have no clue.