Siouxman

The next two weeks will be telling and may set the tone for the whole Gopher season. The Gophers follow up UND with DU, and the Gopher D will either know they have something positive, or wish they had the swine flu. No early season patsies to falsely fatten up your ego with as in past years.

The Gopher fans that I have talked to this year are not hopeful, and see the Gophers as a middle of the pack team. As for Kangas, he is an enormous question mark right now. From the Sioux series on last year he was a living nightmare. Yes, the defense left him out to dry a few times, but he also totally blew some very easy shots which likely torched his confidence severely. The Michigan Tech series was a prime example of very soft goals. Once Jeff Frazee became a head case, it was like a flaming fireball rolling downhill. Kangas could go the same way or he could recover. Two years ago Kangas saved the Gopher season to the extent that he could, but if you watch the video he was not doing anything fantastic. He was simply playing very good position and he has good size so he covers a lot of the net. I believe that last year teams figured out that he does not have great lateral speed, nor does he flash the great glove. Get him a little out of position and he is at best average. Finally, one really has to wonder about Lucia's coaching/handling of goalies and whether that is part of the problem. But I am only speculating on this part. Unless the Gopher D is significantly improved this year, they will again leave him hanging and he will again have confidence challenges. For years the Gopher defense has consisted of a high powered offense. They would get the opponent reeling and then pour it on. Their offense has sputtered the past couple of years and really exposed the defensive side of their game.

I forgot to add the most embarrassing item of the night. During the introductions, David Toews name was spelled Towes on the big screen.

Man, a lot of new names and numbers to learn. Kristo is fast, but we knew that. He showed a very good ability to skate and puck handle with minimal room. He is going to be a pleasure to watch. Not the second coming of Toews, but a lot of the same skills. MacWilliam shows great promise and adjusted quickly. He could be solid in a relatively short period of time. Cichy was around the puck the alot. Clearly not the skill of Kristo at this point, but he may be more in the mold of a grit player along the wall and in front of the net. Bruneteau shows promise and I like what I saw. A little hint of Prpich bulldog attitude but with much less edge. He pushed the edge a little bit at times, but not quite to the point of starting a scrap. I did think he irritated the opponent at times. Blood looked big and solid, much improved. Fienhage - Oh my! That was panic city and not a pretty sight. I hope that it was first game jitters and he adjusts. If not, he won't see much ice time. Gleason - others have commented how good he looked. I didn't notice him that much, so maybe he just slid in between how much I noticed MacWilliam (positive) and Fienhage (negative). I didn't see as much improvement in Malone as I had hoped, but again it is early. The first time Corban Knight was on the ice I thought his foot speed was slow motion, but he seemed to pick it up and it wasn't apparent at all later. It was great to see LaPoint back on the ice. He had a couple of oops, but it could just be in the injury layoff. Genoway looked like he decided to play more at home defense. Most of the guys from last year seemed to take a step forward by the end of the game, although I did see a lot of reaching for pucks instead of skating for pucks. My impression going into the game was that I have been fairly optimistic about this year. After the first two periods I was concerned. But the passing started to click in the third and things improved dramatically. I am back to optimistic about this year. I am hoping for solid improvement against Merrimack this weekend, and I am hoping that we don't get a major psychological setback from a typical fast starting Gopher team. If we play well against Merrimack and at least get a split against the Gophers, we could be positive by Christmas and avoid some of the late season rush. Yes, hockey is finally here.

Actually, the new tribal council doesn't take office until about October 14, so it is still about a two week extension.

A Gopher fan would like to swap two or four tickets with a Sioux fan for the Saturday night game of both UND-MN hockey series. He would like to swap tickets for the Jan 16 game at MN for tickets to the Oct 17 game at UND. If you are interested in such a deal, please give him a call. His name is Fred Lauder at 651-437-9085. Fred is a nice retired gentleman I met at the Final Five. He does not have email, as he states he is technologically challenged just to handle crayons.

To some extent the style of play will depend upon who you are playing. If you are playing teams such as Wisconson with the neutral ice trap, unless your players are really ready to deal with it you will see more dump and chase to avoid the neutral ice turnover. Against teams that tend to be skating teams rather than trapping teams, you will be able to carry the puck into the zone more. It all depends upon who is controlling the flow. If you can get a trapping team off their stride, it is easier to carry it in. Goals don't usually come from rushes that start behind your own net. They come from turnovers high in the zone or at neutral ice. Therefore coaches tend to stress getting the puck in deep, even if it means dumping it. Hakstol has cited that very point several times when asked about goals the Sioux gave up. Someone failed to get the puck deep into the zone. I prefer to see the team carry it in, but sometimes the defensive scheme says dump it and chase. The point about the goalie restrictions in the NHL is a good one. I take more dumb penalties in NHL video games because of that dang rule. I keep trying to have my goalie do too much.

Maybe the problem isn't the CC jerseys??

Or it could be "from your parents"

We travel up from Fergus Falls for every home series, but stay at relatives so no hotel expense. Usually have the extreme nachos at every game. We do buy groceries every trip, so it is about 3/4 tank of gas round trip, plus $20-$30 in groceries, plus the nachos, plus the season tickets. We also travel to one or two away series every year, as we have a goal to see the Sioux play in every arena in the WCHA. We are down to just Denver and Alaska left. We will get to Denver in November. We had planned to make it to Alaska in October, but that won't happen this year. Sioux hockey is our passion.

It was a game by game situation last year. Some games he didn't give up rebounds at all, and some games it appeared he felt sorry for the other team and gave them another chance.

*Bump* For anyone who wanted to get to a game at Mariucci and failed to get tickets this morning. By 10 am, only single seats and standing room only tickets were available for the Sioux series on Jan 15-16. This gentleman is willing to do some ticket swapping.

Quietly??? I don't believe the other 9 WCHA teams would agree with that.

Wow, your profile says you are 99 years old. You've been out of the loop.

A Gopher fan would like to swap two or four tickets with a Sioux fan for the Saturday night game of both UND-MN hockey series. He would like to swap tickets for the Jan 16 game at MN for tickets to the Oct 17 game at UND. If you are interested in such a deal, please give him a call. His name is Fred Lauder at 651-437-9085. Fred is a nice retired gentleman I met at the Final Five. He does not have email, as he states he is technologically challenged just to handle crayons.

That means that you would have been pretty close to Dave Suess. I think that his specialty was a long trench coat and harrassing the opposing team member in the box.

SIOUXELEVENS is just two seats to the right of me, and Troy sat two rows behind us. He did not have those seats last year though. Section 302

This is indeed sad news. I met THETRIOUXPER at a hockey tailgate party a few years ago, and then continued to get to know him. He was a diehard Sioux fan, and while he expected great things from the Sioux he also recognized them as people and defended them against personal attack. Troy, the Sioux fan base will miss you greatly. May God bless you and your family. We know you will be doing recruiting from above.

The guy actually told police that he was trying to hit the man in the shoulder, but hit the head instead. He had cut down the swing, as he stated that he was holding the club between the handle and the head, so obviously accuracy isn't his forte. This was not a little bump or push incident. The victim required stitches.

Is he from Alaska and used to wear No. 9???

I think it varies by program. I have degrees in both engineering and business. Sunday evening through late Friday afternoon were serious time due to engineering classes. Rarely drank during the week, and often went home from hockey games on the weened to do lab reports and homework. We did some partying on the weekend. The business courses on the other hand, If I had just been a business major I could have partied six nights a week and been on the Dean's list.

I hate to burst your bubble, but there is a strong maybe on this contract stuff. It depends upon what law is the basis for the contract. The tribes will want any contract to be interpreted and administered under tribal law. Should any disagreement occur, the issue will then be handled at tribal court, which is equivalent to "the non-tribal entity loses." This is an unfortunate but predominant situation and is one of the significant issues why reservations cannot get outside businesses to come in and do development. The additional risks of doing business under tribal law, which can change continuously to fit the situation, are enormous. So while I see hope in moving forward with the tribes on getting approval, getting an acceptable 30-year agreement that will last 30 years might be darn difficult.

Certainly you must mean WWII. He wasn't out of diapers in WWI.

And you are misunderstanding Ralph Engelstad's motivation here. While Ralph owned a casino, he made it big first in construction. And while many of the contractors were local, the construction management and supervision was done by Ralph's construction managers. They used many innovative techniques and processes that Ralph had perfected in his construction business. The local contractors will tell you they learned many things in the process from Ralph's expertise. The arena was on a fast track construction timeline, because that is the way Ralph got things done. Designs had been completed and material was already ordered and being delivered. To piddle around about the Sioux name when construction was at a critical point would do nothing but cause designs to be changed, material to be reordered, cost mucho dollars, and delay construction raising costs even more. The intended cost had already doubled. Beyond the cost of construction, delaying the progress would have tied up Ralph's people even longer, inflicting significant lost opportunity cost to his construction business. Ralph's no-nonsense approach to business and getting things done likely had as much to do with his threat as his loyalty to the Fighting Sioux name. He was a hard worker and had no time for delays and fooling around.

Not quite correct. When they talk about all time Titan stats and team records, they still include the Oilers stats and records.