mikejm

Ben Noah is from Detroit Lakes, MN. His grandfather is a cousin, I believe, of John Noah.

WARNING: consider this source. Dubay said yesterday on the radio that Hairdo Lucia is bringing in a goalie at Christmas. And just for fun, cruise over to POI and read all the rats leaping off a sinking ship. OMG what a bunch of fair-weather fans.

Jake played well Friday. Jpar played okay Saturday. I don't mind Blais rolling the two goaltenders ala Wild as long as it's working. With Jpar and Ziggy still a little wet behind the ears, its nice to see Jake carry the load, but what happens if he goes down? Then it'd be nice to see one of the freshmen with some meaningful WCHA experience. An aside: I didn't really mind Schmitt's calls this weekend, but have you ever seen so much confusion as to WHO the call is going against? I couldv'e sworn the delayed call Friday was going against the Goofs, and, evidently, so did Jake and the rest of the Sioux bench. But for a heckuva long skate and a great dive, that could've been nasty. And why does it take so long to explain to Donny "Hairdo" Lucia that he had too damn many men on the ice? Let's see, "there's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...and oh yeah, 6 skaters, Don. Guess you'll have to sit one!"

Oiler scout Chris McCarthy recently described [Greene]like this:

Bucks' amazing scoring notwithstanding, I think Quinn Fylling's play has to rank among the team's tops thus far. His hustle and intensity is outstanding. He played the forecheck extremely well against BC, and was in the corners hard both nights. He's becoming a very fun player to watch.

A live chicken is a hillarious addition to any hockey game. The difficulty in resurrecting The Farce, or at least stunts like the chicken, has more to do however, with today's fashions than to the state of the student body's mindset, etc. As one who has personally carried more than my share of live chickens into the "old" Ralph, to be done with the proper, humane, care and decorum, an Army surplus overcoat is almost a necessity. The belt around the coat's waist doubles as a "sleeper" hold on the chicken's neck. Much easier to smuggle a "dozing" chicken hanging under one's overcoat than it is to try to stuff one into the pocket of one's Docker cargo pants.

please make sure to abide by all the NC2A rules as they pertain to a "booster" or alum making direct personal contact with a prospect or any member of that prospect's family.

Inside College Hockey's list of Best Coaches Five Years From Now http://www.insidecollegehockey.com/7Archiv...coach5_0203.htm Dean makes the list, as one would expect. And don't be too hard on Lucia; as has already been pointed out on this thread, the guy wins wherever he goes.

McElhimmey is clearly the cream of the crop among returning netminders. Ellsworth's numbers simply don't stand up under any sort of scrutiny. Even Jake Brandt, who many of us called sieve and any number of other nasties last season, has better stats than Ellsworth. To wit: Brandt .903 SV % 2.40 GAA 3 shutouts Ellsworth .893 SV% 4.04 GAA 1 shutout

Pretty high ranking for the Sioux from a source not many here seem to care for. "2. North Dakota The best incoming forward and two more Shattuck grads highlight another great class headed to Grand Forks. Impact players: Brady Murray, Matt Smaby, Drew Stafford" Ranked ahead of Gophers, DU and UW. High praise for kids yet to step on the ice in the Green and White. I'm excited to see what these additions can do for a club that was very, very close to making something happen last season. 4 weeks, 1 day, 8 hours, 55 minutes to go.....

Umm, 'cuse me, but don't be so quick to give my seats to anyone. Hate to be "nimby" here, but you can take my Section 112 seats when you can pry my dead, cold hands off the armrests. As to atmosphere at the REA: anyone remember the atmosphere at the quonset? Moving to the "old" Ralph was like going into a hospital compared to the chicken wire, etc. over next to the tracks. When the Sioux can consistently put on a good, quality show AND the idiots at REA learn how to run their sound system, the crowd will be into the action. Did you ever notice they try to "fire up" the crowd with their noise meters, etc. ONLY during TV timeouts? They get the folks up off their seats and yelling, only to wait...wait...wait...and wait some more for the little red light on the scorer's table to go off. The REA staff has to work a little harder at understanding the ebb and flow of a game.

I was a student near the end of Bjorkman's tenure. In 73-74 he more or less cleaned house on the team, cutting loose almost all the upper classmen and bringing in a freshman class of about a dozen new players. There were several quality players on those teams, but it was brutal to be a fan in the stands for the next three years. I believe the Sioux this year won more games than the 73-74, 74-75 and 75-76 teams won combined. The recruits came from all over the place: Minnesota (Edina, Detroit Lakes, TRF, etc.), Illinois, even a walk-on goalie from Nashville, TN. One of the kids who came was sort of talked up like Zach was this pre-season: Terry Dennis had scored, like 100 goals in a western junior league, and was supposed to light up the WCHA. Sadly, for some reason, the teams never clicked. Most of the highlights from a fan's standpoint had to do with Alan Hangsleben or Scott Marvin beating the bejeepers out of someone. Marvin and a kid from St. Louis U. (I think) actually dropped their gloves in pre-game warm-ups. That was back in the days when a live chicken often found its way onto the ice during a time-out. It was also a time, if memory serves me, that one could drink an entire bottle of Mateus between Walsh Hall and the old Ralph. Not that I speak from any first-hand experience, mind you, but it seems to me that was the case ;>) I don't remember where everyone ended up, but Brad Becker went on to play for a few years in the Washington Caps and NY Rangers system. Hangsleben had a long, workman sort of career in the Hartford, first in the WHA, then in the NHL when the two leagues merged. It seems to me that Roger Lamoureux played in the NHL, too, but where I can't remember. Becker's sons have developed into something of stars skating for Moorhead high. His oldest signed to play for Air Force. Whenever I start to think that the Sioux aren't playing too well (not often of late!) I think back to the "golden years" and realize just how fortunate the fans of today are to see such skilled players and quality young men.

Hate to rail on this but the fact remains that this team is a goaltender away from being REALLY good! I've watched two periods of every home game from right behind the net the Sioux defend; Sunday's game was simply a replay of the SSDD scenario. Any goaltender is going to make some saves; a good keeper will make all the stops he's supposed to make AND make two or three a game that no one thought he could. If we'd had that kind of performance from ANYONE in the nets this year, the Sioux would still be ranked in the top three or four nationally, and not have their backs against the wall with a week left in the regular season. Josh flat-out stunk yesterday. He flopped around and gave up rebounds on the first goal, and was made to look like a hack on the third. The D left him out to dry, sure, but see my last paragraph. He makes that last save, the Sioux get one point for sure and MAYBE go into OT and pull out what would've been their biggest win of the year. There were at least four other times during the first and third periods when Josh was beaten badly, and the Dogs simply missed the net. Josh is weak to his stick side and especially when it's a screamer low to the ice. Two Dog shots whistled just outside the pipe that would've killed the Sioux and Josh didn't have a clue as to where the puck was even coming from. Sure there is plenty of blame to be spread around the rest of the boys, but I still maintain it is darn hard to play well when you're spending most of your time spinning your head around worrying about whether or not your goaltender is going to make a routine save. Maybe, no certainly, some of the blame has to rest at Dean Blais's feet. This team desperately needs quality goaltending and he's not found it. Josh was supposed to be the answer; he's now proven he's not. Sedevie may never play another hockey game, so the answer's probably not there either. Lamoureaux is at least a year away. I'd say it's time for Dean to cut his losses and send Josh and Sofie (maybe Brandt too) packing and go find someone who is capable of STANDING UP between the pipes and coming up with the saves this team needs to succeed. Maybe the kid from Central is legit, but shutting out the Eastern Dakota Conference and the ND state tourney ain't the WCHA; give him a year in JRs and then let's see. I hear from a pretty good source that Duluth offered Ziegelmann a partial (60%) scholarship and he turned it down; it's time for Dean to get on the phone.

Sorry, I didn't make myself very clear... UNTIL SATURDAY....The offense has scored plenty; the D has pinched or flat-out stood up almost everybody crossing the blue line all year. The D-men made four SAVES Saturday, for crying out loud! They're getting their job done. Yes, nearly everyone on the ice stunk Saturday, but I think a confident, competent goaltender, making a couple BIG saves on those breakaways, would've held the Sioux in the game, and perhaps the homeboys could've snuck out of an off night with at least one point.

I hate to seem to be jumping on the "dump on the goalie" bandwagon, but from my vantage point over the goalie's shoulder at ice level in The Ralph, I think the ultimate cause for Saturday's debacle lies between the pipes. The first goal was a ROCKET that wasn't going to be stopped by anyone. Certainly the D-men made HUGE mistakes which allowed Tech to stroll in on Josh and fire away after that. But, it would seem to be really hard to play good D when you're scared to death that any mistake you make is going to result in another goal against. These same D-men (granted they were a year younger) looked timid and tight last year because it seemed no one was behind them trying to stop a puck. Saturday they looked like they had no confidence in Josh's ability to cover up for one of their own mistakes. Mistakes are going to be made in an up-tempo transition game like the Sioux like to play, but the goaltender has to come up big and make a save on these odd-man rushes and breakaways for the Sioux (or any other team) to succeed. Those are the times we all talk about when a hot netminder can carry a team. The offense has scored plenty; the D has pinched or flat-out stood up almost everybody crossing the blue line all year. The D-men made four SAVES Saturday, for crying out loud! They're getting their job done. It's time for one of these guys to make a stand between the pipes. Stand up on his skates and makes some saves when the guys in front of them make a mistake. I don't know if it's Josh or Jake, or maybe even Ranfranz. But its time.

The weekend in Springs was a disappointment, sure, but look at the Sioux on the Pairwise and KRACH ratings today: still in top 4 on both. INCH still has the boys getting a Number 1 seed into the regionals. There is no reason for panic; no reason to jump off the ship here folks. The Sioux flat got out-played by a REALLY good hockey team on THEIR ice; big deal. Look at what's coming up: Tech 4 points @ Denver 3 points @ Mankato 2-3 points Duluth 4 points @ Wisco 4 points Nothing there to see the Sioux drop out of a Number 1 seed. Keep your chins up and have fun, fercryinoutloud!

Agree about the matchup; but what scares me is how the Sioux will react to their horrible showing last weekend against sub-par opponents. Neither Brown nor Bemidji should even be on the same ice as the Sioux, but both made the hometown boys look quite bad. I sit right behind the Sioux goalie two periods each game; normally it is quite fun to watch the D-men muscle opponents off the puck and into the boards. Once in awhile one of the goalkeepers will make a save. Neither of these occured over the weekend. People were really worried about not having Zach around; the real obvious ingredients missing from the ice were Green and Jones. And I honestly can't belive Josh is this team's best hope between the pipes. You can almost see him float away from himself as he daydreams during games. I was under the impression after watching Blais NOT yank Josh Saturday that he wanted the team to lose to Bemidji; maybe the coaches think the team is taking it's ranking a little too seriously and need a wake-up call. The key this weekend will be if the Sioux can contain CC and keep the shots down.

'Course, they'd have to find someone to sponsor it But a heckuva an idea nevertheless