farce poobah

Yes, but its really cute. My mini-me's are teenagers, so they do things like: Announcer: "Minnesota full strength" Mini-me's, in unison: "And they still suck!"

Why didn't somebody tell me there was a thread about this?

You have represented the University at the highest level, congratulations on a great season.

Nice job with the Gopher Eradication Program. Seriously, hope everything's all right, and if need be, there's plenty of experienced sandbaggers around.

Check to see its not getting blocked by your spam filter...

I did NOT realize this arena would be yet another home ice advantage for the Gophers. "The Can" indeed. Must be an advantage to go from playing in "The John" to "The Can". This is SO unfair. ARRGH!!!!!!

Howard Walker was about the scariest SOB to ever wear a Sioux jersey, but there's nobody I'd rather have on my side in a street fight. Which is what most WCHA games were in those days. We (student section at UND) used to razz Neal about using Christian Brothers sticks "they send you the crappy ones because you don't know how to use a stick right anyway". Also about how Herbie only recruited him so he could get Aaron and Butsy to come play for him.

Its not just what he says. Its also how he plays the game.

No, because there would have been an extra penalty called on the Sioux fans. PS thanks for the setup.

Hey Wookie - just wanted to say thanks for your posts describing Michigan. Unfortunately, we don't see them very often anymore, except it seems in the NCAAs. Much appreciated.

Re your comment on cash cow - average attendance of even 1500 (up say 1000 from this year) would mean another $200k for athletics. Getting women's hockey attendance up to say women's basketball - achieveable given its a hockey-mad U - would be another $200-300k. (That's all before advertising, concessions, jersey sales and so on.) Not exactly cash cow, but the program should be a contributing revenue-positive and not a drag on the athletic dept. And I agree with your first point - it starts with strong leadership and the rest will follow.

Hey, we saw the same PP adjustment. What I was surprised MN didn't do was to take advantage of the 3x2 down low. We were getting drawn quite high on the PK...

They don't do a lot of the big flashy open-ice hits, but along the boards they do a nice job of leaning, bumping, pressuring D. Created a lot of turnovers this weekend that way.

Personally, I'm rooting for 176. Truly an amazing accomplishment, especially given he dishes - and takes - the physical contact with the best of them.

Ironically, ESPN2 has the Women's D-2 Championship Game on Saturday afternoon ....

One of the things that makes games with Minnesota so frustrating to watch - for fans of both teams - is that these coaches and teams know each other so well. Minnesota was reading our plays and getting guys into position to intercept passes, cut off lanes, and so on. UND's penalty kill was all over what Minnesota tries to do and stopping them from doing that. What I observed, or more accurately "think I observed", is that both coaching staffs decided not to make the adjustments to what each team was doing. Heck, Minnesota saw what we were doing on the PK and could have changed their attack in response. They didn't. Same thing on our breakouts and neutral zone; we didn't really change what we were doing. Interested in what other people saw. Or what they think they saw.

There's a shocker. So far - everything according to Simple Math.

I guarantee that I'll never give any guarantees.

Given that there's so little difference between the 3 seeds and the 2 seeds, I agree. Set up more interesting regionals with matchups that you don't already see every weekend.

Hey, does anyone know where I can get some Air Force jerseys?

Wow. Just wow.

Last report in the Herald is that he's a go, likely to play with Porter and VV.

Based on how people have played lately, I am going with Sioux and BADgers for the championship game. Even with Motzko sandbagging about how tired his team is (which he probably wouldn't be saying if they really were tired), I just think our overall tempo will force mistakes, and the smaller ice surface plays to our strength. Thankfully, its a road game so there will be more-vocal support from Sioux fans too. As for tonight, the Badgers have extra motivation and they are pretty well rested, what with Tech's rubber legs and the big lead last night. Minnesota has better speed and shotmakers but they won't get many chances. I predict a 5 OT game. 3-2 Wisconsin wins at 2:30 tomorrow morning.

Yeah, but its fun! I love numbers.

Posted this on USCHO.com also - Something to watch at the game today - faceoffs. UND has multiple guys who are really pretty good at it (top 5 in # taken): Jonathan Toews 636 faceoffs, won .587 TJ Oshie 302 .576 Chris Porter 221 .516 Matt Watkins 445 .515 Rylan Kaip 372 .454 SCSU's primary guys don't have the numbers: Gary Houseman 160 .525 Michael Olson 233 .494 Nate Dey 683 .471 John Swanson 482 .432 Nate Raduns 587 .431 I know that stats get thrown out the window on days like today, but its something to watch, especially on special teams.