USA Hockey

The Gophers had a press releases today about the signing of six recruits, no surprises, guys that have already gave verbal commitments. I would imagine we will see a similar press release by UND soon since it is the early signing period.

The USHL has been the top junior hockey league in America for a long time. What has changed is the landscape of junior hockey in America the last five years. Junior hockey used to be for the kids that maybe weren't ready for college hockey when they were 18, so the league was compromised of 19 and 20 year olds. Now what you're seeing is with the Tier 1 status there are more and more 18 year olds and less 20 year olds on USHL rosters. The USHL is becoming the top 18 year old league in the country. The NAHL now is more reminiscent to what the USHL was ten years ago. The USHL has always been atop the NAHL as the best junior league, it's just that your seeing a shift in American Junior Hockey.

I'm not going to take anything away from the NAHL, it's a good league. But to say it is better than the USHL is sorely mistaken. The USHL is by far the best junior league in America and is becoming a hotbed for more 18 year olds/high school age every year. I don't know about 2006, but in 2005 62 out of the 100 players in the Frozen Four were from the USHL, twenty eight players were selected in the draft, and they have an annual average of 100 players signing division one scholarships. The USHL has the most NCAA and NHL alumni out of every junior league. If you've ever been to a USHL game, it is a much faster tempo and the teams have much more depth compared to high school or any other junior leagues.

Heisenburg's site also has him listed as the #1 recruit out of the AJHL and he just turned 17 two months ago.

I don't know if this kid has been brought up on here before, but Heisenburg's site has a link to him, he looks pretty good. I don't know what schools are pursuing him. Any one else have more info? Here is the link for the article that Heisenburg had, http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Hockey/Junior/20...025035-sun.html

Many people have talked for awhile about how UND was lacking in 2007 recruits. IF UND was to sign Bruteneau, Gregoire, or Nash, that along with Malone and Lapoint (and yes Chuck I was wrong and shouldn't make preceding judgements about kids in Wisconsin high school hockey anymore) this may turn out to be a pretty good recruit class if not one of the best in the country. Guys like Hextall, Trupp, and Marto will also be those four year guys that can provide leadership. Yes I know it's early and all speculation, but with the signing of Kristo and Cichy and the players mentioned above I feel Hakstol and his staff have done a great job recruiting.

In case anyone didn't notice he played here last January for the Boston Junior Bruins in the Midget Hockey Classic. If anyone can make it to that tournament in January I would strongly recommend it, that is some very competitive hockey.

I don't pay to much attention to polls, but I do think UND has the best team in the WCHA on paper. Despite the losses, UND returns 3 of their top 5 scorers from last year, which is better than anyone in the WCHA but UAA and UMD. UND lost only one defensemen and has a proven goaltender coming back. Not to mention the fact that UND returns all their freshmen which was the best freshmen class in the country. Wisconsin lost all of their top five scorers and although they return Elliott they will need some younger underated players to step it up. Minnesota lost 4 of their top 5 scorers and still has a question at goaltender. This means that they will rely heavily on Stoa and Wheeler to step it. The strength of Minnesota this year will be their defensemen. I think the Magnauton Cup will go to UND or Minnesota. After that I feel their is a big gap between 1-2 to 3-6, which 3-6 I feel will be DU, UW, SCSU, and UMD. Then I think there will be a large gap between 7-10 which I feel will be CC, MSU, MTU, and UAA.

The tournament in October is the Upper Midwest High School Elite League. This is a fall high school league that is mostly compromised of players from Minnesota, eastern North Dakota, and I believe there is one Wisconsin team. The teams are split into regions within the state (northwest, southeast, southwest, etc.) Here is their website, www.hselitehockey.com. The tournament in January that Shattuck plays in up here is a Midget Major tournament. These are privately owned teams that come from all around the country. These teams also recruit their players and they are similar to Shattuck in the way they have teams from Bantam on up. It's kind of the same concept as the US NTDP but a step down. Here is a link of one of the premier Midget Major leagues in the country, mwehl.org.

Actually UND returns three of their top five scorers from last year, which is more than MN, Wisc, DU, and CC. UND only lost one defensemen and has one of their goalies coming back (who in my opinion is already a proven goaltender). Not only that, but UND also returns their 12 freshmen (lost Alexander) which helped anchor a team to the Frozen Four last year. Despite the losses, it wasn't such a bad offseason comparing to the other teams. Even though the Gophers have a great recruit class coming in, they still lost four of their top five scorers and still don't have a solid goaltender, although the Gopher defensemen do look very solid for this year. Wisconsin returns zero of their top five scorers. With Elliott back, they will be a competitive team but one player can't lead a team to a national title.

So SDSU and most other athletic programs aren't running a deficit right now? That's the exact problem, you don't know where the money is coming from, so don't come on here and bash UND for having a facility master plan. The money could be coming from alumni donations, boosters, etc. Why don't you worry about your own athletic dept.?

Where are your sources that UND is running a deficit? Speaking that you don't work at UND, you don't know s&!t about how money is spent at this college. Take a look at this website, http://ope.ed.gov/athletics/InstDetail.asp, as you can see UND isn't running a deficit. Also, if you take a look at the task force study most athletic departments are running a deficit right now. For some reason (maybe I'm wrong) I thought you were an SDSU fan (which is a school that is running a deficit right now), why don't you spend more time worrying about your high school field in Brookings that worrying about what UND does?

The reality is is that most athletic departments in this country are in debt right now. If you look at the Division I task force study or www.ope.edu.gov/athletics you will realize that the schools that have made a Divsion I jump are also in debt right now.

NDSU doesn't have a guarantee they will play the Gophers every year, not to add on to the fact that most or maybe all of NDSU's other games aren't on TV. A game with UND can be thought of as an asset.

Oh I'm sure Gene Taylor would love to pass up a sold out game on statewide TV. Obviously you don't think about the revenue that is generated from a UND-NDSU game, much more revenue than Concordia-St. Paul. Also, what does ending up in different conferences have anything to do with not playing? Ever heard of Florida-Florida State, Iowa-Iowa State, Colorado-Colorado State, Georgia-Georgia Tech, South Carolina-Clemson? I'm sure all those schools would love to lose their profits off the biggest rivalry game of the year because they don't want to play "to big of a rival".

It took Denver 30 plus years to finally win it in 2004, it took Minnesota 20 plus years to finally win it in 2002, and it took Wisconsin 16 years to finally win it in 2006. All three of these programs are considered to be right with UND as the best all-time, I don't think six years is too long of a wait.

The kid had 59 points in 66 games, pretty impressive exspecially since the BCHL is a very competitive league. I don't know where you heard that he is coming here, but let's hope we can see a press release soon.

I hope you were being sarcastic. The SU's playing UND would mean an easy sellout and statewide TV. As for the rest of the schedule, UND would have a similar schedule to the SU's, there is no sense in thinking why they wouldn't.

This one I can agree with you on. A national title isn't the only reason that a student-athlete makes a school choice nor is it the measurement of one players success.

And what matters is the playoffs. Since you said their freshmen year doesn't matter because they didn't play much, then we can count just the last two years. The Sioux won both playoff games against the Gophers in 2005 and Irmen and Potulny weren't even good enough to lift their team to challenge the Sioux for the Regional in 2006.

Speaking of SDSU football attendance, has anyone seen their home schedule this year? They play four home football games, three of them aren't against DI teams. They play a D3 team, NAIA team, and DII team at home this year. The only DI home game is Cal Poly, which is conference. For attendance purposes, it has to be hard to expand DI interest with only one DI game. NDSU has a much better home schedule and therefore may have an easier time expanding DI football interest.

I agree totally. UND should no longer be the big fish in the small pond. Many UND fans will say why not just dominate DII? The problem with that is, and UND hasn't seen the big effects of it yet, is that NDSU is going to start taking the best local recruits. A recruit that may have went to UND 6 or 7 years ago is now going to go to NDSU to play DI. Therefore, our DII teams could suffer. If that were to happen, UND could lose a lot of revenue due to poor attendance figures. A neutral sports fan in the Grand Forks area may start driving an hour to go watch a competitive DI game. This could become very prevalent once NDSU starts bringing in mid-major basketball, volleyball, wrestling, etc. and I-AA powerhouse programs. Of course UND wouldn't win national titles in DI, but bringing in mid-major programs in the future will generate much more revenue than playing DAC-10 schools.

It's a good letter. It states many of the reasons that UND should move up.

So what makes it so different with UNH students paying those fees? It's a public institution, it has about the same enrollment that UND does, why wouldn't our students be willing to give out some more money?

I've said all along that UNH would be a great model institution for UND. This school has similar enrollment, a major DI hockey program, a good I-AA football team, and mid major in everything else. Their facilities aren't much better than ours. Buning was smart if he did in fact use that as a model institution for a possible DI move.