Yote 53

Also, just learned the governor of South Dakota has cancelled school statewide for next week. As of now there will be hockey on TV. South Dakota HS tournament is on Midco this weekend. This might be the last live hockey you watch this season, so if you are hard up for some puck...

Nah, hit the casino. What could go wrong? Yes, the casinos are still open but my 5 year old daughter's swim class is cancelled, as is her dance class. My nephew's entire baseball season has been cancelled. Isn't it ironic that youth activities are being cancelled left and right when kids are at low risk but the casinos are still open so the slot jockeys on oxygen can get their fix?

The only people who need to be tested are health care workers, the elderly, and those with underlying health conditions. If you are young (under 50) and healthy and are taking up a test kit, crowding the ER, or otherwise taking up the health systems time and resources you are an a$$hole and part of the problem. Stay home, self quarantine, ride the illness out. If things start getting worse for you then seek help, otherwise use some common sense and don't be a strain on the system. Oh, and the media lies, they are a bunch of liars that push their narrative and it has been that way for a couple decades now. The Trump administration, they lie too. So did the Obama administration, do did the Bush administration, so did the Clinton administration, etc., etc. It's all a game of gotcha and spin, and that folks is the F'ing problem, we can't believe any of them. Rant over.

This virus is serious and I'm not saying it shouldn't be taken seriously. But if we just overreacted and tanked the world economy over something that turns out to be not that bad in retrospect what happens the next time there is a serious, serious pandemic. It's the Boy Who Cried Wolf story.

I realize this is the hockey thread but this goes waaaaaayyyyy beyond sports. Just got a call from my brother, Des Moines Public Schools shutting everything down for 17 days. Not one confirmed case of coronavirus in Polk County. That's 17 days of parents getting pulled out of the workforce to take care of their kids. Other cities will follow. Productivity is going to grind to a standstill. I thought Dow 17,000 was a joke, at this point I hope it stops there. We are heading for a massive recession.

Just transferred $5k more into my brokerage account. Cash ready to buy. This is going to happen and the market is going to drop another 20% as panic on Main Street starts to settle in. I'm buying at that point. "Potter isn't selling. Potter's buying! And why? Because we're panicky and he's not."

There's a lot of truth to this. Airlines are going to bankrupt like crazy. There will be a domino effect of companies falling.

Yeah, I'm not sure about that. I am watching Amazon's stock price and am probably going to jump on it if it approaches 1200. This is an opportunity to buy and hold long term right now. ETA: 1200 is about 40% off of AMZN high of about 2100 a month ago.

The point is that Obama did not panic and shut everything down in 2009 during the swine flu. The reaction we are having today might be more damaging than the virus itself. Yes, we got through the 1930's, but how many people suffered through poverty? How many died as a result of that poverty? I'm not saying coronavirus is not dangerous or that we shouldn't be concerned. I'm just saying that we need to think real hard about the actions we're taking to combat it and how the ramifications of those choices might be worse than doing nothing at all.

At this point I am more worried about a recession the likes of which we haven't seen since the 1930's. The stock market fell 24.8% in 1929. We're down 24% from highs last month right now with no end to the panic in sight. Our economy might not recover from this.

This is my biggest fear, that this is the new normal. I'm not willing to live like this with annual shutdowns and total disruptions of our society. I'd rather live my life and just deal with whatever happens.

I agree with that. I also agree that they may have been forced into the corner of cancelling due to the possibility of bad publicity of continuing the games. It would be a PR nightmare if the games played on and the pandemic blew up and out of control and could be linked to people attending sporting events. Nobody wants to be the league that's legacy is they are willing to kill their fans, or players, just so they can make a buck. It would be a PR disaster.

The only thing I will say is that these professional sports leagues and the NCAA aren't going to make decisions that cost them millions or 100's of millions of dollars based on media hype or overreaction. Before they start costing themselves milllions they are going to consult with the highest levels of government and the CDC. They have access to more information than you or I. My take is that when these businesses start shutting down operations costing them millions then this crap just got real, it must be real. It's really happening and it's not just because of "hype" or "overblown" or "hysteria".

Santa Clara County just effectively shut down the San Jose Sharks. County wide ban on gatherings of more than 1,000 people. Sharks will be playing in an empty stadium. This is getting ridiculous. Media driven hysteria is doing more damage to this country and the economy than the coronavirus. Simply look at the numbers, you have a better chance of dying in a car accident today than dying from coronavirus. The hysteria won't stop until we go full on quarantine like Italy so be prepared to be stuck at home or at least have travel restricted to your county/city. We're stocking up on essentials in the Yote53 household; TP, non-perishable food, water, beer, and vodka. A ton of beer and vodka.

Here is the news story on the incident. LINK Hockey and sports in general mirror society today. There are extremes on both ends. While there are people like this out there and crazy does happen I don't think it reflects or defines the sport. There are a ton of good people involved in hockey doing things the right way, players, parents, coaches, and referees . These days the ugly incidents and knuckleheads can make national headlines in minutes given the reach of social media and make everybody look bad. This guy will never coach again. His club fired him and he's probably already on the Safesport banned list. He's probably got bigger problems as I am guessing he will do time in jail for assault, as he should. The most disturbing thing to me in that really messed up deal is some of the kids stick tapping during and after the fight. Incredible.

Didn't know that. They don't show up on any of the national rankings and they must not be a national tournament bound team because Sioux Falls has gotten a pass to nationals the last couple of years out of the Northern Plains district. I thought the program had folded. Suppose I could have just Googled it to find out. Edit: I did Google it and see only the 14U team is playing Sioux Falls for a spot at Nationals. 16U and 18U are not.

Whatever happened to Team North Dakota Tier 1 Before and After program? They haven't fielded teams the last two years.

Must have flipped his commitment this year. He was a CC commit.

Just keep giving them access to State and support hockey in southern MN. It may take years but they'll get better. Already see the improvement in 3A programs like Luverne, New Ulm, Hutch, LDC, Marshall over years past. Heck, I remember when some of these towns didn't have programs and were just getting youth programs started. It takes a while to catch up.

To be fair, the 1A semifinals are going to be great. Any four of those teams could win the title. Should be some pretty good & entertaining hockey. As bad as the 3A rep Hutchinson got boat raced (as did the 1A and 5A reps) they need to keep the Sections how they have them. Hockey is growing in southern MN and in a few more years you'll see the 3A schools become more competitive. Also, need Section 1A to grow and growth in the Rochester Area. No idea how Rochester is going to support 3 Class AA high schools (Century, John Marshall, Mayo) and 1 Class A school (Lourdes) when the youth hockey program doesn't even field a AA Bantam team instead fielding 2 Bantam A, 2 B1, and 2 B2 teams. Yeah, you could argue the state tournament should have the best teams in the state. I would argue that shutting out the southern schools and not giving them access to State would lead to death of programs that are trying to grow or just trying to hang on. Good article by McFeely that touches on subjects related to this. Class AA is becoming a Metro party. LINK

NTDP, Juniors, AAA. One of the best U16 goalies in the country is from Minnesota and has never played a HS game there in his career. Been at Sioux Falls AAA the entire time and got some time with USHL Dubuque this year as well. You come across quite a few Minnesota addresses if you start digging into Tier 1 and Junior rosters.

I think you missed my point. Players and parents don't get into the game for the purpose of getting a scholarship. If that were the case you could take all the money spent on youth hockey put it in a 529 and pay for an Ivy League school. If you are a good athlete and good at a sport there should be a legitimate pathway to play collegiately, with a relative number of available spots, and we shouldn't be prematurely washing potential hockey players out of the system because there are so many barriers to reaching that level, that's my point. It doesn't take too many years (those pre-HS Bantam years is one point) before "choices" are made about what sport(s) are pursued in HS and if there isn't legitimate opportunity available then the choice to continue or drop a sport becomes easy. I've seen this with kids I know that dropped basketball and focused on baseball, so it's not just a hockey thing, but they were looking at the entire picture and their opportunity to play a sport in college. Just so happens these boys are being offered in baseball in the GPAC. Another kid I know dropped football to focus on wrestling and now he's going to a D1 wrestling school. If you look at the sport of hockey and see so few opportunities the choice to drop the sport and focus on another becomes easy. Minnesota high school is the anomaly, not the rule when it comes to hockey in the USA. But even MN Hockey experiences talent loss to Junior and AAA programs, and some of the best (or at least talented) North Dakota hockey players leave HS hockey to pursue AAA or Junior hockey all due to the ongoing changes in the development path of players. I just need to read the ND State Hockey Tournament thread to see that. Used to be if you were good enough they will find you. For the top 1-5% of players that is probably still true, but for the other 95% they have a tougher road because there are so many talented players today with so limited spots available. So they feel compelled to take what some believe are "extreme" measures in order to achieve their goal. I'm just saying the road can be very hard for what amounts to minimal opportunities because college hockey growth has been stagnant relative to youth hockey growth the last 20 years.

This is important. Lack of opportunities down the road is a disincentive to get involved, stay involved, or continue to pursue a higher level of hockey for players who show some promise. Right now a player has to delay college for 2-3 years and play Juniors with a tough shot at making a D3 roster, let alone a D1 roster. If you use USA Hockey's own Long Term Athletic Development Model (ADM) it has 8 steps and players don't even reach the Train to Compete stage until Stage 6 at U20. Most players wash out before even getting to this point due to a lack of a realistic opportunity that any of this will go anywhere. The percentages say you're better off just going to college and not pursuing Juniors, or just choose a different sport long before you get to this point if you are a good athlete. There are more opportunities to play football, basketball, and baseball at the D1, D2, D3, and NAIA levels. Until more NCAA college hockey opportunities are opened up it creates a bottleneck, and effectively a cap on the number of participants taking up the sport. Eventually it is going to hurt youth numbers, or at best cap them, as people come to this realization

That Iowa article does not say they are going D1. In fact, I've had this argument over on the Iowa board for years, there is just no desire by Gary Barta to start a D1 hockey program. Iowa is one of the richest AD in the country and could do it if they wanted to with Xtreme Arena and it's 5,100 seats sitting right there waiting for them. The fact is they won't do it because it would be winter competition for the wrestling and basketball programs. Wrestling attendance would be fine but basketball, not so sure. When basketball is down Carver Hawkeye is a ghost town. I think the AD is resisting hockey to protect basketball. Lack of money is not an excuse. The Big Ten just raked in the most money ever in history at over $750 million in 2018. Most money EVER for a conference. It's about choosing not to start a program at this point. The interesting take from that article, Iowa City is going to host a semi-pro hockey team, so competition for entertainment dollars is going to happen whether Barta likes it or not. Good. I hope they have crazy good attendance. If that happens the Hawkeyes would see there is a market and maybe Barta would open his eyes to the possibility.

As far as the Summit is concerned the only talk about Augie to the Summit has come from the Sioux Falls media. Nobody from Augie has contacted the Summit about possible membership last I heard. It's now been two years since Augie announced they were going D1 and then... Summit is good at 10. Augie shouldn't even be considered.