SJHovey

Can you say first round bye for UND? Those cancellations remove any chance for a DU at large bid. Have to win the tourney.

Is Ciskie leaving as Duluth’s broadcaster? He had a strange tweet about going to Amsoil for the last time, in who knows how long, and it’s “bittersweet”.

That was UND telling Omaha, “we’re going to win this game, not because we need to, not because we want to, but because we can.”

I watched both of those games last night, and a couple of things occurred to me. First, in the DU-CC game, in the first period, I believe, Chrona got hammered in his own goal again, but this time it was by his own teammate. What was really strange was that Chrona gave no signs that he'd been shot, had been run over by a train, or any of the typical symptoms. Then, in the BSU-Mankato game, the BSU goalie got leveled in what I would describe as a standard Gavin Hain move. Guy was going to the net with the puck, a defenseman was sort of riding him, and their was a collision with the goaltender. For those of you who didn't watch the game, you may be surprised to learn that a 5 minute major was not called on the offending Mankato player. However, the goalie did get two minutes for tripping.

Selective memory is one of the finest tools you can develop.

Oh yeah, although I think the pucks may have been gutta percha. Or maybe that was what the golf team used then? I can't remember. Long time ago.

I have to go all the way back to my college days to recall the finest defenseman I've ever seen play for UND -- James Patrick. Sanderson is the first defenseman I've seen at UND that reminds me of Patrick.

I would at least like to see the opponent score the first goal or two in a couple of the upcoming games. That's only happened a handful of times this year, and honestly we've chased the game a bit (unsuccessfully), when it's happened. UND came back from a two goal deficit against Omaha a couple of weeks ago, but quickly coughed up the lead again.

Yeah, maybe, but I'm not changing my picks just yet. If UND can take care of business this weekend and clinch the Penrose on home ice, UMD will still be in third, somewhere between 1 and 4 points behind SCSU, with their final two games against the Huskies. UMD is struggling for wins right now, but it's not like they are playing bad. They are dominating possession time, and are still a dangerous team.

It was about the no goal. I was watching the game, and UMD may have gotten jobbed on that one. The puck is clearly in the net. I just don't know if the officials believe they blew the whistle before it was in or not. But the play still seemed to be going on when it ended up over the line.

You had it right the first time. Magnuson played D that year. In fact, if you add up the games missed by Stone, Whitsitt, Ludwig, Patrick, Fester and Zombo that year, you will see that those six defensemen missed 22 games, which is exactly the number played by Magnuson. CHN also has Magnuson on the roster as a D-man that year.

It would be fun to see, but I'm not sure it'll happen. UMD will likely finish anywhere between 2 and 4 in the standings, but I think it's much more likely they finish higher rather than lower. UMD has three games left, two of them against SCSU, which seems to give them problems. I still see UMD winning the CC game, and probably getting some points out of at least one of the two SCSU games. That'll put them somewhere between 43-45 points. Omaha has 38 points, but 4 games against us. Even if they split, that's only 44 points. I think with 44 they end up behind, or possibly tied with UMD. I think UMD finishes at least as high as third this year, maybe even second if they can handle SCSU who they are only one point behind. On the other hand, Denver seems pretty locked into that five spot. They can't catch any of the top four teams. WMU could finish ahead of DU (they are up two points right now) but WMU will likely finish with 33 points at best if they sweep Miami. DU can get to 34 if they take 3 of 4 from CC. CC can move up to five if they basically run the table, or go 5-1 in their last six, but with two games at DU, plus one each at SCSU and UMD, that seems like a tall order. My predicted order of finish: UND, UMD, SCSU, Omaha, DU, WMU, CC and Miami

Minnesota played three goalies. The announcers said Wisconsin scored on the first shot against all three. If that’s not a first for college hockey, it’s certainly a rarity.

It's going to be interesting. There will probably be 10-11 selections that will be a piece of cake for the committee, it'll just be a matter of ranking them. Teams like UND, BC, Minnesota, UMD, the best ECAC team, the best AHA team, and a couple of others like SCSU or Omaha, Bowling Green, UMASS, will be in with no problem. The crazy part will be those last 3-4 teams, and Denver figures to fall into that discussion. Is a 13-11 DU team better or worse than say BSU or Lowell or someone? I think so, but what will the committee think.

Can't lose what you never had.

I tend to agree. I have no problem calling it a penalty. I probably wouldn't even complain too much about a 5, although that has to be about the minimum necessary for a 5, but I can't agree on the additional discipline. One of the things I observed watching the replay the night of the game, and again on this replay, is that Chrona clearly braces himself for the contact, and actually raises his left forearm across his body in sort of a blocking motion as he braces for the collision.

As I recall, Gregoire and Gage Ausmus were also kids who committed elsewhere (DU?) and were very good players here.

There is going to be a big push to give two auto bids to each conference.

In my opinion DU's tough pod has to come with a huge asterisk, though. First, the schedule for them was brutal. Their first game was against a very good UMD team, who already had a game under their belt. Every team struggled a little, naturally, in their first game, but DU had to do it against a team that had already played. Game 2 was against the #1 team in the country, at that point, and they lost in OT. Game 3 was against a good SCSU team playing with four days rest, while DU had a really tough game the day before against UND. Those first three games were brutal, from a scheduling standpoint. Then they lose their best offensive player to the World Juniors. DU will be a lot better in the second half. I wouldn't have wished their pod schedule on anyone.

There is no pairwise. You can only do the pairwise when you have interconference games.

But Wodon's site also has some flaws. PwPt%, was the Pairwise percentage that was going to be applied to overtime games, for Pairwise comparisons, before all this pandemic nonsense not occurred. But Wodon is still hung up on it, and thinks that the PwPt% is what should be important for tournament selection time. But take a look at it. CHN has Bowling Green with a PwPt% of .857, for example, which includes two regulation wins over a DIII school.

I think I agree with almost all of this. That was just a good college hockey game between two good teams last night. I thought we started slow, but by the second period we had taken over the game. Sometimes the bounces don't go your way, but I think Duluth is as good a team as we are likely to see this year (outside of maybe a BC team that looks really good) and Duluth certainly isn't a better team than we are. I think it'll help once it goes back to a more normal schedule and the coaching staff is able to have more practices again to tighten up some of the mistakes. There has been nothing about this team that has disappointed me yet.

I'm ok with Perunovich winning. He was a terrific player, although if I were picking a team I'd pick his teammate Samberg over him. Guch had a great year, but it wasn't a dazzling statistical year to set him apart from the other players. He was simply clutch. But as for UND snubs in the Hobey voting, he'd still fall behind Greg Johnson, Jeff Panzer and Matt Frattin in my book.

For goaltenders and forwards drafted in the top ten: Goalies: One year -- Rick DiPietro (1), Three years -- Al Montoya (6) Forwards: One year -- Phil Kessel (5), Kyle Turris (3), Jack Eichel (2), Clayton Keller (7), Tyson Jost (10), Casey Mittelstadt (8), Brady Tkachuk (4), Alex Turcotte (5), Trevor Zegras (9) One and a half years -- Kyle Okposo (7) Two years -- Dany Heatley (2), Thomas Vanek (5), Jack Skille (7), Jonathan Toews (3), James van Riemsdyk (2), Colin Wilson (7) Three years -- Blake Wheeler (5) Four years -- Eric Nystrom (10)

For top 10 defensemen in the last 20 years, it is sort of a mixed bag (draft position in parenthesis): One year - Noah Hanifan (5), Jacob Trouba (9), Erik Johnson (1), Ryan Suter (7) Two years - Quinn Hughes (7), Cale Makar (4), Zach Werenski (8), Brian Lee (9), Jack Johnson (3), Mike Komisarek (7) Three years -- Four years -- Ryan Whitney (5) It's possible I missed a player or two, but I think it's hard to predict whether you'll get one or two years. You almost certainly won't get three out of a top 10 pick. One thing that might be working in our favor is there is some thought that this year's draft might be "down" a bit in terms of talent. The other thing, it's kind of crazy that Michigan has had five of the eleven players listed.