fightingsioux4life

This comment perfectly illustrates the arrogant and condecending attitude of the Big 10 schools (particularly Minnesota) towards schools that are not "big time" in anything besides hockey. And it also tells you how low on the food chain hockey is for the Big 10. Enjoy having hockey as a red-headed step-child in your own conference.

When you know your conference is going to suck, you have to try and compensate with a shiny, oversized trophy.

Okay, I am not tracking the games at work.

Yeah, they might take home their eighth runner-up trophy.

The reason people don't like private schools winning tournaments is that private schools can pick and choose their students (athletes and otherwise), while public schools have to accept everybody. Sure, open enrollment helps even this out to a certain extent, but it's definitely not the same as being able to include and exclude students using your own hand-picked criteria. Having private schools in AA is one possible solution. So is having an all-private school division with it's own tournament (if there are enough schools for that). Either one would be better than what we have now. If you can pick out the eventual winner of the tournament, how much fun is that for the kids?

I think the players pick out the warm-up music and that is how it should remain. I honestly hope REA doesn't ever dictate to the players what music they can warm up to.

Didn't take long for that award to become as big of a joke as the Hobey.

The Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament started today with four Class A quarterfinal games. Class AA quarterfinals are on Thursday. EGF is representing Section 8A and Moorhead is representing Section 8AA. Any thoughts? Predictions?

Yeah, until they moved from the Happy Harry's strip mall to the Town and Country Mall. That killed it off, I think people weren't willing to travel halfway across town to go there. I used to live right behind the Town and Country Mall, however, so I used to walk over there and get one of their subs. They were fantastic.

Nice comback.

Good luck Brett.

fat alberts > subway

Watch out, you'll be lectured on the importance of being satisfied with what we have now.

I honestly don't know if I want someone else picking my seats. I could get stuck in seats I don't like. I think I will wait.

We always have tons of fans there! I was there in 2004, 2008 and 2010 and it was almost as loud when UND scored as it was when Mankato scored (without that stupid "ole, ole, ole!!!" crap, of course).

Blame it on whomever gave Penn State all that money to start a program. That is why this is happening at all.

Okay, that is a fair point. I just think that the attendance for the Big Ten Tournament will pale in comparison to the current version of the Final Five. As will the NCHC attendance. As will the new WCHA attendance. We have had the perfect storm of schools, travel distance, location and facility over the past 15 years with the current WCHA. It will never be duplicated. The X can try all they want, but most of us won't give the Big Ten tournament the time of day.

Why would the WCHA think that anyone that is not a fan of Minnesota or Wisconsin care ONE IOTA about the Big 10 Hockey Conference? My theory is described in one word: A-R-R-O-G-A-N-C-E We'll have to wait and see what happens to their attendance figures and revenue streams before we'll know if this attitude is justified.

When my Final Five tickets came in the mail, there was a flyer telling all of us how to purchase Big Ten Hockey Conference Tournament tickets! And as Final Five ticket holders, we would get priority over everyone else! How considerate of them! Honestly, unless you are a Gopher or Badger fan, why would you even CARE about the Big Ten Tournament? I was a little irritated by that; it felt like a cheap shot at the NCHC.

My point is that we had both going on at the same time and it worked out okay.

I never said that, you are just choosing to believe it. All I did in my original post was point out that having a core of players that stick around 3-4 years makes it easier to build a cohesive unit of players that know each other and work well together. And I provided a concrete example of that (the mid to late 1990's). And it's a fair conversation to have because it goes back to our recruiting philosophy as a program. Unless, of course, you think that should be off-limits on SS.com. I don't think it should be.

Where do you want me to start? The "hot goalie" excuse? The "bad bounces" excuse? The "it's just too hard to win one anymore" excuse? The "we aren't on the East Coast like Boston College is" excuse? The "Jerry York hasn't retired yet" excuse? Does that about cover it for you? And I have never "ignored" the other titles. I go to the Final Five every year and next year, I will go to the NCHC tournament in the Target Center. I love it when we hang any banner of any kind. And I am NOT in the "Fire Hakstol" crowd. Any other broad generalizations you want me to clear up?

FYI, I am 38 (almost 39) years old and I have two degrees from UND and I know all about patience and following through on a plan and not giving up when things don't work out well the first or second time. And FYI, you would be better served in making your points without the moralistic preaching and lecturing.

Okay, besides that debacle, the team was solid in the first half.

Brock Nelson would make this a much better team than it is now. I think Dean Blais said he thinks we would have won the 2001 title if Mike Commodore had come back for his senior year. One player, even in a team sport like this, can put you over the top in certain situations. And don't forget, we had a couple of kids bail on us for the CHL (Jones, Miller). That is another problem with top draft picks: even if you don't lose them to the NHL, you can lose them to the CHL. There is some truth to the point that we have kept more of our players in recent years. That is probably why the 2011 team was so good thru out the season (I don't think that team had a first-half slump). Last year's team had too many injuries to have a realistic chance to win it all. We'll have to wait and see if this year's crop of younger players sticks around or leaves early. If they do, we'll have another 2011-caliber team in one or two years.