fightingsioux4life

Duluth is a well-coached team and plays tough in front of its own net. But with the exception of a couple of players, they have pedestrian talent and should not be this difficult for us to handle. If this is the best we have to offer, we are looking at a middle of the pack finish in the WCHA this year, if not lower. I don't know if they can pull the fat out of the fire again this season.

FSSN names Alex Stalock Player of the Game. Here we go with the "hot goaltender" BS again!

Shoot the dang puck already!!!

Eidsness the only player who has shown up tonight.

I missed the game, but I turned to NBC just in time to watch the (Not So) Fighting Irish sing their precious school song with the band (yes, I know they do it win or lose, how sweet..... ) after losing to Syracuse of all teams. Of course, Charlie Weis gave the usual "We gave the game away" excuse when asked what lost the game for them. I have disliked Notre Dame football since I was around 6 or 7 years old and I probably always will. GO SIOUX!!! GO RUTGERS!!! NOTRE DAME SUCKS!!!

It might help this team to shoot more on the Power Play and not pass it about a dozen times before taking a shot. They have time for passing drills in practice, they don't have time for it in games. Just shoot the dang puck and you just might get a deflection or rebound out of it. It's never a bad choice to put the puck on net, but you wouldn't know it watching our PP unit.

Their season has just imploded from what the expectations were at the start, last week's win over the Rodents notwithstanding. This is just another example of how far they have fallen.

Touchdown Blair Grover!!!

JOSH MURRAY!!! 62 yard TD run!!!

Opps, you're right. I think this cold is getting to me, I can't think straight.

Game over. 1-1 OT Tie. This one got away from us.

Just how many times in this game are we going to allow the Dogs to skate right into the slot with the puck? Eidsness has had to bail our butts out of trouble over and over again.

We have to stop taking stupid penalties. The line-change penalty is an example of not paying attention to what is happening on the ice.

We had better start taking care of the puck.

Come on, let's cash in!

Our Penalty Kill isn't what it used to be.

So much for that idea! :-( Game tied.

Time for the Penalty Killers to step up.

I think I should have said "Paraphrase" rather than "Quote". But I am glad we are on the same wavelength on this!

This is the first team we've had in several years that gets up and down the ice and creates scoring opportunities. This is the style that carried us to national success in the late 90's and early 2000's and it is good to see it again. As for not having "eye popping" talent like Oshie and Toews, that is not all bad. We have a lot of 2nd, 3rd and 4th round NHL draft picks who will likely stick around longer than high 1st rounders will. This will also force our team to work together and have everyone contribute to the success of our team instead of sitting around and waiting for the Oshie's and Parise's of the world to win games for us. Eidesness has potential in goal and the young defense will come around by about Christmas time and be more consistent. I think this team has potential (barring more injuries) and I will enjoy watching them mature and improve as the season progresses.

I am looking for two tickets to the Saturday, February 14th game vs. MSU-Mankato (7:07pm start time) or the Saturday, February 28th game vs. Colorado College (3:37pm start time). I do not need tickets for Friday, February 13th or Sunday, March 1st. If you have tickets you need to get rid of for one or both of these dates, please respond to this post or e-mail me at siouxhockeyrules@yahoo.com. Any reasonable offer will be acceptable. Thank you.

To quote Goon "Anything less than a sweep this weekend is unacceptable". We have to win games like this at home if we are going to contend for anything in March and April. Split on the road and sweep at home. That is what the best teams do and that is what we must do, "hot goaltender" or otherwise.

I've said this before and I'll say it again: This league is full of good goaltenders. Kangas, Bachman, Zacharaias, ect. Every year there is maybe one or two teams that have goaltending issues and that's about it. If you want to hoist the MacNaughton Cup in early March, if you want to hoist the Broadmoor Trophy in the Xcel Energy Center in mid-March and if you want to contend for the National Championship in April, you have to learn how to score goals on good goaltending. Overall, goaltending has gotten better and better across the board over the past 15-20 years. If we keep using the "hot goaltender" excuse over and over again, it will get in our player's heads and they'll have a mental block to overcome (which is a lot harder than anything else). The Rodents scored 5 goals on Connelly and Minnesota isn't as explosive as they historically have been. Denver also didn't have trouble scoring on the Badgers a couple of weeks back. We had a lot of nice, juicy rebounds last weekend that we didn't take advantage of. Hennessey tried to go into "hot goaltender" mode in his post-game with Hak on Saturday, and Hak wouldn't go there. I have been critical of Hakstol on some things, but I give him credit for not allowing this to become an excuse and a mental millstone around the necks of our players. I think this team has the potential to be something special, but it will take time. A split this weekend would be a solid outcome and I wouldn't be disappointed by it. Prediction: SPLIT Friday: CC 5, UND 2 Saturday: UND 4, CC 2 (ENG) GO SIOUX!!!

It's going to take several years to fix the defense. This is the worst defense we've had in probably 20 years.

Fighting Sioux defense gives up 415 yards of total offense. What a difference three years makes! Next week is going to be a tough one for this team to win.