as15

It is probably closer to 6500 underage kids on campus, most don't turn 21 until there Junior year. I remember when I got a minor while I was in college at UND, I had to go to some alcohol class sponsored by the school. There were about 90 students there taking the same class as me. All 90 of the students got a minor on the same day, granted it was a gameday vs the Gophers but still.

Well Stecher's numbers are very good for a defenseman. LaLaggia's and Reilly's stats were extreme outliers, those kinds of numbers are rare. At the same age, in the BCHL, Stecher had almost identical numbers to Justin Schultz.

Florida does have the worst record in the NHL, it would be a hard situation for any player to step into and be successful.

I am not sure if the AHL rule applies to him since he was drafted out of the NTDP, and not the CHL. JT Miller was in the same situation I believe, and was allowed to play in the AHL.

I would refuse to go on the ice if I was up against Johns and Mac, thats a recipe for a concussion.

Whatever Hak decides to do will be fine. Unheralded goalie recruits become stars just as often as blue chip goalie recruits. Hak will pick up someone none of us have ever heard of and he will turn into our version of Juho Olkinuora.

I think the reason why there is no one lined up yet is Hak is still deciding what he wants to do with the position for next year. He can either bring in another goalie like Tate, practice goalie, probably won't see any time behind the two scholarship goalies. If they do this, then a scholarship goalie will be brought in the fall of 2014. The other option is to bring in recruited goalie this fall, have him play behind Saunders and Gothberg, and take over the backup role after Saunders leaves. To be honest, I'm not very worried about it, Gothberg is our goalie for the next three years, I doubt he leaves early. I think it will be tough to land a high end recruit in the net in the next 2 years, because I doubt there any that will be able to beat out Gothberg, especially after another year of development. We have seen what Zane can do when he is on his game, now if he can just become more consistent we have a future All-American in net.

I also thought he had a very solid second half of the year. I would like to see him take some more risks offensively, its obvious he has some very good skill, we just didn't get to see it very much. Hopefully this offseason and a solid freshman year give him the confidence to become an impact player next year.

50 bucks says someone pulls up the goals against rankings to rate the defenses.

Really? Even though we have to replace three of our Top-6? Gleason is easily replaced, but Mac and Forbort will be missed, especially there size.

I think of the 4 (Stecher, Schmaltz, LaDue, and Thompson), Schmaltz has the highest offensive ceiling. Thompson will be better defensively, but I'm not sure if he has the poise, or offensive skills that Schmaltz has. This might seem like a bold claim to some, but I think LaDue will play a larger role on this team as a freshman, than Schmaltz will as a sophomore. I think LaDue will be our #2 d-man next year behind Simpson.

I think Thompson is widely considered to be the better player now, as well as having higher potential than Ausmus. Ausmus is a steady-stay at home guy, Thompson is projected to be a pretty good two-way defenseman with great skating ability. The scouting report on Thompson reminds me a lot of Chorney when he played at UND.

Thompson is an elite skater, but him better than Rocco good might be pushing it. There are very few NHLers that can skate as well as Rocco. If you wanted to teach a near perfect skating stride, just show a clip of Rocco. He might have the longest stride on the team, and he is 7 inches shorter than most of the other players.

Interested to see if LaDue's or Thompson's skating ability have improved? I have seen both players recently, and I would say that skating is a strength for both of them. Thompson will be our best skating defenseman next year (I haven't seen Stecher play, so I can't comment on him).

In my opinion, LaDue, Thompson, Ausmus, Stecher are all close to being Top-10 dman recruits for next year. The others I would include in the Top 10 are Ian McCoshen, Will Butcher, Steve Santini, Connor Clifton, Michael Downing, and Tom Vannelli. I think LaDue will have the biggest freshman impact of any of those players I just listed, except maybe McCoshen.

Highlight clip of Adam Tambellini in the BCHL playoffs I have a feeling this kid is going to be very good. Likes to initiate contact, goes to the hard areas, hard worker, and has some silky hands.

Kids that are very good, but think they aren't talented enough to play big time D-1 hockey, take a look at LaDue, he was in the same situation as you were. Who knows, someday the light bulb might just turn on, as it obviously did for LaDue.

Absolutely, when he left high school, did you think he would play Division 1 hockey? Now he is one of the top defenseman recruits in the country and likely USHL Defenseman of the Year.

The blogger from the Lincoln Stars just had this to say about Paul LaDue: "In my opinion, LaDue is the best all-around defenseman that has ever wore a Stars uniform. Steady as a rock. He will be missed next season". That is some pretty high praise, Lincoln has had some pretty good defenseman there. Just running through their past rosters some names stood out to me, Colby Cohen (BU), Chad Langlais (Michigan), Matt Bartkowski (Ohio State, played a handful of games with the Bruins), Garrett Raboin (SCSU), and Brian Lee and Robbie Bina each played there for a handful of games as well.

All of these things are great characteristics in an award winner and should be honored with a prestigious award. I am also saying that the greatest individual honor in NCAA hockey should not be constrained to hockey humanitarians on successful teams. The greatest individual honor should go to the greatest individual hockey player in the NCAA.

The idea of the award seems to be finding the player that exemplifies Hobey Baker himself, rather than identifying the best player in the country. I would rather have an award for the best hockey player in the nation, regardless of class, position, or character (if his character is that bad, he probably won't be in a position to win the award anyway). The Heisman goes to the best football player in the country, hockey should have an award that goes to the best hockey player in the country.

Absolutely, this is the year I thought a goalie would win it. The leading scorer in the nation had 53 points, which is an abnormally low total. The other members of the Hobey Hattrick also had a things going against them, LeBlanc (not many goals), Gaudreau (underclassman), I thought Hartzell had all of the elements, best player, on the best team in the country, and is a senior.

He is an exception. 6 of the last 7 winners have been seniors.

Kristo would've absolutely been there. The Hobey is basically the following: 1) Must be a senior 2) On a team that is in the NCAA tournament 3) In the Top-20 in scoring 4) Who didn't get in trouble in his career I think 1 and 4 are emphasized more than they should be.

There needs to be an award like the Heisman, an award for the nation's best player, period. LeBlanc is a great player, no doubt about that, but of the three finalists, Gaudreau is the best player and its not even close.