GFG

lol complaining about goal celebrations..really? He's an 18 year old kid straight out of high school, why not get excited? You just seem like a real douche nozzle for ripping on an 18 year old for being excited about scoring some goals. Have you watched ALEX OVECHKIN? The guy goes nuts after every goal he scores and he's the one of the greatest goal scorers in the history of the sport! Anyone that complains about goal celebrations is just plain stupid. Pop your jersey, do whatever you want. The only thing I would frown upon is yelling at an opponent or purposely going to celebrate in front of their bench. It's not like it's soccer where they do backflips, take their jersey off and flop around like a fish.

I think the biggest problem is that there are so many sports choices in Minnesota for such a small populated area. Vikings, Wild, Twins, Lynx, Gophers, St. Cloud, Duluth, etc. There are far too many teams for a state with a population of about 5 million. Especially when you combine that with the fact that all the major ones are in one city. Schools like Wisconsin, Iowa, North Dakota, and to be honest about 95% of major athletic universities, are not located in population centers where there are many more teams to choose from. That is what I think takes away from the popularity of U of M sports.

The freshmen were very bad in todays game, which is expected sometimes with a young team. But there are a couple of them that won't be making next weeks road trip because of stupid retaliation penalties, and not moving their feet on defense. They probably lost most playing time for the rest of the year after today. They've been outplayed by the other guys they were competing with that were scratched today. That being said, gotta give credit where credit is due, Vermont looked much better today and their goaltender Madore was very good in net and was the decisive reason Vermont won.

Our basketball program is pretty good actually. We're consistently in the top 25 and we were ranked #11 last year, including beating North Carolina, until we lost both of our point guards and spiraled down hill. Football on the other hand...well...lol. It is hard to believe, even I can't believe it sometimes, but it's the truth.

UND fans all assume hockey is the most popular there, but it's not even close. Football is by far the most popular (even tho we suck big time, being in the Big Ten still keeps it popular with the opponents), and basketball is quite a bit more popular than hockey as well. It is like that at all the Big Ten schools with those three sports. Even at Michigan football and basketball are more popular than hockey. I, along with most gopher fans who grew up in grand forks and other northern areas, love hockey the most followed very closely by football and basketball, but that just isn't the case down in the cities.

lol

We all know UND deserved AT least 2 points this weekend, but keep your heads up Sioux fans. You know Hak will get the team going by seasons end. Next weekend you play St. Cloud, and based on what I have heard about them UND should have a hay day with their swiss cheese defense

lol not a bad point

Do you think it is at all possible that the forwards who departed early were a much bigger part of the defensive scheme for this team than people originally thought? I've seen Lamoureaux struggle at picking up his guys a few times when they go into the slot, which is something that a guy like Malone never let happen. Malone was a beast in the defensive zone

I know it's early in the season, but what is with the struggles of the defense? There have been so many missed assignments and people failing to pick up their man around the net its ridiculous. They're allowing people to stand in front of the net without challenging them either, very unlike a normal UND defense. It looks eerily like Minnesota's had the past 3 seasons, and that's what caused minnesota to lose so many games. Like I said, I know it's early, but unless Hak gets things righted quick it will be a long season for the Sioux. Minnesota is perfect example of that. There is no way their offense can make up for what the defense has been like so far.

lol! No kidding, and most sioux fans only stayed for one game. I dealt with that crap both nights

Very true, I think MN, Duluth and UND will all be competing hard with each other for 3-5 places and I think those spots could go any way between them

That's never something you want to hear from a committed recruit.

What a loss for Michigan. It sounds like Stefan Matteau might bolt for juniors too rather than go to UND.

UMD isn't much worse than last year. They have some very good freshman, primarily Caleb Herbert, the kid is absolutely sick. To be honest I thought UMD looked better this past weekend than they did most of last season. Very talented offensive team. Here's a highlight reel goal of his against Minnesota. https://www.snappytv.com/snaps/817-umd-cuts-lead-in-half-with-3-on-2-goal-about-minnesota-at-minnesota-duluth-on-fox-sports-north UMD really didn't have many quality scoring chances, Minnesota had just as much as them on Saturday night even while being outshot by 34. UMD just threw pucks on net from their own end of the ice and the neutral zone. A lot of them. Just a fun fact as well, Pattersons top 4 games for most saves last season were all against UMD as well. I've watched the gophers the past three years, and let me just tell you that this is by far the best team they've had in those years. The attitude is completely different than past years, the defense is much improved but is still their weakness. Patterson is honestly probably my vote for best goalie in the WCHA too. Him and Dell are far and away the top two. Patterson finished the season with a 58% save percentage on breakaways, and believe me, he faced a lot of them. An average for that stat is about 15-20%. I've talked with Schlossman and he said he would be amazed if Minnesota didn't make the NCAA tournament again. I've watched hockey all my life and if the gophers keep playing like they are they will easily finish in the top 3 of the WCHA. They've looked much better than UND has so far (God, I haven't said that forever), but with both of those teams being so young there will be inconsistent play from both of them throughout the season.

Here is my prediction: 12. Minnesota State 11. Bemidji State 10. Wisconsin 9. Michigan Tech 8. Alaska Anchorage 7. Nebraska-Omaha 6. St. Cloud State 5. Minnesota-Duluth 4. North Dakota 3. Minnesota 2. Colorado College 1. Denver I think Denver will run away with the league title and CC, MN, UND, and UMD will all be very close together

To be honest I think they made a small deal with Denver to have a couple of games televised and they picked the two home games of Denver that they knew would be the larger television draws. Wisconsin is our biggest rival, but UND is tied for biggest rival in hockey. I brought a couple of friends down to a Gophers football game this year and they wore sioux stuff because they thought they would get an uprise. I tried telling them people don't hate UND like UND fans hate Minnesota but they didn't believe me. They went through 7 hours of tailgating and the game yelling "Sioux Ya Ya" and stuff with only one person even acknowledging them, and that person just asked about the nickname lol. But of course, there's always that guy, who was wearing Badgers stuff there and was getting heckled endlessly. Like I said, in the hockey world we're huge rivals, but hockey is only the third most popular sport at Minnesota so the majority of the minnesota fan base doesn't even acknowledge the UND rivalry

It's all true, Notre Dame games have been confirmed by the CCHA website and some people from USCHO have told me about the Minnesota and North Dakota games at Denver.

Gopher fan here, no hard feelings, just on here because I like to talk hockey with people. Got some breaking news about hockey games on VERSUS this season. So far these four have been confirmed: 12/31 - BU @ Notre Dame 1/20 - Mich @ Notre Dame 2/10 - Minn @ Denver 2/24 - UND @ Denver