TNF

I need the lawyers to weight in. Does he get 50% credit on the “ties to either having attended or through employment” preferred qualification since his wife is an alum? 😏

Conquered UND in an exhibition game earlier this year. 🤣 He has an upstart Augustana team relevant already while starting from scratch. I’m no Rabion expert, but I think you would have to take a look if he was interested.

There is a separate WBB thread for in depth reaction but Chaves has been a busy man. Internal hire done immediately. https://fightinghawks.com/news/2025/3/24/womens-basketball-mallory-bernhard-to-step-down-dennis-hutter-named-next-head-coach.aspx

Can anyone recall an instance where they announced an assistant or head coach from a program still actively playing to fill a vacancy for another program? I know portal timing is changing the dynamic but I just don’t see it happening.

Close applications Wednesday the 26th; announcement on Thursday or Friday at the latest? With the portal opening on Sunday, they will want time for public comments on the new direction of the program. I have to imagine Dane is in the loop at least on the general direction they are leaning so he can reassure current team members and recruits. The longer they wait, the more likely something leaks from a player, agent, family member, etc. But I agree, with this short of a window they already know who the next coach will be. This also screams Fruechte vibes; meaning the interim will be retained for continuity. Who would be most likely to retain Dane? To me, this makes Hak the strong favorite with a former player a remote possibility.

If it was leaked that he has been quietly fighting Berry to install a more modern style of play…it would be slightly more palatable. But it would be seen is Berry 2.0.

Same exact press conference to announce both if memory serves correctly.

Bubba 1.0 in football and Bubba 2.0 in hockey are two people that absolutely bleed green. They seem to be great guys and all of this is very unfortunate. But results matter and athletic programs can fall behind very quickly. Most of the fanbase can recognize their many contributions and be sensitive to their love of the program. But all of us also have a high bar for what these programs should be. And I suspect, Brad would be the first to say that the teams the past few years haven’t lived up to expectation. Always sad to see this result but hopefully hockey gets a similar shot in the arm as football at least recruiting wise.

If Berry doesn’t leave, doesn’t something have to give? Swap out one or more of the assistant coaches? Bring in Chyzyk as GM? We have one NCAA tourney win in four years. This is the definition of insanity if we go another year without changes.

The latest they can change out an AD would be around December IMHO. In this current climate, you have to have a new HC in place almost immediately after you announce their predecessor’s dismissal. Basketball and hockey can’t have lame duck coaches during their respective early portal windows. Hopefully the way they handled football proves Armacost understands this dynamic.

Is the GM type of role different from a “Director of Hockey Operations”? I was trying to research which teams have a GM type of role and was surprised when UND was on the top of the list. I do remember when this was originally announced but somewhat assumed it got phased out. I was wrong in that assumption; https://fightinghawks.com/sports/mens-ice-hockey/roster/coaches/patrick-swanson/566 “Swanson, who had spent his previous five seasons as UND’s equipment manager, oversees the program’s day-to-day hockey operations, including budgeting and spending, travel arrangements and video analysis and scouting breakdown.” I would love to see carving out scouting, NIL, and player development under a new GM role. The portal, NIL, and CHL eligibility…are all new frontiers since this role was created. Winning on this front is going to be a differentiator.

Are the assistant coach contracts year to year or are they set to expire with Berry’s? If Berry is allowed to stay one more year then something has to give. But just like his loyalty to #27, I don’t see anything changing unless he is forced to do so by someone else.

Which makes it inexcusable that Croal sat as often as he did. He is the one player that jumped out for his tenacity on the forecheck. But maybe that was frowned upon by the coaching staff because it was outside of the “system”?

To answer your riddle, pick either end. Using last Friday as our guide, we only get shots on goal in the first two periods. Is that it? Did I get it right? 🤣

We don’t either (other than that one time we got to host the tournament during a global pandemic). Two can play this game. 🤣

They will. And we will play them at 4 pm.

I’d assume if they could have called a two minute “contact to the head” penalty they would have done it. But with the review it was all our nothing. His elbow was barely above the dasher so really tough to call it for a high hit.

Great visual. I’d be interested how the ranking has changed over the last 7 games. Boisvert now sitting at 16 g x 12 a = 28 pts in 34 games.

For those in the “give Berry another year (or more) camp”, how do you define success or failure for that timeframe? Another Penrose? At least one ncaa win? Or two? Trying to answer these questions have moved me into the “time is now” camp. Getting an NCAA win or two next year would be a starting point but lack of consistency has been another huge struggle. So good enough to get an extension and then what happens if we quickly regress? The only option to avoid that situation is a short term deal. Good luck getting recruits with a lame duck coach. It just creates more issues. Looking around the NCHC and college hockey as a whole; there is no doubt a handful of coaches have done far far more with much less in this current era. This isn’t a one year experiment where the team chemistry just didn’t line up. And then I go back to never learning from our shortcomings. Ever since BC beat us in a frozen four over a decade ago, teams have learned UND can’t beat a full ice high-pressure trap. You don’t have to look any farther than one of the stains on this year’s resume…Bemidji. If it wasn’t for the pure puck moving abilities of Troy Stetcher and CBS, we’d still be looking for #8. They succeeded despite our systems not because of them. I’m not someone who typically blames the coach for everything but I just don’t see more than a year or two blip of improvement followed by down years. Not the standard we should be comfortable at UND. And for a lifelong fan, this was the first year I was okay turning off a game or skipping a scheduled weekend in GF. If I’m willing to tune out so are lots of other fans. Why wait and let it get worse?

^This^ plus encourage officials to actually call penalties in the third period and in overtime(s). One of the biggest reasons these games drag on is the fact there are zero special team situations even when they are more than warranted. And it doesn’t have to be power plays. Two guys get into after the whistle…match them up and go 4x4. And to be clear, I’m okay with continuing to ignore the ticky-tak penalties that don’t directly impact the play. But far too often the whistles get completely swallowed including infractions on scoring opportunities

Croal may add himself to this list before his time is done at UND. The game has changed over the years so he may fall more into the Malone/Gardner category. I believe we will look back at the end of the year and realize his injury had a bigger impact on the start of the season than we thought. He has a motor that doesn’t quit and he’ll lay a hit any time he can. That sort of stuff is contagious and directly leads to other teammates doing the same thing.

Let me rephrase. One of the many reasons people are coming after Berry is the laser focus on winning the Penrose. To do so, you ride older portal goaltenders in games you are favored in instead of getting your younger guys much needed reps. You ride your top d-pair in key situations often logging crazy minutes instead of developing the next pair. Denver is the perfect example. They are okay to drop games along the way if it means developing as a team Even in a high profile road series, it wasn’t exclusively the Devine, Buium, etc show down the stretch. They roll their lines and trust their development throughout the year. And over several years, they have guys up and down the lineup they trust in any situation. And if their start is any indication, they aren’t even sacrificing regular season wins at this point.

The focus needs to be on getting healthy, finding chemistry in line combinations, potting a key goal or two that unlocks a player ready to raise their play to a new level, and getting out of here with two much needed wins. Being hyper-focused on Pairwise at this point is the exact reason people are coming after Berry. We need to spend this first half of the year developing young players and learning to play as a team through adversity. Try different players at center (for Berg) so they get experience for later in the season when injuries come back around or gain key experience for players that will be asked to do it next year. This is how you build success, not only for this year, but use this time to get players ready for future roles.

Rachel Doerrier in her ESPN+ Draft article today has Emery going to the Maple Leafs at #23 and Boisvert going #26 to the Canadiens. First time I’ve seen the order flipped but she seems pretty sure Emery will go to Toronto unless he is already off the board.