Benny Baker

You’re probably right. Wishful thinking on my part for the next 12 hours …

What, the Canes need to sleep on it another night, lol? Genuinely curious—with the Canes officially announcing multiple other college signings—just wondering why Blake hasn’t been announced yet. Especially as a Hobey Hat Trick finalist with the last year for the Canes to sign him before he hits FA. Should have been a done deal by now, right? Hope he rejects the full court press like LaDue after the 2015 season.

Does anyone know why it hasn’t been reported that Blake has signed? Morrow signed. Nadeau signed. Why hasn’t Blake yet?

Which makes 100% perfect sense, because if you’re going to complain about a semi-final loss in the national tournament, you’re no doubt going to complain about a regional semi-final loss in the national tournament. UND’s post season performances are trending in the wrong direction. They are not getting closer to a national title, they are getting farther away.

Correct. Look at where things are trending for the program.

Good point. But can’t a program push a current player to the portal? Thought I saw someone on here implying Hastings was pushing Lucius to the portal. Wasn’t Collin Adams’ scholarship pulled for a year? In other words, if Minnesota wants to find a way to get Wood scholarship money, they can. Or maybe their NIL pays his tuition. But yeah, would be great for UND to land Wood and/or Wilkie.

Lol. Duluth and Notre Dame’s first game winning goals were waived off against UND in 2021 and 2022, respectively. Both teams literally had to score 2 game winning goals each to beat UND in the NCAAs. In back-to-back seasons. If UND only got more favorable bounces in the NCAAs!

100% agree. I also remember having the same karma-related line of thinking, haha. When they scored 2 goals in the last 100 seconds to tie AND then Duluth’s first over time goal was waived off, I said the Hockey Gods were rewriting a wrong (BU game) and ensuring UND beat Duluth. Once that goal was waived off, I was all but certain UND was going to the frozen four. But alas, unlike BU who capitalized on the additional chance, UND didn’t.

Cameron Rowe was a goalie commit at one time, FWIW.

Agreed, that’s a fair point, but I think the distinction is that where college coaches yield most of the power over the hockey team, the GM and front office have much more control in NHL. So I’d agree some star players could wield more power than some NHL head coaches, but management and ownership will always run the day.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not calling them excuses, but I think UND found fortune and still lost some of those games. They were down by 2 to BU with 7 minutes left. If they don’t tie in the final minutes, it doesn’t even get to OT, and no one gets to talk about a 4th period or an “offsides” that wasn’t. They were down by 2 to Duluth with 2 minutes left. If they don’t tie in the final minutes, it doesn’t even get to OT, and the “5OT against a rested team” narrative doesn’t occur. They originally lost to Notre Dame 2-1 in regulation because no one backchecked to pick up the man in front at the end of the game. If video replay doesn’t show the puck go in a few milliseconds after the final horn, UND doesn’t even get the second chance to lose in overtime. Like the recent Michigan loss, all of those games could have easily been regulation losses for UND, if not for some fortune on their end.

https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/39886931/top-2024-recruit-sarah-strong-commits-uconn Is it an apples comparison? The narrative is that UND is both losing on the ice and in recruiting. Not like UND has Cole Eiserman or 2 of the top 4 recruits coming in next season like UCONN women’s basketball.

Considering this some more … In his 8 seasons following a title, Berry is 1-4 in the NCAAs. In his 8 seasons following back-to-back titles, Gwozdecky was 1-6 in the NCAAs. Seems like things may have paid off by firing a coach who managed 1 NCAA win in 8 seasons despite prior national championship success.

You’re right. Heck, I thought Denver made a drastic mistake getting rid of Gwoz and they would go downhill. But they just keep getting better with each new coach.

Hate shootouts. Maybe in basketball, the best player on each team can play H-O-R-S-E to decide the winner. In football, we’ll just have a RB stand across from a LB at the 15-yard line and see if he can score.

If Carle gets another title hopefully he starts garnering interest from the pros and leaves Denver.

I don’t like the portal any more than I like the 1 year scholarships that schools offer student athletes. If a university can’t commit to a student athlete for 4 years, I can’t blame a student for leaving either.

Fair. That same championship team also had 11 other skaters who spent time in the NHL though.

Exactly

Guess that’s cool we got a goalie. Not sure I’m over the moon that the goalie is a playing on his 3rd college team in 4 years though. That fact tells its own story.

I'm thinking the same. Hope he's okay though. Made the same comment to the group of people I watched the game with---Blake took and run and may have injured himself into playing one more year at UND.

Hey, thought I heard we had the collective up and running to take care of our business side of things and to buy our transfer portal recruits? Just need to make sure our NIL collective and AD department are on the same page unlike Florida football and Jaden Rashada. Ugh, amateur athletics are becoming gross.....

Portal = Free Agency NIL = Endorsement Deals College = Professional

Wouldn't this be a fun wrinkle to the transfer portal? NHL GMs directing their draft picks into the portal and onto a new team.