jk

A couple midseason thoughts. First, I just adore the north-south, push the pace approach. So many times, the normal thing would be to go D-to-D, but nope, we're skying it up the rink. It results in some extra icing calls, but that's a small price to pay for the extra pressure it applies. Second, what forward do you take out when Reschny and Zakreski return? Everyone seems practically indispensable. Unfortunately injuries will probably make that decision for us, but wow, the forward group on this team.

Promisingly, they're usually not on the same line, which means they're not feasting on each other.

Plenty of teams have won it off-schedule. Just in UND's history, 1997 was arguably early and 2000 was late. By contrast, 2016 was right on time.

Not following the disrespect of BSU after this one. They played well, including pushing the play offensively. There've been plenty of boring games in the past, but Bemidji pushed the pace on this one.

Had a fun time in attendance tonight. Not even remotely the goalie's fault. ASU has some slick offensive players and they made the most of their very few chances. 4 and 18 were on the ice for both those second period goals. 18 is almost unbelievably gifted offensively for a person his size and age, but defensive coverage is not currently a specialty. Not down at all about the squad, as they had a lot of jump and were clearly the better team. Sometimes the other team (which, you know, has good players too, and they're trying too) has momentum and you have to weather those times. That was the downfall tonight. But this UND team is good, and they carried the play.

That sounds a lot like Blake at the start of his college career. Drove me nuts, but the next shift he might try something that worked. Good for McKenna to be in the NCAA this year to get better.

Need to find a way to break that split pattern, but it's so difficult, as we see all over the country every weekend. The fifth goal is how I want this team to be. Croal won the puck in the corner and wasted no time in wiring the puck to Strinden, who immediately put it in the net. Just like in bubble hockey.

PTSD from going 1-4 against them the prior year, including some beatdowns. Even the regular season split that preceded that playoff weekend included a 7-3 Omaha win. So I am tired of it. Likewise CC.

I'm tired of getting worked over by Omaha.

That's a HS senior. He's obviously a gifted offensive player and already has a green light, but it'll take some getting used to a defenseman down by the goalline in the offensive zone so often.

I still like this team's chances to be good. When they're going, which we've only seen glimpses of so far, I think they're better than the last few years. Even when Blake was here, he was amazing, but the whole team couldn't seem to put it together. Shorter: this team has a high ceiling.

Thought UND was playing great up until they went on the PP. Dominated possession, crisp passing. Similar to the start of the Friday MN game. Then it kinda went to hell.

You saw hints of what Verhoeff can be, especially with the puck, and he may change a lot between now and March. On the downside he looked a bit lost on the rush that ended with their fourth goal.

Schneider is a quirky centerman, but he's got two bombshell wings that do the heavy lifting, and a propulsive back end that keeps the unit always in motion. Very creative.

It was a joke.