jk

As to the question of challenging MN next year, I think MN will be among a handful of very good teams next year. BC fans think next year belongs to them, as they don't lose much, return a team with stars and depth, add Patrick Eaves back to the mix, and add some high-profile newcomers to a team that is a 2OT loss away from being exactly where MN is right now. Michigan has a lot of young guys that will be maturing. UND will have the team to contend, but goaltending will continue to be a huge question until it is consistently answered. (I was pleased with Jake's finish, but that doesn't mean the problem has been solved.) As for the direct MN/UND comparison, it's tricky. I think UND can play right with MN, and I don't think the talent difference between the two teams this year is that great. However, and it pains me to write this, the biggest difference is in the teams' play in crunch time. MN got better in the second half, and UND didn't. I don't think it was just the schedule getting tougher. For instance, when UND handled MN for five periods in Mariucci in January, the team moved the puck better than they did at the end of the year. More importantly, they didn't make the ugly mistakes they made later. Was it coaching, or something to do with the makeup of the team? I don't know, but along with the goaltending, this is something that we will need to see solved before we know if the team can seriously contend.

skate, Just a few clarifications: Murray is 18. His DOB is 8-17-84, making him 20 days younger than Parise. Also, his all-star recognition was first-team Interior Division, as the BCHL has two all-star teams, much like the NCAA has East and West All-America teams. Despite that, I think Panzer will end up being a good comparison for Murray. I've only seen him once, but I thought he was just a touch quicker than Parise in the game I watched. Also, he seems to be quite small, which will end up being another good comparison point with Panzer. I miss seeing Panzer's sweater flapping in the breeze as he flew up the ice. I hope Murray is able to bring that element back. One other positive Murray point for me is that he spent the year in a rough league like the BCHL. Since he is small, I'm glad that he's had a taste of nasty Canadian hockey. All that said, he will still have to adjust to the NCAA, as all freshmen do. Stafford will be exceptionally young next year. His DOB is 10-30-85, so he will be a full three months younger as a freshman than Parise was this year. His adjustment period should be longer, but he does have good size to help him adjust.

Two days too late for the Sidd Finch reference. Nice though.

Subjectively, that may be true; you may think MN lost more. But objectively it's hard to make that case. UND lost the nation's top goal scorer, its first line center, its first defensive pair, and some depth forwards. MN lost the nation's top goal scorer, its first line center, its top defenseman, and some depth forwards. And Hauser. So that's the difference. UND lost another top defenseman and MN lost Hauser. Basically a wash, objectively.

My opinion on roster size would be to lean toward having a few extra players around. Of course you have to have some guys who can accept not playing, but you really need the injury insurance. I think the ideal roster has about 14 or 15 forwards, 8 defensemen and 3 goalies. I thought the Sioux were too thin at defense this year with only 7. Obviously trimming the number of goalies from 6 will be a necessity. At the risk of violating the Sicatoka's scholarship discussion rule, I think Brandt, Siembida and Sedevie are probably scholarship goalies, with Sofie, Ranfranz and Ziegelmann walk-on candidates. Competition should be fierce. Forward lines for next year? I start with: Parise, Bochenski, Murray Lundbohm, Massen, Fylling McMahon, Prpich, Hale pick 'em from the rest: Palmiscno, Genoway, Connelly, Canady, Stafford, Porter, Fabian From the top three lines, I think Fylling and Hale would have the best chance of moving down if someone shows up to camp really ready to contribute. I consider the other seven players on the top three lines to be very difficult to bump out of their spots. If everyone returns to the defense, how about: Hale, Schneider Jones, Greene Fuher, Smaby Ouch!

I think you typically dress 12 forwards, 6 defensemen and 2 goalies.

Of course it's way too early for this, but I'm tired of talking about other teams that are still playing. By class, this is very preliminarily how it looks: Forwards, seniors first: R. Hale Lundbohm Palmiscno Canady Connelly Bochenski Massen McMahon Fylling Genoway Parise Prpich Murray Stafford Fabian Porter Defensemen, seniors first: D. Hale Schneider Jones Fuher Dahlen Greene Marvin Smaby Goalies, seniors first: Sofie Ranfranz Brandt Siembida Sedevie Ziegelman That's 16 forwards, 8 defensemen, and 6 goalies. Suddenly youth is no longer an issue or an excuse. This will be an experienced team that will need to get the job done.

Against Michigan, MN/UND (as appropriate), CC, Mankato, Duluth, SCSU and Denver: Schneider 23 games, 18 points Ballard 20 games, 16 points Against cupcakes: Canisius, Niagara, Princeton, UAA, Brown, BSU, ALabama, Mercyhurst: Schneider 12 games, 14 points Ballard 5 games, 9 points. I never said one bad thing about Ballard. He's a great player. But I ask again: If he's so much better offensively than Schneider, then why the even production? Schneider did it against the good teams, just as much as Ballard. If you want objective, there are the numbers. As for the defensive comparison, Murphy holding the zone better isn't a defensive characteristic, but an offensive one. And I agree that Murphy was much better there. I absolutely disagree that Murphy played the body better. Making contact is one thing, but being strong enough to physically move the guy is another, and Schneider has both Murphy and Williamson in the strength department. The only thing I can remember about Williamson defensively is his bad pinch at Yost with three minutes left in a tie game; sadly everything else has been blocked out of my memory. So we disagree about some former Sioux greats. Not really a problem as I see it.

Vanek played three seasons in Sioux Falls. In fact, he had hat tricks in calendar 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002. Wow. Since Zach stepped in to college and ended up sixth(?) in the nation in scoring, I don't think he should have gone to juniors. Maybe he would have been a little better this year if he had spent his senior year of HS in the USHL rather than at SSM, but even that is debatable. I think his development has been just about as good as it could possibly have been so far.

Have to disagree with you on some of this. Depth at forward. This was the deepest Sioux team since the title team in 2000. The next year had only the Panzer line; 2002 had only the Bayda/Skarperud line. This season obviously had a top-producing first line, but the second was good and produced reasonably well. Massen fading down the stretch had a lot to do with it becoming less dangerous. The third line of McMahon, Prpich and Hale was solid nearly all the time, with good possession and chances; if Hale could have finished a little better, their production would have been there as well. The bottom line is that I was not uneasy when any of the top three lines were on the ice. I didn't feel that comfortable in either of the two preceding years. I was disappointed that the fourth line didn't play better. I thought with a pool of Fylling, Canady, Connelly and Genoway, a very quick and productive fourth line would have developed. Fylling played most of 2001 on the third line, and Canady and Connelly played most of 2002 on the third line. To top it off, Genoway came with some pretty good preseason talk. Canady's injuries and the complete failure of Connelly and Genoway to produce scrapped that plan. Goaltending is mediocre. Hard to argue there, if you're talking about the whole season. But Brandt was as good as the opposing goalie for the last few weeks of the season. He made some saves he had no business making against Denver, UMD and Ferris. I definitely haven't been a big Jake backer, but I have to give him credit for stepping up. No offensive-minded defensemen. This is one of my pet peeves with Sioux nation. Following is my post from a different thread: ---------------------------------------------------- Schneider, 43 games, 11-30-41. To me, to take the view that UND needs an offensive defenseman, you have to crane your neck to see around one that's standing right in front of you. Sure, he's not as slick on the move as Murphy was, but then who is? He doesn't possess the unearthly calm with the puck that Roche has, but who does? But he just had a stunning offensive season: Preissing 42 games, 52 points Ballard 43, 41 Schneider 43, 41 P. Martin 43, 39 MacKenzie 41, 32 Plus he did that while being better defensively than Murphy or Williamson. I have no problems with Schneider being on the PP point for the next two years. --------------------------------------------- In addition, Fuher finished tied for tenth among WCHA defensemen in scoring. Ballard's a great offensive player, but if he's so head-and-shoulders better than Schneider, how did their production end up the same? Andy's not getting the respect he earned, IMO. Specialty teams. I agree with you here. For some reason, the PP has almost always been weak under Blais. Even when it had Blake and Panzer on it, it seemed like a PP was more a momentum killer than an opportunity. It was like, let's get back to 5-on-5 so we can get going again. The Sioux are solid. They are close to being very good. With the kind of goaltending that Brandt delivered at the end of the year, they will be hard to handle next year.

This is a topic a lot of us have wondered about as Blais signed up quite a few physically big recruits in the last few years. I agree that Ferris seemed quite a bit quicker than the Sioux. In fact, I thought they made the Sioux look slow in a way that neither CC nor MN did earlier. I also thought UND would be faster this year than last, with Parise, Fylling and Genoway coming in and Connelly returning from injury. But I'm not sure they were. I don't see the team getting faster next year either. While Murray can fly, I don't know if the others (Stafford, Porter and Fabian) are great skaters. (Perhaps someone who does know could chime in.) The team needs to replace the speed of Spiewak (not gonna happen) and Notermann, though, so that will be tough to do.

It's interesting that a look at the statistics tempers my view on some players. As an example, I tend to get down on Massen more than Canady or Connelly because I expect more from him, but it would be unfair to be too disappointed with Massen when he obviously stepped up this year. Of course, he still needs to take it to another level next year. Bochenski 43 games, 35-27-62: Sometimes I get disappointed with his play, but that is so silly considering the guy scored 35 goals this year. The thing that I saw early in the year that was missing later was his ability to control the puck under heavy pressure. I remember him coming out of the corner with the puck glued to his stick, while being checked and hacked the whole way. Later it seemed like the hacks successfully removed the puck from his control. Maybe the hackers just took stronger swings later in the year. Parise 39 games, 26-35-61: How's this? Hrkac 1984-85 36 games, 18-36-54. Preseason comparisons to Hrkac bothered me, but they are fair enough to make now. Zach far exceeded my expectations with his play this year. I'm not sure why the production faded later in the year, but he had an amazing year for a true freshman. IMO, the reason he seemed less dominant later is that his game is to move the puck. Many times, Parise's puck possession on the forecheck consisted of a one-touch pass to a teammate with more space. He usually makes the right play in those circumstances; if the right play is to keep the puck because there's no room to pass, then he keeps the puck. A pretty good comparison to me would be Kevin Garnett's complete game (sorry for polluting the board with bounceyball). Zach obviously has a super head for the game, nice vision, great hands and plenty of grit. He's not fast enough right now, which is interesting because Hrkac had the same issue. He needs to be stronger as well, which I'm sure he'll work on over the summer. Lundbohm, 43 games, 15-37-52. Had a fine year, with a lot more consistency than in the past. His occasional stunning moves left me expecting to see them more often. Picked up a lot of points by being on the point on the PP. Does fine there, but is a defensive liability on SH rushes the other way (Fylling has the same problem). He must be the most sluggish-looking skater I've ever seen, but he gets there. (This is funny because Whitey was fast and looked it.) Still, he was a big question mark for me before the year and really stepped forward. Schneider, 43 games, 11-30-41. To me, to take the view that UND needs an offensive defenseman, you have to crane your neck to see around one that's standing right in front of you. Sure, he's not as slick on the move as Murphy was, but then who is? He doesn't possess the unearthly calm with the puck that Roche has, but who does? But he just had a stunning offensive season: Preissing 42 games, 52 points Ballard 43, 41 Schneider 43, 41 P. Martin 43, 39 MacKenzie 41, 32 Plus he did that while being better defensively than Murphy or Williamson. I have no problems with Schneider being on the PP point for the next two years. More on other players later.

Improvement in total points (example: Bochenski 62 points in 2002-03, 32 points in 2001-02, +30 improvement): Boche 62, 32, +30 Lundb 52, 23, +29 Schnei 41, 14, +27 Fylling 30, 7, +23 Masse 35, 13, +22 Fuher 25, 4, +21 Notes 37, 22, +15 Spiew 29, 17, +12 McMah 20, 10, +10 Leinwe 4, 1, +3 Connel 5, 4, +1 D. Hale 8, 10, -2 Palmis 2, 4, -2 Canad 3, 8, -5 R. Hale 7, 15, -8 Statistics don't tell the whole story, but they have some value, anyway.

I always have trouble with formatting data in these posts, so apologies for what follows (I ended up truncating long names to try to make the numbers line up; ugly I know). It's important to remember the effect on an individual's statistics of playing more games, so I've looked at points per game in addition to total numbers. The following lists the players in order of improvement in points per game from the prior year (example: Fylling .73 in 2002-03, .17 prior year, +.56 improvement (Fylling's "prior year" is 2000-01; for everyone else, it's 2001-02)). Fylling .73, .17, +.56 Boche 1.44, .89. +.55 Schnei .95, .40, +.55 Fuher .63, .12, +.51 Lundb 1.21, .74, +.47 Massen .83, .38, +.45 Noterm .86, .59, +.27 Spiewa .69, .46, +.23 McMaho .49, .28, +.21 Leinwe .12, .06, +.06 D. Hale .31, .29, +.02 Jones .18, .19, -.01 Conne .14, .18, -.04 Palmis .14, .19, -.05 Canad .12, .22, -.10 R. Hale .17, .41, -.24 This is where the newcomers finished in points per game: Parise 1.56 Prpich .43 Marvin .23 Greene .10 Genow .10

Handy, I can live with that.

Could you GUESTS (TC, KBG, bert) follow Greyeagle's lead and show a little respect here?! So people bag on the Gophers. What do you expect on a Sioux board? Go back to POI and bag on the Sioux there.

Gee, if you're sorry to be bringing it back up, then I have an idea ... don't. Can't get enough enjoyment from your team winning that you have to take shots over here?

Take it to POI, TCTroll.

Hammy, I try to let it go, but it show a little class on the Sioux board the day after the Sioux season ended. Parise won't become the rule, and nearly all of us know it. You don't have to come here and rub it in. I wouldn't dare do it on POI, no matter what someone said about the Sioux there. Your hindsight is so wonderful I just can't believe you only use it for hockey predictions. Can you tell me where the stock market is going to be in two years, from three years ago? Potulny has turned into a wonderful player, one whose particular talent the Sioux would have dearly loved on their team. But he was definitely a late add-on to a very strong class and was not expected by Gopher nation to contribute much. Even after his 20-goal freshman year, many Gopher fans (and I'm about 80% sure you were one of them (at the risk of putting words in your mouth)) thought he would not continue to be one of the team's main players, as Donny started to roll in the recruiting classes. I think many thought his #1 PP spot would be taken by big Tallackson last year. Anyway, he's a clutch player, and Blais made a mistake to not recruit him. But that wasn't very clear three years ago. And if Grant doesn't come, then Ryan doesn't and probably Irmen doesn't either. Display the joy you take in UND's failures somewhere else.

I went to the game and I had a pretty different impression than a lot of you. I thought the team played plenty well enough to win, but just didn't. This game fit right into the second part of the season. This is the best offensive team that can't score goals in the history of NCAA hockey. First period had about five grade A scoring chances by the Sioux, and no goals. Bochenski partial breakaway, Bochenski PP tip just wide, Lundbohm clean breakaway, Prpich in close, McMahon ? in close. Second period: pipe, quick whistle as the puck goes in, Parise on the doorstep, McMahon on the doorstep. Third period: two pipes and about ten great chances. When teams are going good, it seems like they score on accident, but when they're going bad (and I've never seen it go this bad before) it seems like there's nothing they can do to score. This team just couldn't put the puck in the net, despite having many, many chances. UND fumbled the puck around in their own end a few times, and each time Ferris was good enough to generate a good chance. But it's not like Ferris was able to cycle the puck at all. What they did do was counterattack very well. And when they had a shot at an odd-man rush, it always developed because of their speed. I didn't think FSU was very good, but they were definitely fast. It's the first time this year I've thought the Sioux looked slow; I never thought that against CC or Minnie. The last five minutes of the second (you know, when FSU had one odd-man rush after another) was terrible, but other than that, I didn't think FSU controlled play at any time for an extended period of time. Ferris hadn't even been down in the Sioux zone in the third until they scored. I think it may have been David Hale who had some problems down there with the puck, which is understandable given his two-month layoff. The Sioux fans around me also thought the Sioux were playing pretty well. The reason we had faith at each period break is that we felt the team was playing well enough to come back. I think one is dreaming if they think Ferris will beat MN. If the Sioux can outshoot Ferris 45-25, so can MN. Except this MN team will bury their chances, which the Sioux just lost the ability to do. I'll just engage in a little coaching second-guessing. I don't think Blais should have pulled Brandt, who had made some big saves. Josh looked shaky the whole third period. I thought Ryan Hale should have been at forward all game, not just for the third period. It's not fair to expect him to play defense very well when he has hardly ever played the position. "Moral victory" talk isn't appropriate for NCAA games, especially for a UND team. But I can't agree that the team played terribly or didn't show up or didn't try because that's not what I saw. Stepping back, I think we've owed the hockey gods and they're making us pay right now. The 1997 title was a year early and completely unexpected. We had to pay for that with two first-round exits the next two years for powerhouse Sioux teams that deserved better. Then 2000 and 2001 were likewise unexpected - 2000 was the year after the Blake class left and things were supposed to be tough. Then the next year was the depth-free year. And they went a lot farther than I thought they possibly could. Well, the great hockey scale is evening out right now, as the goal the Sioux shoot at shrinks and the pipes grow. I hope we've just about paid our debt so we can go back to having a shot.

Sockeye, Nice to see you here. Good luck this afternoon. We'll be cheering the boys on.

I like Woog as an announcer. He offers praise to MN's opponents. He also was a good coach. He was so good I think (wish) he would have stayed at MN for another decade.

Blais knows best, but assuming Connelly is unavailable, this dummy would go with the following: Parise, Bochenski, Notermann Lundbohm, Spiewak, Massen McMahon, Prpich, Hale Genoway, Canady, Fylling Schneider Greene Jones Fuher Hale Marvin The fourth line as reported seems like one destined to sit on the bench for much of the game. By contrast, the fourth line listed above is one I would be comfortable rolling out there any time. Everything else being equal, I would rather have Marvin at D than Ryan Hale. I also would choose Ryan Hale at forward over Marvin. So to me that is an easy one. Ryan Hale scares me on defense; I've seen too many odd-man rushes the other way when he's on D. It's not a rip on him, just a result of his not having played the position much.

I would go for Marvin as he has played relatively well down the stretch. A pleasant surprise for me.

Duh! I was even there (at the X) and I still wrote Mariucci. Sorry. Good to hear he had fun.