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Miscellaneous thoughts from Thursday: Strongest feeling from the day: The X is a dump. REA is truly the finest hockey arena in the world. I had not been to the X since last year; in the interim, I attended five Sioux games at REA. Now that I've returned to the X, knowing that it is considered in the top handful of NHL rinks, my feelings about REA are even warmer than before. I saw Blais in the concourse just before the Gopher game, but he was visiting with someone, so I didn't stop to say hello. He appeared to be in good spirits. Even though Maine poured it on in the third, I can't say I was impressed with either HE team. The Sioux that we saw go toe-to-toe with MN at the end of the year could have handled either team. The Rodents' puck possession game was very good; they look tough to beat. Still, Michigan did get their chances, and Hauser made some big stops (at least in the first 54 minutes). Leopold and Pohl both showed up and played great in this big game. I also thought Koalska looked very good and will be a real factor in the future. Sorry I missed meeting up with you Sioux fans. Maybe next time.

Selected SSM players stats: Game 2 Total Hirsch 0-1-1 3-3-6 Murray 1-1-2 2-4-6 Parise 0-2-2 0-7-7 Porter 0-2-2 1-3-4

SSM beat the Pittsburg Hornets 7-4 in its first game.

Bumped into this story from December on a USAHockey site. Very complimentary of UND's returning forward. ---------------------------------- Fylling toast of prospects event By Ken Welsch Special to USAHockey.com PLYMOUTH, Mich. -- For a good number of the scouts in the stands at the USA Hockey Top Prospects Tournament earlier this week, the top prospect on the ice was off-limits. Much to their dismay. College scouts from some of the nation's elite NCAA programs had to try and ignore the play of United States Hockey League forward Quinn Fylling, who already has a year of collegiate hockey play under his belt at the University of North Dakota. Fylling, who plays for the Sioux Falls Stampede, scored four goals and had three assists in 42 games with the Fighting Sioux last season, and gained NCAA championship game experience as UND finished runner-up. Having seen that level of action, it's little wonder that Fylling is tearing up the ice in the United States Hockey League, and he put his skills on exhibit during the Top Prospects Tournament at Compuware Arena in suburban Detroit Dec. 3 through 5. In the three-game tournament, Fylling scored four goals with seven assists to lead the USHL to a 3-0 record. He opened the tournament in grand style, scoring a hat trick in his team's 9-0 win over Team Top Prospects, and added an assist for good measure. Not bad, considering he entered the game unsure about his health. "I was telling my teammates before the game that I felt run-down," Fylling said. "I didn't feel good at all." The buzz around Compuware was that if anybody on the ice would one day be playing in the NHL, it's Fylling. And if that comes true, Fylling will again be taking his game outside of the Dakotas. A native of Minot, N.D., Fylling stayed home when he chose to play at UND. His USHL days have taken him a short drive to the south, but many believe that much further travel awaits his hockey future. Prior to college, the 5-foot, 10-inch, 180-pound forward took his game to Ann Arbor, Mich., where he honed his skills as a member of the U.S. National Development Team. The 19-year-old, (who'll turn 20 in January), returned home to UND after playing in Michigan, and his acceleration through hockey's ranks doesn't appear to be slowing. He's helping the Stampede to a title chase in the USHL West Division, where they currently hold third place, still in striking distance of leader Sioux City. Through 23 games, Fylling has nine goals and 15 assists for 24 points, ranking him among the team leaders in both categories.

A little note about Wes Dorey from the Colorado Springs paper: WCHL ALL-ROOKIE TEAM: Garrow and two Idaho Steelheads - goaltender Jason Cugnet and forward Wes Dorey - were unanimous selections to the WCHL all-rookie team. Cugnet, who played at Colorado College, has a 2.47 goals-against average and a 10-4-2 won-loss record in his first season. Cugnet's .909 save percentage is second best among WCHL goaltenders.

The national midget tournament runs from April 3-7 in Colorado Springs. SSM is the defending champion. Here is a pre-tournament story from the Colorado paper. http://www.gazette.com/stories/0402spts3-4.php?section=4 And the following is from the Faribault paper. The link would disappear tomorrow so I cut-and-pasted it. "The Sabre boys, meanwhile, skate into nationals as the defending champions, at full strength and regarded as the definite favorite. The Sabres outscored six teams 34-9 at nationals last year in West Chester, Pennsylvania, and similarly dominated the prestigious Mac's tournament in Calgary this past Christmas and New Year's. Junior forward Brady Murray said last week that his team is guarding against overconfidence. "Two years ago, when Zach Parise and I were playing, we went into nationals with a 40-game unbeaten streak and thought we couldn't be stopped," Murray said. The Sabres were stopped, in the semifinals by the Chicago Chill, a team they'd handled during the regular season. "We will be confident but we have to make sure we aren't not too cocky," said Murray. The Sabres' main firepower comes from the line of seniors Parise (69 goals, 93 assists) and Tyler Hirsch (55-72) plus Murray (53-76). Next-leading scorer is Chris Porter (27-25). Sharing the goaltending duties are Mike Mayhew of Owatonna, who has a 27-2-3 mark and .903 save percentage, and Kevin House, who's 23-2-3 with an .890 percentage. Asked about the national field, J.P. Parise, head of hockey operations at SSM, said they don't know much about it except that a Philadelphia team has beaten SSM once, early in the season, and Team Wisconsin, a pool-play foe, is a big and strong group whom the Sabres have beaten. He noted that the Chicago Chill, a fixture at nationals, are absent this year, having lost to Team Wisconsin. The Sabres, coached by Tom Ward, will be seeking their third title in four years. In pool play, they will meet the Pittsburgh Hornets on Wednesday, Team Wisconsin on Thursday and Alaska All-Stars on Friday." ------------------------------ Apologies for focusing on recruits so much, but with the Sioux absent from the FF, I need to follow something.

http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb....99.html dagies, Try this.

One other thing: I noticed on the website for Mr. Later's team that a few of its former players include Arnason, Westcott and Ritchie Larson, so Mr. Dahl may have some kind of connection there.

On an unrelated matter, I was glancing at Heisenberg's site and came across this defenseman.

From http://www.usacollegehockey.com/ Along with a new arena, Dean

Good idea, Scott. I think I'll be there for Thursday's games, but I don't know the "X" very well, so I couldn't suggest a meeting place. I'll follow this thread, though, and show up at a designated site, if possible.

A few years ago, this league had some titans in the nets in Goehring, Meyer and Melanson. Not titans in stature but in their play. Even though Dubie and a few others had fine seasons, I don't think the level of play at that position is back to where it was. Denver: If Dubie's back, best in the league. If not, Berkoel is still among the best. However, how he reacts to being "the man" remains to be seen. SCSU: The Weasel is gone. Moreland is back, and he will probably be fine. Helping him will be a big group of experienced defensemen. MN: Subtract one headcase. Return two talented sophomores, neither of whom stepped up to claim the job this year when it was available. Big question mark that may turn out fine. CC: Sanger is gone. McIlhenny returns. He was highly touted, but is still a question mark at this point. Wisconsin: Kabatoff and Bruckler both return. This tandem will be near the top of the league in quality, and the Badgers will need that. MSU: Return Pateman, Volp and Jensen, all of whom are at least decent. Not as big a question as most league teams have. UAA: Return Reiter and King. Whether that's a good thing remains to be seen. UMD and MTU: I'm too tired of typing to look into it. UND: Kollar leaves, which is too bad since he seems to have found his game. Both Siembida and Brandt showed flashes of fine play, but faded down the stretch, especially Siembida. The Siembida that started the season, so confident and solid, seemed gone by the end of the year. Even though MN looked awesome in Siembida's last game, he still was absent from the net on a few of those goals. I hope an offseason of work, practicing with the team from the start of the season, and a little better team in front of him will help him be the good goaltender I think he can be. Brandt looked pretty good to me in the second half of the year, but he must be doing something wrong because he can't seem to get into the lineup. I have seen differing reports on whether Sedevie is coming in 2002 or 2003. All in all, no other team in the league has a more uncertain goaltending situation than the Sioux. Someone may step up, and things would be fine. But it could turn into another tough year as well.

It's quiet and I'm frustrated watching *other* teams in the postseason, so I thought I'd start a thread to bring together some of the discussions about the defense scattered on other threads. Is it fair to consider Schneider and Fuher the most "offensive" of the top four defensemen? If so, then perhaps they are in different pairs: Hale, Schneider Jones, Fuher Leinweber, Greene Marvin Most everyone seems appropriately worried about a lack of offensive skill at the defense, but an even more important issue for me is how the defense handles the puck in its own zone. Moving the puck to the right man and out of the zone with control is crucial to success. On this point, I think we saw pretty good progress toward the end of the year. The own-zone puck movement that we saw in the last two periods of the last game of the year was excellent. If they can build on that, the team could really blossom this year. One thing that can be said about this group: there are a bunch of tough SOBs back there. None of them individually will be as physically dominant as Commie, but as a group, they will be more punishing than any I can remember in the Blais era. Hale and Schneider are both very tough. I hope they save their fighting DQs for a league game. I didn't expect to see the physical play the Sioux got from Jones, but I thought it was very impressive, especially for such a young guy. By reputation, both Greene and Marvin like to make their presence known to opposing forwards. The Sioux will miss the experience of Mazurak and Schneekloth, but their play seemed to slip a bit from their junior to senior years, I think mainly because of injuries. Even though the top two pairs will be junior, soph, soph, soph, at least they are all very experienced, having played basically every game last year.

Likewise, though, jumping from midgets to the WCHA is even harder. I can't see that Parise would have any easier adjustment to this level than Vanek. In fact, I hope people don't get on Parise's case if he performs like a freshman in his freshman year. It seems like our expectations for him are pretty high. I would settle for consistent effort and flashes of brilliance, and I think we'll get at least that.

One other thing. He's third on the team in PIMs with 113. Good. Getting tougher was a big part of this move, I would think.

This is hardly real data, but I thought I'd pass it on. There is a discussion on the SF Stampede board about their team awards for the year. For most valuable player for the year, the votes are as follows: M. Sertich 0.3 Corey 1.0 Pierzep... 2.3 Fylling 2.3 One fan who voted for someone else for MVP chose Fylling for most determined. I guess a player who played forty NCAA games the previous year should do well, but it's nice to see that his team's fans have developed affection for his game. Vanek was voted outstanding offensive player by everyone. I suspect we may find him very offensive as well.

I am far from an expert so someone is welcome to chime in with real facts, but it seems to me that Colby put up the numbers in bantams. At SSM, I know that Parise plays with the Midget AAA team. SSM also has teams that play Midget AA, Midget A, Bantam AA, and Bantam B. So I'm guessing Genoway didn't put those numbers up at a similar level of hockey. Not that I will object in any way to his being a fine player.

HKNTSMN - That's hilarious. I bet his mom thinks he's going to be good, too. Let's hope he's right. It must just kill these guys to have to sit out a year, after playing every day of every winter for as long as they can remember. The great part about it, though, is they have the year to adjust to college life and classwork. So when they finally do start playing, they are only adjusting to college hockey, not college life. And since they have been practicing for a year, even the adjustment to the speed of the game should be easier.

Thought I'd roll this one back to the top now that we're officially looking forward to next year. How are we supposed to put hippity-hoppety lines together for next year if we don't know if Genoway can play? Someone must have an idea now whether we should expect an inconsistent third or fourth-liner or someone who will be competing for time on the top lines. Anyone?

Very nice, non-homer, analysis. I can't seem to keep the green glasses off when I look forward. Considering their losses, I see SCSU and CC in a big group behind the top teams, fighting with UND, Mankato and maybe Duluth to finish third and stay out of the play-in game. Denver: Head-to-head, the Sioux seemed to match up fine with Denver, but the Sioux now lose more from this year than they do. When you look at the year they had, though, and the players leaving and arriving, it's hard not to like their chances. SCSU: They could have the kind of year the Sioux had this year - UND lost Goren, Ulmer and Commie and surprised people by contending. Then they lost "the rest" of their stars, Panzer, Luhdbohm, Roche and Goehring, and slid pretty far. Well, SCSU lost Arnason, Westcott and Meyer and surprised (me anyway) by contending. Next year they lose the rest, Hartigan and DiCas. Plus the jury's not out on Dahl. MN: I think Taffe leaves. If Vanek arrives, MN should be very good. If he bolts, I think MN falls into the mass of mid-level competetive teams. CC: Good talent, but lose a lot. How they adjust to the loss of their best players just isn't known. The jury's still out on Owens. Wisconsin: Eaves will be good for them, but the biggest problem for Sconny is Sauer left a year too late. This is their year for a big recruiting class, and it's probably not what it could be had a promising new coach been reeling them in. I would be shocked by an upper division finish. Mankato: I don't know why they don't stink. Brose/Jutting must know how to coach. UAA: I think they fade, as they lose much more than they bring in. UND: Suddenly lose a lot. They really need the sophomore bump across-the-board. Duluth: Despite their losses, they are getting a taste of success. I think they'll continue to come on. Tech: What dan said.

Verrry interesting. In some ways it's like a mirror image of this season: home from mid-November to mid-January instead of away for all that time, and finish with three of four weekends away. Things I like: Only three weekends off all year - Oct 18-19, Dec 20-21, Jan 17-18. Four if you count the week between the regionals and the Frozen Four. No three-month road trip - It's still not balanced (three straight road series followed by six straight home weekends), but it's better. Things I don't like: Very weak non-conference opponents - It is good for college hockey to schedule these guys, but they won't do much to prepare the team and the RPI is already begging for mercy. I wish we could get all the schedule abuse from some of our opposing fans out of the way now. Since UND has the extra games from the UAA trip this year, I guess you could consider the Canisius series in mid-December as two extra games instead of having the weekend off. SCSU in the first half - Once again we aren't able to participate in the Husky Swoon, as all of our SCSU games are done by December 7.

Ouch. Best wishes to Ryan. As for leadership, there will be three fourth-year players on the team, all good character guys - Spiewak, Notermann and Ryan Hale. I'm not so worried about the leadership. It's the production I'm worried about. Its going to take more than one person stepping up to replace Bayda's offensive impact. One of the guys in the group above needs to have a Skarp-like breakout year. A few members of the big class need to move into the 30 to 40 point range. One other implication is that another scholarship has probably been opened up. Does Porter now come this year? Or does Blais have someone else in mind? Even without Bayda, strictly by the numbers there are plenty of forwards for next year.

Ryan Bayda, thanks for your great contributions to the Sioux's success from 1999-2001, and for helping to teach the new guys what Sioux hockey is all about. You will be missed. Good luck. For that matter, thanks also to Chad Mazurak, Aaron Schneekloth, Tim Skarperud and Andy Kollar, who all played significant roles in the Sioux competing for the national title in two consecutive years. Things didn't end the way everyone would have liked, but I'll remember the contributions during the great years.

We'd love him if he chose the Sioux. I can't complain about nothing being called on the jersey play because that was the way the OT was called - and I loved it. End-to-end, great chances, great saves - a bit of hooking and holding along the way, but that was due to the utter desperation on both sides. I can still picture Bayda floating in front of Hauser with the puck, all alone, waiting for an opening. Alas, he tried to move it over to Skarp, and it bounced around instead.

From Sunday's Herald: "As far as I know, Ryan will be back," Blais said. "But you never know when any player you have who has been drafted by the NHL might sign a pro contract." -------------------------------------- I am reasonably encouraged by this. It's been said by many, but it really is miserable to not have the Sioux playing now, especially when they're just as good as many of the teams still playing.