SCSU Game 2

[Diggler]

This is the first time I have seen a Sioux goalie win a game for the team in quite a few years ...extraordinarily encouraging to me...

You must not have seen the DU playoff games last year then.

UMDDogz did Peluso at least manage to not get whooped tonight?

[CRC]

You must not have seen the DU playoff games last year then.

Brandt played well in the 3 games against DU in the playoffs last year. However, I don't recall him being left out to dry so often as in the first two periods of the game tonight. Brandt made 3 saves on breakaways (including a behind the back, blind, glove hand save) to keep the game tied with SCSU tonight. Every one of those saves was at a critical point in the game, especially since SCSU was outplaying the Sioux at those points, and the result of the game could have certainly been different. I'm just saying that it's the first time in 2 1/2 years that I have seen a goalie win a game for the Sioux.

My point is that Brandt played really well tonight - I was impressed and am really optimistic about the rest of the season.

[schmidtdoggydog]

Well, since I complained of the Schneider/Smaby defense early, I should add that they played well after that, no more whiffs. Jones, of course, was super, and if he isn't an All American dman this year noone in the WCHA is.

I was at both games and have to say that, in my opinion, Schneider and Smaby were the two worst players on the ice for UND this weekend! AS was -3 on Friday, which is unacceptable for a player of his caliber. Does someone know, is he still feeling the effects of his early season injury? Smaby had three penalties last night, which puts a large burden on the penalty killers (ala Greene last year). I didn't think either of those two were particularly effective tonight either.

As for Jones, he has been awesome and clearly elevated his game considerably. He has been fantastic on both ends of the ice. Your comments about All-American status is right on the mark.

As for Bochenski, is there a better player in the country right now? In my opinion, NO!!!

[UMDDogz]

UMDDogz did Peluso at least manage to not get whooped tonight?

Peluso was the only player to get a misconduct for the 15:04 incident. I didn't hear the game, but he must have just throw a haymaker. Probably getting revenge for what happened at 13:33. A Falcon player was given a misconduct in tht incident. It must have been bad. After 13:33 there were 10 players in the box (5 each team, plus one BG Falcon ejected). After 15:04 there were 12 players in the box, plus another misconduct; totalling 14 ineligible players. I can't even imagine what you do as a coach in that situation. Bowling Green knew they had to start all kinds of trouble in order to play with the Dogs, and I'm sure there was a level of frustration after being blown out the night before.

[UMDDogz]

A funny footnote: The CCHA website, in it's preview of the BG/UMD series calls Minnesota the land of 1,000 lakes!!

[NorthDakotaHockey]

I was at the game with my kids. Sat in 208. A great gackle of Sioux fans there. We stayed and cheered hard for the Sioux until the handshakes were over and the team was off the ice. Because we were right behind the student section, a few of the SCSU students finally got a little irate, for no good reason. Perhaps they simply have never seen, and will never understand, the type of support that Sioux fans give their team, especially on the road.

Was a sloppy game, by and large. Nevertheless, there is nothing better than a WCHA game going into the third period on a Saturday night on a tie score. All of the boys looked a bit tired by that time, but only because they had been skating hard past, and through, clutch and grabs for five periods, and an OT session, by then.

Brandt was huge on several occasions. He did not have as much help as he should have had. Greene and Jones are always solid, or nearly so. Schneider is with Smaby because he can, and will, and does, teach Smaby things that Smaby needs to learn before he will become solid. Fuhrer and Bina are more than adequate. Bina is really growing on me. Maybe a shade too offensive-minded, but nothing wrong with that with the likes of Brandt between the posts.

All in all, a huge 3 point weekend. All the SCSU fans could resort to at the end was the now long-tired waving of play money to mock Bochenski, and asking us if we wanted to buy any pull tabs. Funny. I wish that I had brough along a couple of sixth grade work books so that I could have asked them if they wanted to help, Conboy get back on the ice.

Great crowd Sioux fans. We really did take it to the home team, all weekend long.

[CoteauRinkRat]

Great win and three point weekend for the Sioux. They needed at least two points out of the weekend, and got three. Let's keep on this roll.

[huskies679]

Wow are we bad!

[Smoggy]

I was able to go to the game last night and here are my thoughts:

National Concrete Center

Can be a very loud place, but they didn't cheer much. Lots of fans right on top of the ice. I have been hearing how terrible their fans are, but was only told that we suck once. Must be because only handful of students were there. Good thing they are buying new scoreboards, because you can't read the ones they have.

I had standing room tickets and for those that don't know, you stand in the aisle between lower and upper seats. You have to stand against the back wall, but fans are constantly walking past you! Even the ushers are walking during the play. The standing room seats are like $12 (plus fees), which is rather high when you can't see a lot of the game due to inconsiderate people.

Ice was awful. Pucks bouncing and players falling. At times it was a Mites game.

The Game

Ugly. There was no flow. I didn't feel that SCSU held us so much through the neutral zone, but along the boards was terrible. They loved to pull us down and then lay on us for a while. They must need some lovin'.

We looked slow/lazy on D into our defensive zone. Tired maybe? SCSU had a very easy time getting into our zone. St. Cloud just looked faster coming into the zone. That shorty we gave up was a terrible defensive play.

Our forecheck was very good, but sometimes our guys wouldn't even put a stick out and try to knock down a SCSU pass. I believe McMahon caused a SCSU rush in the third, because he didn't grab the puck in our offensive zone.

Our penalty kill is awesome. Our power play wasn't the worst I've seen. We kept control of the puck and had it in the offensive zone almost the entire time. Our point men seemed a little slow on either shooting or passing. Only one horrible powerplay where SCSU constantly cleared the puck.

Brandt made some great saves, but was flopping a bit. I counted 3 wide open nets that SCSU completely missed with shots, plus the shorty goal was a direct result of Brandt getting himself out of position. That said, he played very well.

Coole didn't impress me. He can stop a shot just fine, but couldn't control a rebound and didn't know when to cover the puck. He fumbled a lot of passes.

Anderson

Sucks. Bad. One thing I didn't like from the Sioux was how much slashing they did. He didn't call it though. He missed many calls and made other calls that didn't make sense. In the second on a SCSU 1 on 1 rush, our d had their stick in front of him. The SCSU player ran into it and fell face first. Penalty. Fine. But on the kill, the puck was slowly cleared and Bochenski was rushing up the boards. As the puck crossed into SCSU's zone, the d man turned and gave Bochenski a hug and hauled him down. No call and Bochenski wasn't near the puck.

EDIT (thanks to dirty for reminder on USCHO): Anderson calling bochenski for checking the goalie when Boch was checked. Anderson also takes the SCSU player. Either he was shoved and hit the goalie, or checked the goalie. It can't be both ways.

PCU's Announcer

Different. He talks to the crowd which was fun. BUT, the PC police better get on him for my two favorite lines that he says.

"Yes, YES, Here come the Huskies!" needs a parental advisory for sexual content. The first time I heard it I thought someone tapped the mike with a porn.

"Here come your HUSKY cheerleaders," was just plain funny.

Sorry so long, but thanks for reading.

Edited January 4, 2004 by cheeringsiouxfromsmoggycali

[Smoggy]

A couple of other things.

It seemed like we were really killing them in face offs won. I love the draw going right to Bochenski for the shot.

The National Concrete Center has some tinted windows in the one end of the rink where the suites are. I just get this image of Bill Gates, Monty Burns and Darth Vader sitting in there saying "excellent" and "everything is going according to plan."

[UMDDogz]

If you get there really late you have to stand on the end behind glass, and try to see around big concrete pillars. The scoreboard animations suck, and are impossible to read. The graphix scream 1989, and every other bulb is burned out.

[DBSearle]

My two cents on the weekend....

The Sioux better call Jostens to get their ring orders in. Their forward can fly, thier D is nasty and their goalies are good enough if not spectacular when they need to be. I don't know how the hell Brandt stopped Houseman pointblank with a behind-the-back no-look glove save. The Sioux do have a few things to work on, as was previously mentioned, Schneider looked tentative/injured and Smaby looked like a Squirt at times. Massen just doesn't seem that interested in playing sometimes (girlfriend trouble?). But when you throw in Fylling, Canady and Genoway and "Hobey" Bochenski with the three guys you were missing; you can afford a few minor chinks in the armor. Oh yeah, you have the best coach in the country, as if you didin't know that. The Huskies transition game was OK, but our powerplay was brutal. 0-12 with only 7 shots on the weekend. Thank God they managed two shorthanded goals. My buddy and I were speculating that SCSU should decline the Sioux penalties, we seemed more competitive 5-5. St.Cloud had trouble with faceoffs all weekend, especially in their defensive zone. Goaltending was good, but as somebody else said, Coole leaves too many juicy rebounds. The Huskies had the effort this weekend, just not quite enough talent to sneak two points away from the Sioux. Anderson called a decent couple of games, although I'm not sure how you call a rough against the Sioux AND a diving minor against Jensen for the same play. Shouldn't it be one way or the other?

Good luck to the Sioux Nation.

[siouxgrad]

I was also at the game on Saturday and wanted to know if anyone else saw the student throw a puck at the last of the Sioux players leaving the ice after warm-ups?

Haven't seen anything that bad for a long time; and the student didn't seem to want to come up to visit us to discuss what he did wrong. We were seated right above the student section.

Not sure where security was during this incident, but you'd think they would be watching the student section and someone should've been tossed for it.

Some additional observations:

1. SCSU need to take up a collection for the painted student in shorts who also needed to paint a number on himself. Although I'll give him credit, he got fan of the game.

2. The SCSU students need to learn which finger to use when addressing Sioux players/fans. It's #1 not the middle finger.

3. Sioux fans were loud.

4. Little kids behind us with their parents were great fans. They were clapping and chanting "Lets Go Huskies" and the rink was so quiet you could actually hear the little kids. The other fans could learn from this; or maybe their hands were too full of pull-tabs/Bochenski bucks.

[dagies]

My seats didn't allow as good a view on Saturday as on Friday so didn't come away with quite as many comments but here's a few:

Schneider - still looking for his game. Played hard, but had trouble handling the puck, and difficulty getting the puck to the net which is something he's talked about in the past.

Smaby - I thought had a better game on Saturday, didn't get beat as often while looking for the big hit at the blue line as he did on Friday. And made some impressive plays with the puck. He's got potential and just needs experience I think.

Fuher had another good game but late had some difficulty, once icing the puck very late in the game (Hakstol got on him for that) and once when he and Genoway allowed a shorthand rush on Brandt. Fuher got turned around pretty good. However, it was tough to tell if it was Fuher's fault. As he came to the bench he was communicating with Colby and demonstrating what the Husky did. Could be he was telling Colby that it was Fuher's fault, or he was demonstrating how Colby should have picked the guy up....

Genoway had another very solid game, and looks real confident out there.

Jones - a stud once again. What a great player.

Bochenski - another good game but didn't have quite the ability to do what he wanted as he did on Friday night. I credit that to St. Cloud playing better.

Porter - Chris had a great game. Late in the game replaced Fylling on the top line.

Fylling - not quite as noticeable as on Friday night.

Prpich - solid, but not real noticeable.

Canady - Brian had another strong game and seems to me he'll be playing a lot the second half of the year. Didn't seem to me to make many mistakes, and played hard aggressive hockey. I'll be honest, I think there are times in the past when Brian would have gotten into situations and gotten frustrated and taken a penalty. None of that this weekend...Brian seems to have matured and is playing well.

Massen - I think Massen had a better game on Saturday then on Friday. And I was hopeful because he played a bit harder that last part of Friday's game. Saturday he still at times looked tentative or lacking in confidence, but he did put one WICKED backhander on Coole in the 2nd period that I'm sure had to be surgically removed between periods. It gives me hope that James will be able to play his way through this. I can think of one shift in particular where he was dominant on the ice.

Power Play - didn't get set-up and rolling as well as on Friday. This seems to be the story of the game as I think SCSU just played better and harder on Saturday.

PK, was pretty good except for the SH.

Defense - we kept them out of our zone quite a bit, but once they got in the zone it was always scary. And after the quick starts both nights you always seemed to suck in your breath every time SCSU had a rush.

Brandt played well it seems but all the big saves were at the other end so was hard to see them. It did appear that St. Cloud missed some open net chances.

[cfm567b27]

Best seat in the house at the NHC is the SRO ticket.....center ice or wherever you choose if you don't mind standing for the whole game. I agree that arena is SEVERELY old school. Then again we are a bit spoiled.

[Smoggy]

Best seat in the house at the NHC is the SRO ticket.....center ice or wherever you choose if you don't mind standing for the whole game. I agree that arena is SEVERELY old school. Then again we are a bit spoiled.

The standing room would be great if people weren't allowed to constantly walk in front of you while the game is going on.