The Golden Gophers @ UND- 10/17 and 10/18

[Wilbur]

The gophers visit the Ralph after splitting with BC.  Losing Thursday night, but rebounding to get the all important non conference shootout victory on Friday night.  The weekend before they split with Tech, in which they trailed in the third period in both games. 

Friday night has all the makings of a trap game.  UND feeling good about themselves, and the gophers winless in regulation in their last three and may play with some desperation.

Full building, lots of energy, we need to come out with a ton of energy.  Get the first one and blow the roof off the place.  If you get the 2nd and the 3rd I'd bet on the gophers folding up the tent.  

I'll say a split, with some growing pains for UND.

[fightingsioux4life]

43 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

The gophers visit the Ralph after splitting with BC.  Losing Thursday night, but rebounding to get the all important non conference shootout victory on Friday night.  The weekend before they split with Tech, in which they trailed in the third period in both games. 

Friday night has all the makings of a trap game.  UND feeling good about themselves, and the gophers winless in regulation in their last three and may play with some desperation.

Full building, lots of energy, we need to come out with a ton of energy.  Get the first one and blow the roof off the place.  If you get the 2nd and the 3rd I'd bet on the gophers folding up the tent.  

I'll say a split, with some growing pains for UND.

That is what usually happens between these teams.

Not being in the same conference anymore does nothing to dimmish the importance of this rivalry for myself. They are the #1 enemy of this program (Denver is a distant second). Let's blow them out of the building this weekend! 

[Und Princess]

I am Excited too!!! My pregame and Prediction blog for the Gophers series will be up Friday Morning!

[beastandco]

UND has to stay out of the box this weekend. If they stay out of the box, this team will wear their opponent down.

I felt like a couple of the penalties called on UND were soft on Friday. Nonetheless, we cannot play like we did in the 2nd period last night.

Minnesota will likely be less disciplined than St. Thomas. I would expect to see our powerplay a little more than we did last night. 

[Oxbow6]

9 minutes ago, Und Princess said:

I am Excited too!!! My pregame and Prediction blog for the Gophers series will be up Friday Morning!

Better predict a sweep or you might see this from the SS faithful by noon on Friday.....

[hawksfan12]

According to Wikpedia, series all time is 145-137-16 in favor of Minnesota. I want to see us make progress on passing them in all-time series (hopefully in next 15-20 years can pass them).

As a side note, programs with 5+ games played UND has a losing record against. Very small list!

Cornell (12 games) - .417

Wisconsin (113 games) - .460

Michigan (94 games) - . 468

Minnesota (298 games) - .487

Notre Dame (38 games) - .487

[fightingsioux4life]

10 minutes ago, hawksfan12 said:

According to Wikpedia, series all time is 145-137-16 in favor of Minnesota. I want to see us make progress on passing them in all-time series (hopefully in next 15-20 years can pass them).

As a side note, programs with 5+ games played UND has a losing record against. Very small list!

Cornell (12 games) - .417

Wisconsin (113 games) - .460

Michigan (94 games) - . 468

Minnesota (298 games) - .487

Notre Dame (38 games) - .487

A lot of those losses to Minnesota happened in the 1970's, which were not kind to UND.

[farce poobah]

48 minutes ago, hawksfan12 said:

According to Wikpedia, series all time is 145-137-16 in favor of Minnesota. I want to see us make progress on passing them in all-time series (hopefully in next 15-20 years can pass them).

As a side note, programs with 5+ games played UND has a losing record against. Very small list!

Cornell (12 games) - .417

Wisconsin (113 games) - .460

Michigan (94 games) - . 468

Minnesota (298 games) - .487

Notre Dame (38 games) - .487

UND counts the all time series record as 136-143-16 .488 (the difference is a few games in the 1930's vs a UND club team (maybe even a frat team? predates me)

GF-GA amazingly 1008-1005

https://fightinghawks.com/documents/2025/10/1/2025-26_UND_Hockey_Media_Guide.pdf

[Und Princess]

1 hour ago, Oxbow6 said:

Better predict a sweep or you might see this from the SS faithful by noon on Friday.....

I am UND all the way! Minnesota Gophers Suck!!!

[Dave Berger]

The North Dakota/Minnesota Hockey Rivalry: A Trip Down Memory Lane

Please enjoy, and make sure you've got enough time to watch all of the video clips! 🙂

 

Dave

[ND_Texan]

The Minny program is going to continue to suffer as long as they avoid CHL chippahs. They no longer draw the best of the best from their own state (for example, Zellers). Haven’t for a long while in fact. The golden era of the Golden Gophers has long left the station. Motzko and Company are about to feel the full brunt of their isolationist approach to recruiting. Maybe they are already are. 

[brianvf]

They've had a nice current recruiting cycle...even picking up a few very good non-MN players.
Still no CHL or any even rumored to want to go there.  
Their last recruiting cycle was pretty bad though, and I think they'll feel that for a few years.

[Blackheart]

49 minutes ago, ND_Texan said:

The Minny program is going to continue to suffer as long as they avoid CHL chippahs. They no longer draw the best of the best from their own state (for example, Zellers). Haven’t for a long while in fact. The golden era of the Golden Gophers has long left the station. Motzko and Company are about to feel the full brunt of their isolationist approach to recruiting. Maybe they are already are. 

I don't know...they were pretty damn good a couple years ago.  How they lost that championship game to the Q is beyond me; that Gofer squad was LOADED.  If they are down a little now, great for UND...because it usually doesn't last too long before they are good again.

[hockeytherapy13]

59 minutes ago, ND_Texan said:

The Minny program is going to continue to suffer as long as they avoid CHL chippahs. They no longer draw the best of the best from their own state (for example, Zellers). Haven’t for a long while in fact. The golden era of the Golden Gophers has long left the station. Motzko and Company are about to feel the full brunt of their isolationist approach to recruiting. Maybe they are already are. 

They’ve made the frozen 4 twice in the last 4 years, including making the national championship game. Combine that with having a really good recruiting cycle so far and a new hockey-only NIL collective, I don’t anticipate them being in bad shape.
 

But man I hope they bring the same game they played last weekend to the Ralph this coming weekend 

[Wilbur]

36 minutes ago, Blackheart said:

I don't know...they were pretty damn good a couple years ago.  How they lost that championship game to the Q is beyond me; that Gofer squad was LOADED.  If they are down a little now, great for UND...because it usually doesn't last too long before they are good again.

They took advice from Brad Berry and played not to lose the third period....two shots on goal....

Then they didn't start Faber in OT for whatever reason, and got beat by a center ice set play that hadn't worked all season for the Q.

[beastandco]

39 minutes ago, hockeytherapy13 said:

They’ve made the frozen 4 twice in the last 4 years, including making the national championship game. Combine that with having a really good recruiting cycle so far and a new hockey-only NIL collective, I don’t anticipate them being in bad shape.
 

But man I hope they bring the same game they played last weekend to the Ralph this coming weekend 

After listening to GPL last week, it sounds like there is a lot of concern and frustration with Minnesota’s ability to pay players and are less than optimistic when looking into the future.

Minnesota’s issue with paying hockey players is that they are not allocated really any money for revenue sharing and their “Dinktown Athletes” NIL fund is not giving them much support either. The Golden Helmet collective was created to try and bypass these issues.

Now, the issue with the Golden Helmet Collective is that the player has to provide equal value to the company for their NIL services or the newly created NIL Go will not clear the deal.

Minnesota will be fine but much like North Dakota, they will not be able to be the highest bidder.

[hawksfan12]

6 hours ago, fightingsioux4life said:

That is what usually happens between these teams.

Not being in the same conference anymore does nothing to dimmish the importance of this rivalry for myself. They are the #1 enemy of this program (Denver is a distant second). Let's blow them out of the building this weekend! 

I think Denver is currently enemy #1, not Minnesota. 

[nodakgirl93]

Just now, hawksfan12 said:

I think Denver is currently enemy #1, not Minnesota. 

Agree. Especially with their 3 natty wins since our last. 

[fightingsioux4life]

46 minutes ago, hawksfan12 said:

I think Denver is currently enemy #1, not Minnesota. 

Nope. Not even close.

The decades of enmity between UND and UMN is simply unmatched. At least Denver fans recognize our program's place as one of the blue bloods in this sport. There are Goofer fans that don't think we belong amongst the mighty Golden Gophers, which is part of what fuels the rivalry.

[Godsmack]

2 hours ago, Blackheart said:

I don't know...they were pretty damn good a couple years ago.  How they lost that championship game to the Q is beyond me; that Gofer squad was LOADED.  If they are down a little now, great for UND...because it usually doesn't last too long before they are good again.

Thinking back on that overtime winner, had the one Gopher D man not bit and committed in the neutral zone, maybe Q doesn’t score on that sick two on one. Man, if that were a designed set play, kudos to Coach Pecknold and staff for drawing that up! He deserves a ten year extension simply for that one play, IMO. 

[ND_Texan]

3 hours ago, Blackheart said:

I don't know...they were pretty damn good a couple years ago.  How they lost that championship game to the Q is beyond me; that Gofer squad was LOADED.  If they are down a little now, great for UND...because it usually doesn't last too long before they are good again.

My point is they are going to suffer going forward for not dipping into the talented CHL pool. It’s a new opportunity for all, but they seem to be avoiding it. For now anyway. 

[Goon]

I took a look back at some of the great memories from this rivalry series.

Link: Minnesota and North Dakota to Battle; Oh, the Memories

 

 

[tnt]

8 hours ago, beastandco said:

UND has to stay out of the box this weekend. If they stay out of the box, this team will wear their opponent down.

I felt like a couple of the penalties called on UND were soft on Friday. Nonetheless, we cannot play like we did in the 2nd period last night.

Minnesota will likely be less disciplined than St. Thomas. I would expect to see our powerplay a little more than we did last night. 

There were a couple times last night where UND took a couple swats at St. Thomas after the whistle.  Can’t afford to take unnecessary penalties after the whistle.  Minnesota probably has a little more talent to make us pay for those penalties since they live off the power play.  
Hopefully Strinden is letting the new guys on the squad about the history of the series, along with Minnesota’s hatred for Canadians.

 

 

[hawksfan12]

1 hour ago, fightingsioux4life said:

Nope. Not even close.

The decades of enmity between UND and UMN is simply unmatched. At least Denver fans recognize our program's place as one of the blue bloods in this sport. There are Goofer fans that don't think we belong amongst the mighty Golden Gophers, which is part of what fuels the rivalry.

Every Gophers fans I've meant knows UND is a blue blood. They just hate our program. All I say is F them back.

5 hours ago, ND_Texan said:

The Minny program is going to continue to suffer as long as they avoid CHL chippahs. They no longer draw the best of the best from their own state (for example, Zellers). Haven’t for a long while in fact. The golden era of the Golden Gophers has long left the station. Motzko and Company are about to feel the full brunt of their isolationist approach to recruiting. Maybe they are already are. 

I have to admit Bob Motzko does not seem like he should be a coach of a blue blood. Gophers need a young visionary polished guy running the program. Doesn't appear that Bob has any vision or striver mindset like the other big school coaches (he's no Hakstol, how Jackson sounds, Nick Saban in football if you hear them all talk). I seriously have no idea what Minnesota saw in him unless he was a transitional coach for them after Lucia. 

[Goon]

3 hours ago, fightingsioux4life said:

At least Denver fans recognize our program's place as one of the blue bloods in this sport. There are Goofer fans that don't think we belong amongst the mighty Golden Gophers, which is part of what fuels the rivalry.

If I had to guess, I would bet most of us couldn't care less what some clueless Gopher fan thinks. UND is a blue-blood program.