2006-2007 ND High School Hockey

[NDstatehockey]

RR and South are very good teams this year, I cant wait to go to Fargo on the 9th to watch them meet head to head. Central is having a hard season this year, but, I dont believe they can blame it to much on Alex Simonson quiting, he wasnt doing to much for the team this year. He is a very talented played, just not putting up the points. It could be because he may not have got enough playing time or something was wrong, I dont have enough info. to say anything more about it.

South should definetly be ranked number one right now base on the games they have played and the teams they beat. I don't see how you can rank DL over Grafton though when Grafton beat DL. I also don't see why everyone thinks Red River is so good when they barely beat WF and East Grand. Grafton blew WF away when they played them. I think the interesting game will be when Grafton demolishes RR.

[RoughRiders09]

South should definetly be ranked number one right now base on the games they have played and the teams they beat. I don't see how you can rank DL over Grafton though when Grafton beat DL. I also don't see why everyone thinks Red River is so good when they barely beat WF and East Grand. Grafton blew WF away when they played them. I think the interesting game will be when Grafton demolishes RR.

Was that a seriouse post? Stay off the coke buddy.

[Siouxmama]

South should definetly be ranked number one right now base on the games they have played and the teams they beat. I don't see how you can rank DL over Grafton though when Grafton beat DL. I also don't see why everyone thinks Red River is so good when they barely beat WF and East Grand. Grafton blew WF away when they played them. I think the interesting game will be when Grafton demolishes RR.

Maybe based on the rest of the games they have played so far. The DL/GPR game was a 1 goal game...in OT.

[roper1313]

I think you will see the South side hockey continue to compete with the Moorhead teams in the future. To be honest, this may be Moorhead's last shot at a HS state title for quite some time. The reason for the improvment in fargo is that there are more and more parents that played hockey now have kids coming through the system. When I came through the Flyer system in the 80s and South in the early 90s my dad was one of the 2 or 3 parents who could skate, and was probably the only one who played HS hockey.

I was fortunate enough to play against some of the best youth hockey teams in the country (GF Central/North team that won a Bantam national title and a moorhead team with multiple Div. 1 and NHL players) the reason these teams were so good is because their parents and coaches had a passion for hockey that didn't exitst in fargo at the time. A lot of that passion came from parents who played HS hockey and passed that down to their kids.

Will fargo ever get to that point? It's hard to say, but the gap is closing by the year.

[NDstatehockey]

Was that a seriouse post? Stay off the coke buddy.

Ok, RoughRiders09 everybody already knows how much credability you have. Zero.

[NDstatehockey]

Maybe based on the rest of the games they have played so far. The DL/GPR game was a 1 goal game...in OT.

Well if you mean minot, shanely, jamestown, and barely beating West Fargo you just prove my point even more.

[Siouxmama]

Well if you mean minot, shanely, jamestown, and barely beating West Fargo you just prove my point even more.

Yeah, whatever. I forgot you know so much more than me. I'm not claiming I know it all, I just posted my thoughts to your post. Chill.

[He Who Shoots Top Shelf]

Well if you mean minot, shanely, jamestown, and barely beating West Fargo you just prove my point even more.

In the end we should not be basing our opinions on a team based soley on scores. This year everyone knows South or Red River will finish 1-2 so why argue back and forth about how close they are to each other. It's unfair to judge Red River based on a one goal win over WF. Nobody is calling for DL's head who also had a tough game with WF. I'm also still not fully sold on Fargo North. The East is wide open 3-6 with GPR, DL, North, and WF. I believe North they were fortunate to steal one from GPR at home, but with their goaltending situation I'm not ready to make them state bound. We will learn a lot about North in the next week with home games against DL and WF, and they travel up to Purpur to battle Red River.

[riders06]

Well if you mean minot, shanely, jamestown, and barely beating West Fargo you just prove my point even more.

Red River hasn't played Minot this year.

[sioux ya ya]

South should definetly be ranked number one right now base on the games they have played and the teams they beat. I don't see how you can rank DL over Grafton though when Grafton beat DL. I also don't see why everyone thinks Red River is so good when they barely beat WF and East Grand. Grafton blew WF away when they played them. I think the interesting game will be when Grafton demolishes RR.

I hope you are kidding buddy. Grafton has questionable D and Goaltending. RR also played there back up goaltender against EGF, not sure on the WF game tho. But lets get serious, Grafton will not demolish RR nor will they even beat them.

[Lives-to-play-hockey-06]

average??? I heard they are picked to finish 2nd this year in 8a

One supposed "best team" in the state Red River eakes by a unranked 1A team 5-4. The other supposed "best team" in the state south beats top 15 minnesota 2A team 5-1.

Thanks Red River (my alma mater) for representing ND high school hockey with that solid win over EGF, South you guys should be ashamed only beat WBL by 4 is a joke, I mean come on WBL isn't half as good as the EGF Green Wave.

8A teams-Bagley, Crookston, Detroit Lakes, East Grand Forks, Kittson Central, Lake of the Woods, Park Rapids, Red Lake Falls, Thief River Falls, Warroad.

That is one deep conference: i hear bagley and kitteson central are pretty solid this year.

[NDstatehockey]

I hope you are kidding buddy. Grafton has questionable D and Goaltending. RR also played there back up goaltender against EGF, not sure on the WF game tho. But lets get serious, Grafton will not demolish RR nor will they even beat them.

I sincerely apologize for offending people on this predominantly Red River sight. Grafton may not demolish RR when they play them, but it will be a good game pitting GPR's offense v. RR defense. I'm sorry but South is the only team in the state that can be classified in a league of their own at the moment. RR isn't nearly what they are hyped up to be, the only thing they have is good defense who in turn make their goalie look half decent, and give their offense a chance. I saw RR goalie play in Fargo in the fall; I wasn't at all impressed with him when he didn't have strong defense in front of him.

[Matt]

One supposed "best team" in the state Red River eakes by a unranked 1A team 5-4. The other supposed "best team" in the state south beats top 15 minnesota 2A team 5-1.

Thanks Red River (my alma mater) for representing ND high school hockey with that solid win over EGF, South you guys should be ashamed only beat WBL by 4 is a joke, I mean come on WBL isn't half as good as the EGF Green Wave.

8A teams-Bagley, Crookston, Detroit Lakes, East Grand Forks, Kittson Central, Lake of the Woods, Park Rapids, Red Lake Falls, Thief River Falls, Warroad.

That is one deep conference: i hear bagley and kitteson central are pretty solid this year.

Hey now, easy on the 8A teams. I'd trade Crookston, EGF, LoW, TRF, and Warroad for any teams out west straight up to make it a better state tourney.

[BringDeanBack]

I think you will see the South side hockey continue to compete with the Moorhead teams in the future. To be honest, this may be Moorhead's last shot at a HS state title for quite some time. The reason for the improvment in fargo is that there are more and more parents that played hockey now have kids coming through the system. When I came through the Flyer system in the 80s and South in the early 90s my dad was one of the 2 or 3 parents who could skate, and was probably the only one who played HS hockey.

I was fortunate enough to play against some of the best youth hockey teams in the country (GF Central/North team that won a Bantam national title and a moorhead team with multiple Div. 1 and NHL players) the reason these teams were so good is because their parents and coaches had a passion for hockey that didn't exitst in fargo at the time. A lot of that passion came from parents who played HS hockey and passed that down to their kids.

Will fargo ever get to that point? It's hard to say, but the gap is closing by the year.

Good point. Fargo South's/Flyers success is also based on numbers and having what appears to be good coaching, at least at the youth levels. Most Flyers teams that I have seen never have that one standout kid that scores all of the goals. Rather, the teams are full of solid, above average players. They don't have that weak kid that you can count on to fall flat on his butt while defending the 2 on 1 that most teams seem to have.

[Matt]

If anyone wants a preview of South's Dec 21 opponent-Moorhead-they play Grand Rapids on FSN @7:45.

[RoughRiders09]

I sincerely apologize for offending people on this predominantly Red River sight. Grafton may not demolish RR when they play them, but it will be a good game pitting GPR's offense v. RR defense. I'm sorry but South is the only team in the state that can be classified in a league of their own at the moment. RR isn't nearly what they are hyped up to be, the only thing they have is good defense who in turn make their goalie look half decent, and give their offense a chance. I saw RR goalie play in Fargo in the fall; I wasn't at all impressed with him when he didn't have strong defense in front of him.

So I guess RR's goalies anrt good, yet they are the top two in the state, tell me how that works? South is not in a league of their own and what do you mean RR isnt as good as they are hyped up to be? They're 6-0, tell me how theyre not good. You will say, "well that havnt played as hard of teams as South has." Well we will play them, dont worry about it. South and RR at this point are tied for 1st place, not in the standings but in reality. You cant say anyone will smoke anyone until they acaully play.

[ND Pride]

The Fargo Patriots were formed in the late 80's and was started for kids who could not afford to play for the Raiders or Flyers. The Patriots attracted many kids that would not have otherwise played organized hockey. They did not "break away" from anybody.

Towards the end, the Patriots ended up imploding because of overzealous parents who wanted to start an 'A' team. They ended up starting the Outlaws - a B-1 bantam team. I spent five years coaching the Patriots and a large number of kids went to Oak Grove or Shanley, many of these families switched to the Angels when they started up.

The Patriots were a great thing for youth hockey in the area, in that they gave kids a chance to play. I agree that they did not "develop" talent to play at the next level, but that was not the point of the program. It was simply to let the kids have fun. Although a number of talented players played Patriots, including Tanner Bombeger from North and Alex Hooey from South.

The Angels appear to have watered down the Flyers a bit. Most of the Angels players are southsiders. It will be interesting to see how many of the top players go to Shanley.

It is true that the Fargo Patriots provided a nice outlet for some kids to play hockey. Some of the kids who played, may in fact, have not played hockey had it not been for that club. However, the group was formed in opposition to the other Fargo Youth Hockey programs. I am well aware of this as I was asked to do a review of any research literature that would show the negative aspects of kids being cut or being put on a B team as opposed to an A team. One of the founders of the Patriots asked for this research review. They wanted a total B program and initially, some did not want checking as part of their program. The early relations between the Patriots and Fargo Youth Hockey were extremely negative. In fact, there was a lot of hostility between the organizations. My recollection is that the club was started in the late 70s or early 80s. I can get an exact start date for the group in a day or two. I have talked with many of the parents on both sides of that development back in the early days and there was a lot of conflict.

There were a number of talented players who played for the Patriots such as Mr Hockey Cory McClean who left as a peewee or bantam. One of the problems with the Patriots is that some parents put kids in the program that belonged in a better developmental situation. That ended up hurting hockey in Fargo from the high level competitive standpoint. Many Patriot parents were just as competitive as Flyer and Raider parents and in fact felt their players were as competitive (if only they were not in a B system). For a year or two a Patriot All Star team played Raider teams at least at the Squirt level. The Patriot organization was conflicted in many ways and people who did not understand hockey development got their kids in their low level program when they should have been in a better one. If you just wanted to have fun, were concerned about costs, and did not want to travel much it was a cool place to play. But from a strictly competitive developmental standpoint Patriot hockey hurt high level development in Fargo. That may be a bad thing, or a good thing or neutral depending on your standpoint but when talking about who could have the best team Patriots hurt mainstream clubs by draining off some of the talent and not developing them as effectively as they should have been developed.

[ND Pride]

One supposed "best team" in the state Red River eakes by a unranked 1A team 5-4. The other supposed "best team" in the state south beats top 15 minnesota 2A team 5-1.

Thanks Red River (my alma mater) for representing ND high school hockey with that solid win over EGF, South you guys should be ashamed only beat WBL by 4 is a joke, I mean come on WBL isn't half as good as the EGF Green Wave.

8A teams-Bagley, Crookston, Detroit Lakes, East Grand Forks, Kittson Central, Lake of the Woods, Park Rapids, Red Lake Falls, Thief River Falls, Warroad.

That is one deep conference: i hear bagley and kitteson central are pretty solid this year.

Nice analysis. Thanks for putting that together.

[JacksonW]

I think you will see the South side hockey continue to compete with the Moorhead teams in the future. To be honest, this may be Moorhead's last shot at a HS state title for quite some time. The reason for the improvment in fargo is that there are more and more parents that played hockey now have kids coming through the system. When I came through the Flyer system in the 80s and South in the early 90s my dad was one of the 2 or 3 parents who could skate, and was probably the only one who played HS hockey.

I was fortunate enough to play against some of the best youth hockey teams in the country (GF Central/North team that won a Bantam national title and a moorhead team with multiple Div. 1 and NHL players) the reason these teams were so good is because their parents and coaches had a passion for hockey that didn't exitst in fargo at the time. A lot of that passion came from parents who played HS hockey and passed that down to their kids.

Will fargo ever get to that point? It's hard to say, but the gap is closing by the year.

Coming from another part of the country that doesn't have high school hockey, but has midget minor and midget major. Which level of pee wee and bantam do the best North Dakota teams play at?

[ND Pride]

Coming from another part of the country that doesn't have high school hockey, but has midget minor and midget major. Which level of pee wee and bantam do the best North Dakota teams play at?

In North Dakota the regular season (Nov-March) youth hockey teams are essentialy based on a geographic area within a community. Smaller communities have one team (Grafton, Jamestown, etc) and larger communities have more (e.g. Grand Forks, Bismarck, Fargo). Since they do not take players (petitions are possible) out of their district (which is typically the boundary for the nearest public high school) they are classified as "A" teams. At the bantam level in years when a team is sent to USA Hockey Nationals they compete at the Tier II level. There are no regular season AAA teams in North Dakota and you could probably argue that our post season spring Select teams are probably AA at best and not at the Tier I level such as teams like Chicago Mission, Team Illinois, Little Cesaer's, Honeybaked, Compuware, Shattuck-St. Mary's etc.

[UNDhockey22]

So I guess RR's goalies anrt good, yet they are the top two in the state, tell me how that works? South is not in a league of their own and what do you mean RR isnt as good as they are hyped up to be? They're 6-0, tell me how theyre not good. You will say, "well that havnt played as hard of teams as South has." Well we will play them, dont worry about it. South and RR at this point are tied for 1st place, not in the standings but in reality. You cant say anyone will smoke anyone until they acaully play.

I believe the two best goalies in the state are Michael Hillman (recruited to play for Bismarck of the NAHL), and Sean Diechert. Sean and Michael were arguably the best goalies in the state last year (Rosendahl, Kringstad) and with Red Rivers goalies playing back-up last year and only playing 6 games this year, I do not think it's reasonable to say they are at the same level as these two.

[UNDhockey22]

In North Dakota the regular season (Nov-March) youth hockey teams are essentialy based on a geographic area within a community. Smaller communities have one team (Grafton, Jamestown, etc) and larger communities have more (e.g. Grand Forks, Bismarck, Fargo). Since they do not take players (petitions are possible) out of their district (which is typically the boundary for the nearest public high school) they are classified as "A" teams. At the bantam level in years when a team is sent to USA Hockey Nationals they compete at the Tier II level. There are no regular season AAA teams in North Dakota and you could probably argue that our post season spring Select teams are probably AA at best and not at the Tier I level such as teams like Chicago Mission, Team Illinois, Little Cesaer's, Honeybaked, Compuware, Shattuck-St. Mary's etc.

The AAA label in North Dakota and every state for that matter is thrown around way too loosely. It seems that if you play in the summer, the team you are on is called a AAA team. I've been at tournements where those "AAA" teams couldnt compete with a good A team. I can only think of two or three summer teams that North Dakota has had that could have been considered a AAA team. An actual AAA team would usually lay a pretty good licking to a team from ND that claims to be AAA.

[RighteousOne]

I believe the two best goalies in the state are Michael Hillman (recruited to play for Bismarck of the NAHL), and Sean Diechert. Sean and Michael were arguably the best goalies in the state last year (Rosendahl, Kringstad) and with Red Rivers goalies playing back-up last year and only playing 6 games this year, I do not think it's reasonable to say they are at the same level as these two.

there garbage

[Matt]

Have any ND high school players given any D-1 verbals this year?

[ND Pride]

The Fargo Patriots were formed in the late 80's and was started for kids who could not afford to play for the Raiders or Flyers. The Patriots attracted many kids that would not have otherwise played organized hockey. They did not "break away" from anybody.

Towards the end, the Patriots ended up imploding because of overzealous parents who wanted to start an 'A' team. They ended up starting the Outlaws - a B-1 bantam team. I spent five years coaching the Patriots and a large number of kids went to Oak Grove or Shanley, many of these families switched to the Angels when they started up.

The Patriots were a great thing for youth hockey in the area, in that they gave kids a chance to play. I agree that they did not "develop" talent to play at the next level, but that was not the point of the program. It was simply to let the kids have fun. Although a number of talented players played Patriots, including Tanner Bombeger from North and Alex Hooey from South.

The Angels appear to have watered down the Flyers a bit. Most of the Angels players are southsiders. It will be interesting to see how many of the top players go to Shanley.

You have your dates correct as the Patriots were started in the 87-88 season and added their building in 1989. I was only off by about 8-10 years.