FIXING IT !

north45

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Let's talk about what needs to happen to FIX the Gophers !

1. Replace Lucia !
As I've said before I think it's time for Don to move on. However, with an AD how could care less about the hockey program Don probably isn't going anywhere until Don decides it's time to go. MINNESOTA IS A HOCKEY SCHOOL ! They couldn't have picked a worse person to be the AD at a hockey school than Norwood.

2. Goalie !
They have to come up with a lights out goalie or everything else is a waste of time. The good goalies these days are big guys. The era of the small quick goal tender seems to have past.

3. Take care of business in your own end !
How often this past season that the Gophers control the puck in the offensive zone for extended periods only to give up an odd man rush and the other team scored ? A LOT in my recollection. Watching the NCAA tournament the best teams had big tough defenseman who never let anyone near the slot. The Gophers rarely have problems scoring but they need to do a lot better in their own end.

4. Size matters !
Winning teams tend to have bigger (and older ) players these days. You can have a few Cammerattas and Lettieris but you have to have size these days. Ryan Collins and Jaxon Nelson would seem to indicate that they are looking for size. You also need guys who have voted a few times already. 19 and 20 year olds have trouble competing physically with 23 and 24 year olds.

5. The right blend of players !
Don seems to get a lot of guys who want the puck and want to score. He can't seem to put the right "blend " together however. The team chemistry often seems out of whack. Herb Brooks knew how to put the right group of guys together. Players with grit and players he could push when necessary.

6. Is it time to recruit more outside of Minnesota ?
I hate teams like RIT that load up on almost exclusively Canadians. BU had a lot of local players but they also brought in players from Europe and elsewhere. Personally I've always been very proud of the fact that Minnesota's roster was almost exclusively Minnesotans but maybe it's time to bring in a few players from outside of Minnesota ?
 

Let's talk about what needs to happen to FIX the Gophers !

1. Replace Lucia !
As I've said before I think it's time for Don to move on. However, with an AD how could care less about the hockey program Don probably isn't going anywhere until Don decides it's time to go. MINNESOTA IS A HOCKEY SCHOOL ! They couldn't have picked a worse person to be the AD at a hockey school than Norwood.

2. Goalie !
They have to come up with a lights out goalie or everything else is a waste of time. The good goalies these days are big guys. The era of the small quick goal tender seems to have past.

3. Take care of business in your own end !
How often this past season that the Gophers control the puck in the offensive zone for extended periods only to give up an odd man rush and the other team scored ? A LOT in my recollection. Watching the NCAA tournament the best teams had big tough defenseman who never let anyone near the slot. The Gophers rarely have problems scoring but they need to do a lot better in their own end.

4. Size matters !
Winning teams tend to have bigger (and older ) players these days. You can have a few Cammerattas and Lettieris but you have to have size these days. Ryan Collins and Jaxon Nelson would seem to indicate that they are looking for size. You also need guys who have voted a few times already. 19 and 20 year olds have trouble competing physically with 23 and 24 year olds.

5. The right blend of players !
Don seems to get a lot of guys who want the puck and want to score. He can't seem to put the right "blend " together however. The team chemistry often seems out of whack. Herb Brooks knew how to put the right group of guys together. Players with grit and players he could push when necessary.

6. Is it time to recruit more outside of Minnesota ?
I hate teams like RIT that load up on almost exclusively Canadians. BU had a lot of local players but they also brought in players from Europe and elsewhere. Personally I've always been very proud of the fact that Minnesota's roster was almost exclusively Minnesotans but maybe it's time to bring in a few players from outside of Minnesota ?

Agree with everything except point #1. Has Lucia run his course at Minnesota? Maybe, but I'm not ready to run him out of town yet. Also, Minnesota is more than a hockey school. North Dakota is a hockey school. We have big money revenue sports in football and basketball.
 

1. I'm on the fence with Lucia. Some fresh blood would be nice in some ways, as there really is no excuse for the lack of fire the team showed at times this year. Does that mean axe Lucia? Probably not but there needs to be some influx of intensity; how you go about that has answers aplenty (new assistants, new mindset, etc)
1b. No UMN is not a "hockey school". Those schools in the region are UND, SCSU, Mankato. They're schools that have hockey as their draw and nothing else and they get their money there. Hockey is not the only priority, nor should it be. We will always be very good at hockey b/c we are the state of hockey, but with the revenue that comes from B10 football and men's basketball, we are not a hockey school.
2. A goalie is only as good as the Dmen and forwards playing in front of him. Yes Wilcox was not "as good" as last year, but we don't know his mental state this year considering the awful state of the defensemen for most of the year. Yes getting a large tender would be awesome, but they don't just grow on trees. Finding a "lights out" goalie is often luck. Sometimes highly heralded in state guys pan out (McIntyre/Gothberg) and sometimes they don't live up to the hype (Mike Lee to name a recent one) and often it has to do with the team in front of them.
3. I don't really get what you're getting at with the point and follow up material. Do you want a philosophy shift (we're going to play tight D and sacrifice forecheck/offensive zone time in order to assure we're back) or that we should stop pinching (giving up odd man rushes) or that we need to recruit huge D-men?
4. Therein lies the issue of the players we recruit. Our big guns (the Bjugstads, Okposos, Reillys, etc) can't be kept down playing in the USHL for forever; you play the game of trying to get them in uniform for as many years vs making sure they can compete physically. We are signing the best of the best year in and out; Don knows the types of guys he wants, but it's a matter of those guys meeting expectations. I agree we need to beef up on the back end. I love guys like Marshall, but you need to have some guys who are intimidating and can throw the body out there to play your penalty kill and lock down opposing top lines. We didn't have that this year. As good as Reilly is, he's not a shut down D man. He just doesn't play that style and it showed this year. We can't keep missing on our bigger bodied in state kids either. Losing players like Avery Peterson, the Poehlings from Lakeville (yes I know they're under 6 feet, but they play physical), etc. hurts but it's the nature of recruiting now. You are getting commitments from 15 and 16 year old kids who aren't filled out yet. And it's only going to get harder.
5. I would disagree. Last year we had it, just played a really bad game at the worst time. This year's team was.... just off. now why is up for debate, but he's had teams with plenty of guys who wanted the puck and complimented them with lines that are out there to check and play with grit and kill penalties. This year was an anomaly and it's clouding your judgment.
6. Yes it's time to look outside if we're going to keep whiffing on the top in state talent. Minnesota will always have an elite crop of kids. We should be able to cherry pick the top 5 of 10 from our state every single year (with UND likely stealing one or two and SCSU, UMD, etc stealing guys with bloodline ties) but we need to expand our recruiting footprint. Hockey is being played in more and more of the country at a high level and we need to get in on those players.

An addition, switch the rink up. We can't keep playing on the big ice because we build a team that fits that style of ice, then get rocked by the tighter checking teams that are used to playing a tighter game. You can't win a national title on the olympic sheet and we need to stop learning to play on one.
 

I bet the team would get significantly better if we banned the practice of inserting a space between the end of a sentence and an exclamation mark !
 

I bet the team would get significantly better if we banned the practice of inserting a space between the end of a sentence and an exclamation mark !

Oh my gawd! Sister Mary Robert's ghost has returned to haunt me!!!!
Don't hit me with the ruler again !!!!!! I'll try to use the exclamation mark properly in the future !!!!!!
OPPS !!!
 


Same old whining.

Why don't we fix it this way:

1. Win the National Title every year. If we don't, fire the coach, the AD, cut every kid and start over. When doing this, we must win the national championship the following year or we should fire the school president and/or the governor.

2. Try to match the women's team and lose 10 or less games every 4 years. If we lose more than 2.5 games a year, make sure heads roll.

3. Have AD check into whether visits with the president of the united states can be done every other year as we'll be going too much.

4. Apply for the Gophers to play in the NHL once the college season is over. Granted that only gives them a couple months of NHL games, but that should be enough to make the playoffs and assure their names are on the Stanley Cup every year where they rightly belong.

5. Put a roof over TCF and start playing hockey there all see long as we'll need that many seats for the greatest team ever conceived.

6. To help make hockey a challenge, offer to let any opponent start with a 4 goal lead.

7. Institute a new college rule that allows running time after we get up 10 goals. 14 goals shouldn't take too long (since opponent starts with 4), so that will get games over in a reasonable amount of time.

8. Instead of playing two games a weekend, ask if we can play double-headers against different opponents. The 2nd or 3rd game of the night might possibly be more challenging (assuming we play different teams).

9. Modify the rink inside TCF to contain only one penalty box since we won't need one.

10. And finally, to prove we're the best, we'll go Hoosiers on the rest of the NCAA and only play 4 guys skating out.
 

Oh my gawd! Sister Mary Robert's ghost has returned to haunt me!!!!
Don't hit me with the ruler again !!!!!! I'll try to use the exclamation mark properly in the future !!!!!!
OPPS !!!

Elephant


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Same old whining.

Why don't we fix it this way:

1. Win the National Title every year. If we don't, fire the coach, the AD, cut every kid and start over. When doing this, we must win the national championship the following year or we should fire the school president and/or the governor.

2. Try to match the women's team and lose 10 or less games every 4 years. If we lose more than 2.5 games a year, make sure heads roll.

3. Have AD check into whether visits with the president of the united states can be done every other year as we'll be going too much.

4. Apply for the Gophers to play in the NHL once the college season is over. Granted that only gives them a couple months of NHL games, but that should be enough to make the playoffs and assure their names are on the Stanley Cup every year where they rightly belong.

5. Put a roof over TCF and start playing hockey there all see long as we'll need that many seats for the greatest team ever conceived.

6. To help make hockey a challenge, offer to let any opponent start with a 4 goal lead.

7. Institute a new college rule that allows running time after we get up 10 goals. 14 goals shouldn't take too long (since opponent starts with 4), so that will get games over in a reasonable amount of time.

8. Instead of playing two games a weekend, ask if we can play double-headers against different opponents. The 2nd or 3rd game of the night might possibly be more challenging (assuming we play different teams).

9. Modify the rink inside TCF to contain only one penalty box since we won't need one.

10. And finally, to prove we're the best, we'll go Hoosiers on the rest of the NCAA and only play 4 guys skating out.

Reasonable.
 

We always underachieve but I think that's the nature of hockey. One crazy deflection can make all the difference.
 



Most programs would look at our last season and never think of fixing anything. But, as one poster mentioned, we recruit the best of the best. Along with that comes very high expectations and rightly so. I have never appreciated Lucia's idea of the ideal d-man and realize I probably never will. I also have long taken issue with rostering an unhealthy percentage of offensive wizards who, in my opinion, often become underachievers at playoff time, when distractions associated with their pro futures disrupt their focus. I know this: The guys who are best at building teams are in the NHL and nearly all them believe in building a team from the net out. Normally they look for goaltenders who lead and inspire, big mobile d-men who hit hard and play a little nasty and a mix of speed, size and two-way play up front. I asked a coach once to tell me his idea of the ideal hockey player. "That's easy. The guy should have size, a nonstop motor, lead the team in scoring and also penalty minutes." Lou Nanne took over the North Stars at a time when they were annual underachievers based on paper ratings. He said at the time, "You can't win with guys who won't muck out the corners." In the last several years I've seen too much of what Nanne didn't like from our Gopher squads.
 




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