Lucia lost a great deal of respect

MNSpaniel

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Don Lucia just lost as much respect from folks around the state as any coach could in one sports article. In a Tribune article today ... He actually encourages kids not to play football for his own selfish reasons. I used to coach a winter sport in high school and one year lost several outstanding players due to football injuries. However, I never told players not to be part of the other high school programs. It is a big part of enjoying your high school years. Shame on you coach Lucia
 

I just read the StarTrib article and I completely understand what Lucia is saying. "If you commit to play hockey for me I would be prefer you didn't play football" I also understand his logic behind it too. "I'm invested a great deal of time recuiting you and I'm going to invest a large sum of money in your education and time in your player development so I don't want you playing football and risking all of that." He isn't saying if you can't play if you aren't at a big time recuit level but if you are a big time recuit you shouldn't.
 

Why is this so upsetting? Lucia shouldn't care about his recruits possibly getting hurt? Why shouldn't he be advising the recruits to not risk getting seriously hurt in football?

The Gopher Hockey team goes through a lot of players. Good players rarely stay for four years and we need as many good players coming in each year to replace the ones that leave. If Lucia let it all slide, and one of his classes of recruits loses 2-3 players to knee injuries, setting them back a year, wouldn't that be kind of hard on the team? Wouldn't people start asking, "What's wrong with the team, they're so shorthanded all the time?", "Where are the freshman that are supposed to be here?", "Who told the recruits to play football and risk getting hurt", "What's wrong with you, Lucia?"

It's Lucia job to look out for what's best for the team, and he needs good, healthy players to make a good, healthy team.

Let's also remember that there kids are getting a full ride at "the" University of Minnesota, maybe that should be valuable enough to focus on hockey only. If a kid really loves football, I say let him play, but Lucia can still reccomend against it, and he can even recruit kids who will focus just on hockey. Maybe if a kid is dead set to get a full ride in hockey and play football in HS he should find a different university to go to.
 

wrong message

You are an obvious hockey fan and not a person who wants students to experience all that a high school experience can offer. I am a retired coach who has been a head coach in three sports. High schools need all the participation they can get out of the students involved.

He might do better to recruit athletes that are not using the U as a stepping stone to the pro hockey ranks and recruit players that want a college education. Maybe then they would stay the full four or five years it takes to get a college education instead of being gone in two.

Under that scenario the U becomes nothing more than a glorified junior college.
 

I disagree that Lucia lost any respect for this, aside from the person who posted this thread. But while it is not unreasonable for the coach not to want recruits to play football, it is also not at all unreasonable for the recruits to play football while they are in high school. Why shouldn't they play football in high school? When the recruits start college, then the coach can so "don't play football" and have it actually mean something.

Of course, by playing football, hockey recruits do risk getting hurt and not getting their scholarship.
 


Haven't seen this article. Assuming the comments may have been regarding Zach Buddish, who should be good to go next season for the Gophers, but blew out his knee playing football for Edina and will now miss his senior season.
 

You are an obvious hockey fan and not a person who wants students to experience all that a high school experience can offer.

Give me a break.

There are tons of kids out there right now who pick one sport to focus on in High School, just to try and make junior varsity, let alone attempt to get a DI scholorship. If you're really concerned about high school students getting all that high school has to offer from sports, you would think this is a good thing. There is only a limited of teams at each high school, and only so many spots on each sports team, but many schools across the state have huge enrollments. If less kids played multiple sports more kids overall would get a chance to play. Why should only the really talented kids get to play all the sports? You are obviously a fan of super jocks, and not a person who wants the greatest number of students to experience all that a high school experience can offer.
 

Haven't seen this article. Assuming the comments may have been regarding Zach Buddish, who should be good to go next season for the Gophers, but blew out his knee playing football for Edina and will now miss his senior season.

Actully the whole article was based of the fact the Buddish blew out his knee.
 

You are an obvious hockey fan and not a person who wants students to experience all that a high school experience can offer. I am a retired coach who has been a head coach in three sports. High schools need all the participation they can get out of the students involved.

He might do better to recruit athletes that are not using the U as a stepping stone to the pro hockey ranks and recruit players that want a college education. Maybe then they would stay the full four or five years it takes to get a college education instead of being gone in two.

Under that scenario the U becomes nothing more than a glorified junior college.

I think you're over exaggerating what he said and way off here. Maybe, based on his experience, Lucia feels that playing football can have a negative effect more times than not. I played and coached football in college and have no problem with what he said. It would be different if he said something along the lines that he makes his recruits quit football or he will not recruit any players that play football. But that's not what he said. To me it was more of him giving advice. Even if you disagree with what he is doing and saying here, it's hardly anything that should make him lose a ton of respect.

Secondly, I believe I recently saw that there currently more high school student athletes in MN now than ever before.
 



Lucia was on KFAN this morning.

If a kid is playing football, it's not going to affect whether Lucia recruits him or not.

Lucia encourages all kids to play as many sports as they want to find out what they have a passion for. Once a kid commits to the 'U', he'd PREFER they didn't play football their senior season. If they chose to play football their senior year, NO PROBLEM WITH LUCIA! As Lucia said "THAT'S HIS CHOICE". He won't tell the kid what to do, but will tell him what he prefers....big difference.

You'd think the way Lucia has conducted himself during his tenure here, he would've earned the benefit of the doubt...but of course not, it's written in the paper so it must be true.

Get a clue people. If you don't know what Lucia is about...watch his speech

Lucia Youtube speach on hockey, kids and parents
 

Why is this so upsetting? Lucia shouldn't care about his recruits possibly getting hurt? Why shouldn't he be advising the recruits to not risk getting seriously hurt in football?

The Gopher Hockey team goes through a lot of players. Good players rarely stay for four years and we need as many good players coming in each year to replace the ones that leave. If Lucia let it all slide, and one of his classes of recruits loses 2-3 players to knee injuries, setting them back a year, wouldn't that be kind of hard on the team? Wouldn't people start asking, "What's wrong with the team, they're so shorthanded all the time?", "Where are the freshman that are supposed to be here?", "Who told the recruits to play football and risk getting hurt", "What's wrong with you, Lucia?"

It's Lucia job to look out for what's best for the team, and he needs good, healthy players to make a good, healthy team.

Let's also remember that there kids are getting a full ride at "the" University of Minnesota, maybe that should be valuable enough to focus on hockey only. If a kid really loves football, I say let him play, but Lucia can still reccomend against it, and he can even recruit kids who will focus just on hockey. Maybe if a kid is dead set to get a full ride in hockey and play football in HS he should find a different university to go to.

I agree with your post and I feel that Lucia has every right as the coach of the program to tell a kid who accepts a scholarship that it comes with stipulations which may include not playing another contact sport where a injury is possible. The kid then has a choice to make, to accept the offer with those stipulations or to not and look for another school, it is the kids call.
 

I agree with your post and I feel that Lucia has every right as the coach of the program to tell a kid who accepts a scholarship that it comes with stipulations which may include not playing another contact sport where a injury is possible. The kid then has a choice to make, to accept the offer with those stipulations or to not and look for another school, it is the kids call.

The thing is, Lucia didn't even say that. He said he prefers them not to play football. He never said they had to quit football if they accepted a scholarship from him.
 




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