Gopher mens hockey thread

BigWerm wrote:

I think Motzko (who is probably second to Sandelin for college coaches imo) will have them competing for Big10 Championships and Frozen Four runs every year. Maybe not winning/making it, but in the conversation. The real question is if the fanbase ever returns, a ticket at Mariucci for a top ten matchup used to be one of the hottest tickets in town. Now the tickets are almost all corporately owned, and rarely entirely filled. Lou Nanne has talked about this a lot on KFAN, and I’m not sure what they can do to remedy it, but something should be done.

I agree. At the very minimum, they should be in contention and qualify for the NCAA’s almost every season.

The attendance/ticket thing isn’t an easy fix. I heard the same thing on the corporate tickets.

Yeah the attendance thing isn’t likely going to get fixed too soon. In the WCHA days a good chunk of the conference was just few hours in the car away, people could take a half day off and be at a visiting arena for a Fri night game. That is what made the rivalries so great….visiting fans here and Gopher fans going to away games. Back in those days it was so much fun going to away games….now you need to get on a plane or have long car rides for away games except WI.

Beyond that…the WCHA teams typically had a decent # of MN kids so a lot of the rivalries between the college teams was building all the way up through youth and high school hockey because so many played against or with each other growing up.

Just a bummer things went the way they did with the Big10, they needed 6 teams to form the league so MN and WI had no choice. Now that there are 7 teams in the Big10 it would be nice if the U could petition out and get into the NCHC with ND, St Cloud and Duluth. They have enough teams they don’t need to hold the U hostage any longer.

Dutchboy wrote:

Anybody know when the season starts? How are they expected to do?

Really? I guess I missed it. You mean the Gophers finally have joined the like of St. Thomas and have a D-1 hockey program?

Who’d have thunk it? Maybe someday they’ll be good enough to play in a division with St. Cloud, Mankato, and even UMD?

Grouse

Um those teams don’t all play in the same conference sorry.

Big ten have 4 teams ranked in the top 11.
NCHC 4 in top 10 So virtually the same.
CCHA has 2

Attendance is one thing to gripe about with the Gophers but competition is not.
Big Ten along with NCHC are the top conferences in the country.
Parity is much different in college hockey than it was 20 years ago. Way more Division 1 programs than back then.
Mankato plays in one of the softest conferences in the country. Hell there is barely 3 teams over .500 in that conference.

TheFamousGrouse wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Dutchboy wrote:</div>
Anybody know when the season starts? How are they expected to do?

Really? I guess I missed it. You mean the Gophers finally have joined the like of St. Thomas and have a D-1 hockey program?

Who’d have thunk it? Maybe someday they’ll be good enough to play in a division with St. Cloud, Mankato, and even UMD?

Grouse

What the hell has Mankato or St Cloud ever won.

Maybe the hearts of ex-big $$ fans.

Ripjiggen wrote:

Um those teams don’t all play in the same conference sorry.

Big ten have 4 teams ranked in the top 11.
NCHC 4 in top 10 So virtually the same.
CCHA has 1

Attendance is one thing to gripe about with the Gophers but competition is not.
Big Ten along with NCHC are the top conferences in the country.
Parity is much different in college hockey than it was 20 years ago. Way more Division 1 programs than back then.
Mankato plays in one of the softest conferences in the country. Hell there is barely 3 teams over .500 in that conference.

Rip I think the pairwise rankings are a better representation than a poll ranking at this point in the season.

Using these numbers, they represent raw data rather than what a person thinks.

Using this method, the NCHC has 4 teams in the top 10. Big 10 has 2 in the top 10. CCHA has 2 in the top 10.

I will give you the benefit of the doubt because you are a knowledgeable hockey guy though. I do think that the CCHA is the inferior conference overall but Mankato is better than people give them credit for. They split with St Cloud, swept Massachusetts, and swept Duluth in non conference play. Last March they eliminated Minnesota in the NCAA regionals handily. As of right now I put them on a higher pedestal than the Gophers but overall I don’t think there is even a comparison.

That being said, it benefits the State of Hockey as a whole when several of the D1 teams here do well nationally. Mankato, Duluth, and St Cloud all went to the frozen four last April and all 5 teams made the NCAA tournament too.

Here’s your pair wise. Edit first post as I had fat finger I meant 2 not 1.
Either way 4 Big ten 4 NCHC. We will say in the top 12 as that is how close the pair wise is at the moment.
Don’t get me wrong Mankato is good my comments were more about the conference they play in.
Don’t get me wrong I think everyone in the area wish the wcha was around, but it’s not and not happening any time soon. So enjoy the conferences for what they are including the big ten. Michigan is loaded with talent.

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Best cheer in college sports … When SCSU is at Mariucci …

Husky women, husky women …

Brittman wrote:

Best cheer in college sports … When SCSU is at Mariucci …

Husky women, husky women …

The best one was when UM was playing at the DECC. When they would announce the home team and where they were from, the Gopher fans would chant, U-S-A, U-S-A, while Bulldog fans chant U-M-D, U-M-D.

Word on the street is the U is getting rid of the Olympic sheet, and doing a reno of Mariucci that will result in 1000 less seats. Someone cue up “Glory Days” by Bruce Springsteen

BigWerm wrote:

Word on the street is the U is getting rid of the Olympic sheet, and doing a reno of Mariucci that will result in 1000 less seats. Someone cue up “Glory Days” by Bruce Springsteen

That has been in the works for years. Less seats? I would think it would yield more seats.

CaptainMusky wrote:

That has been in the works for years. Less seats? I would think it would yield more seats.

I agree. Should be more seats.
Maybe it’s been discussed here before. The Gophers signed kids for playing on the big sheet and then, many times, would get beat in the playoffs on the smaller sheets.

Don’t look now but with a Gopher win tonight they will win the Big Ten title. Oh and moving up the rankings. 3-4 depending on which poll you like.

Can you imagine if they still had Lafontaine?

I got to watch some of the 3rd period. They looked pretty good.

Yup they have some pretty high end talent on that team. Love all the hockey that happens in March.

The Sioux have bounced back from their rough stretch after Christmas. They are #6 in the Pairwise now after sweeping Duluth and beating Western Michigan last night.

Mariucci is far from empty tonight

10k last night…Definitely some badger fans but makes it fun.

Greenhorn wrote:

The Sioux have bounced back from their rough stretch after Christmas. They are #6 in the Pairwise now after sweeping Duluth and beating Western Michigan last night.

They are a lot better than I thought. With the massive roster turnover they had from last year, there’s no way they should be in contention for a third straight Penrose Cup. For a while there they were kinda on the pairwise bubble. Now they could move up to a top seed.

Big 10 champs with 8 game win streak if anyone was wondering. Now wild on.

biggill wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Brittman wrote:</div>
Best cheer in college sports … When SCSU is at Mariucci …

Husky women, husky women …

The best one was when UM was playing at the DECC. When they would announce the home team and where they were from, the Gopher fans would chant, U-S-A, U-S-A, while Bulldog fans chant U-M-D, U-M-D.

Saw quite a few UMD games at the DECC back around ’05/06. Was sitting in the UMD student section with a girl I was dating at the time. The UMD student section was BRUTAL with their chants.

tornadochaser wrote:

Saw quite a few UMD games at the DECC back around ’05/06. Was sitting in the UMD student section with a girl I was dating at the time. The UMD student section was BRUTAL with their chants.

Once saw a gopher fan get a shirt ripped clean off his back there. The shirt said “Spehar Sucks” the gopher fan crossed out “sucks” and wrote “scores”.

I also saw the loon get kicked out for getting in a scrap with a gopher fan. The loon was spraying gopher fans with a squirt gun.

Good times.