0:03 This is The Gopher Puck Live Podcast, episode number 12, recorded January 10th, 2012. 0:20 Welcome to The Gopher Puck Live Podcast, along with Hammy and Ryan Cardinal. 0:25 I'm your host, Jupiter. 0:27 We've been off for almost a month now, but quite a bit has happened since we've been off the air in early to mid December. 0:35 Yet another year, Gophers can't win their own holiday tournament, followed up by a loss to Notre Dame in the US Hockey Hall of Fame game. 0:44 What's going on, Cardinal? 0:47 Well, there's kind of many ways you can look at it, but big picture-wise, the team got off to such a great start and they kind of gave themself a little bit of room for air. 0:56 And obviously as fans and as a team, you don't want to see them kind of take a step back, which they've definitely done here over the last six weeks of play or pretty much since that North Dakota series. 1:06 But at the same time, they're still in decent position if they can get things going in the right direction. 1:11 But I think just down to eighth in the pair wise, I think this is pretty much the time of the year where you can start paying attention to that on a weekly basis. 1:18 And again, big picture wise, the WCHA, as most people know, has really struggled in non-conference play. 1:24 And the Gophers have contributed to that going. 1:26 I think what they're 4-4-1, I think they wrapped up non-conference play and a couple of the wins against Sacred Heart and another against Niagara. 1:32 So against the better than average or really good, depending on who they're playing non-conference teams, they really struggled. 1:38 So because of that, the WCHA is probably not going to get five or six teams in the NCAA Tournament this year. 1:43 It's probably going to be two or three. 1:44 So yeah, again, the Gophers put themselves in a good spot, struggled a little bit, but I think this is a pretty big weekend for them coming up to kind of set the tone for the rest of the season because they definitely need to, I think going 500 the rest of the way probably won't cut it in terms of WCHA goals and NCAA goals as well. 2:04 What do you think, Hammeh, any overall thoughts in the last month? 2:10 Well, it's one of those things where you kind of know that you're not going to maintain that high level of play the whole season like we did early on. 2:19 I mean, you're going to have your bumps. 2:21 Maybe some teams have it in the first month. 2:24 Some teams have it midseason. 2:25 Some have it towards the end of the season. 2:26 And it's one of those things where I think that, you know, I mentioned on GPL that expectation level got jacked up because of the early success of the team. 2:37 Whereas big picture, I mean, if we want to go back to our original broadcast, we all picked the Gophers to be around the fourth, the fifth kind of range. 2:48 And so, you know, they're probably a little better than what we expected back in the beginning, but they're not maybe quite as good as those expectations had lifted for the fans after that first six weeks or so of the season. 3:01 So I think, you know, we've been inconsistent and the penalties have really killed them. 3:06 And that's something that really needs to be focused on, especially this next weekend, because it's certainly going to be an energetic couple of games, I'm sure. 3:15 And you kind of have to keep your wits about you. 3:18 So I'm not shocked that, you know, you're going to have bumps and just that we're having ours now and hopefully they'll recover and have a successful second half. 3:29 Well, how about those specialty teams, Ryan? 3:31 I noticed you posted on Twitter the other day talking about how, you know, obviously the penalty kill percentage has gone down by about 10 percent. 3:39 The power play percentage has gone down, what, 5 or 6 percent or something. 3:43 Then I noticed that that same evening, Lucia mentioned some of the same things. 3:49 Is that one of the big problems or is there more going on? 3:53 Yeah, you know, just with the way they lost in Notre Dame with giving up a couple of power play goals and then the shorthanded goal too and then even going back two weeks to the Northeastern debacle with all the penalties and giving up a pair of 5 on 3s. 4:06 And, you know, it's just early in the year. 4:07 And I think the Duluth weekend kind of exemplified this where special teams just really carried this team early in the year. 4:13 And, you know, like Lucia touched on with his radio show, I mean, they were playing at such a high level, especially the power play that, you know, of course, it wasn't going to stay over 38 percent for the year. 4:22 But, I mean, in college, I think you can have an elite power play that's, you know, 25, 26, 27 percent. 4:28 And even, you know, I think, well, I can't remember exactly the numbers I tweeted. 4:31 But it's about 21 percent, I think, since that North Dakota weekend. 4:34 And, you know, I think, you know, I don't have the numbers to back this up. 4:40 A year, I could be wrong on that. 4:41 But I think, you know, it's just a little bit worse now. 4:44 And instead of allowing one or two goals a game, Patterson's allowing, you know, three and sometimes four. 4:48 And, you know, if the power play is just a little bit worse and they're not getting the two power play goals a night, which pretty much what it was for the first six weeks of the season, again, it doesn't take much to, you know, kind of tip the scales. 5:00 And, you know, so I think that's something that's going to be pretty critical this weekend because North Dakota's got a pretty good top power play unit. 5:06 And, you know, special teams and goaltending are always huge. 5:10 That's, you know, it's cliche. 5:11 But it's totally true that, you know, nine out of ten hockey games, if you can win those two battles, you're going to win the game. 5:16 And, you know, again, the team relied on them so heavily early. 5:19 And you kind of worry about that a little bit. 5:20 But again, in college, I think it's a lot easier to, you know, you saw Minnesota Duluth last year. 5:25 I mean, they rolled their power play all the way to a national championship. 5:27 And, you know, you can win a lot of games just based on having really good special teams. 5:32 And the Gophers have been kind of average in that department over the last, you know, whatever. 5:35 And it's shown because there are 500 teams since that North Dakota series. 5:39 So that's going to be big. 5:40 And like Cami touched on, especially this weekend, I don't think they can, you know, give North Dakota six, seven, eight power plays this weekend up there and expect to, you know, come out of there with, you know, three, four points or whatever their goal is. 5:51 So, yeah, it's going to be big the rest of the year, especially in a big rivalry series in a hostile environment. 5:57 Kind of lost you for a second there, Ryan, for a little bit, but luckily you came back. 6:03 Okay, well, let's just kind of wrap things up. 6:04 Is there any, you guys have any other thoughts in the last month? 6:07 Anything that happened at the Classic? 6:08 Anything else that stuck out for the Notre Dame game? 6:12 I mean, obviously, Notre Dame is a great team, but boy, they, besides the penalties and the power play, they looked, the Gophers looked awfully flat. 6:22 I mean, I think, you know, they looked a little, yeah, discombobulated. 6:26 And I think that you can kind of blame a little bit of the, you know, the break and some stuff like that. 6:33 You know, teams are going to, some teams are able to handle that better than maybe we just didn't handle it very well. 6:37 It's hard to say, but I, you know, the big thing for me is, you know, you got to stay out of the box. 6:43 And if you're not going to stay out of the box, you have to have a very effective penalty kill. 6:47 And, you know, we really haven't been doing either as much in the last couple months. 6:51 I mean, like you touched on, the penalty kill has definitely dropped. 6:56 And then we've taken quite a few penalties. 6:59 I mean, what was it? 7:00 12 power plays that we gave up against Northeastern, whatever it was. 7:03 But, you know, you can't be doing that and expecting to win games, especially on the road, you know, in the WCHA. 7:10 And granted, it's a down year in the league, you know, but still, you can't be taking stupid penalties and so teams are going to make you pay. 7:18 And North Dakota has that capability, even though they're a much thinner team right now that don't have quite the depth, they still have some, you know, high end skill guys at the top line. 7:28 So I got to stay out of the box. 7:31 Well, we've talked about this discipline problem with penalties ever since we started the podcast. 7:36 It just seems like they are still taking way too many stupid penalties. 7:40 I don't know if the coaching staff hasn't gotten through to them or what, but there's, what, aren't they the most penalized team in the WCHA right now? 7:49 I don't know based on... 7:51 It's pretty close if they're not. 7:53 Well, I don't, I'm not sure about strictly just league play. 7:57 I know that in terms of the national, including all games, they're pretty up there. 8:03 I think they're in the top like, well, they're not top 10 as far as penalty minutes, but they're up there 12, 13, somewhere in that range. 8:10 And I know that there's a couple other teams. 8:13 I got it right here. 8:13 It looks like Minnesota State, actually UMD is a little bit more penalized than the Gophers as well, but Gophers are 13th in the nation as far as penalty minutes per game. 8:22 So they certainly are taking first. 8:25 In the WCHA, as I say, they are first. 8:27 They have 236 penalty minutes in 14 games. 8:30 So they do lead the league in conference games in that category. 8:34 That doesn't surprise me. 8:36 Well, they're going to have to fix that soon. 8:38 I don't recall them being so bad in WCHA games in the past. 8:42 At least I don't recall them leading in penalty minutes in WCHA games. 8:45 So hopefully, they could turn that around. 8:48 Well, and I'm sure some of it's, you know, there's been some majors, you know, that contact to the head kind of stuff. 8:54 I mean, Helgeson and Ambrose have been penalty happy at times. 8:58 So it's one of those things where a lot of it is, you know, a few guys, if you look at the statistics, you know. 9:05 Yeah, but we're halfway through the year. 9:08 I could see that in the first half or first quarter or whatever, or the season, but when the same guys are continually taking these stupid penalties, you know, penalties in the offensive zone, you know, and late hits or whatever it may be, the coaches should be on these guys and, you know, take it away some ice time or do something. 9:27 It should have been solved by now, or at least diminished quite a bit. 9:31 I believe that they probably are riding them on that stuff in town, but at the same time, you know, this is the thing that sometimes with people, they automatically assume that just sitting the guy is going to, you know, be the cure to it, but at the same time, then who are you going to play? 9:47 How effective are they going to be? 9:49 I mean, you have these guys in the lineup for a reason, and yeah, if they're really hurting the team, of course, then you, yes, do sit them down. 9:55 But, you know, we've rode pretty much the same lineup from the beginning, and I'm sure we'll touch on it a little later, but, you know, the lines haven't changed a hell of a lot, and, you know, I really think that there's kind of a time to shake things up. 10:08 You don't necessarily have to make, you know, differences in who you're playing, but, you know, maybe shaking up the lines a little bit, I don't know, but something needs to be done, I think. 10:18 Well, we'll get to this week's games in a minute here, but I just thought I'd bring up a topic that was actually brought up on GPL today. 10:26 Thoughts on renovations or changes at Mariucci. 10:31 Obviously, in a couple years, Mariucci is going to be 20 years old. 10:35 Not much has changed in those 20 years. 10:38 I mean, a few years in, they added some seeds, and then they added some sweets and whatnot. 10:43 But obviously, in the case that somebody is bringing this subject up, it's time to do some things, new scoreboard, other little things. 10:51 What are your guys' thoughts on maybe some renovations at Mariucci, or what is needed at Mariucci? 10:58 Well, I know one thing that you suggested, Jupe, and obviously the scoreboard is the easiest one. 11:02 I know like Yost at Michigan, they put in a new one before this year, and that's the low-hanging fruit. 11:08 Not in terms of the cost, because obviously that's going to be pretty high, but just the fact that with higher quality board and better HD replays and all that good stuff. 11:17 But I think the ribbon nav, or whatever you want to call it, that kind of goes around between the suites and the main bowl. 11:24 I mean, you see it pretty much at the X and everywhere. 11:26 And I just think with that, it's probably not cost-wise all that great. 11:30 And with the advertising that you could do with that, which they can't do now, I think it's a lot easier to offset the cost, because you know that's going to be with anything with the U. 11:38 And you know, honestly, with any public institution, I mean, its costs are going to be an issue, but the hockey program is one where hopefully it's not as big of an issue. 11:46 But I think that's kind of one of the main ones. 11:48 That and the sound system, I know I looked at that thread a little bit on GPL, and I think you said at Jupore, in some places you can hear really well, in other places it's complete garbage. 11:56 So yeah, those two things, I think, would be kind of number one and two for me. 12:01 Well, I just saw the example Saturday night that I mentioned on GPL, that they were introducing the 92 or whatever team on the ice, and they were calling their names, and the first four or five guys didn't even know their names were being called, because we just couldn't understand the garbled sound that was hitting us at that part of the ice. 12:22 And I just, it's just embarrassing how bad the sound system is there. 12:26 I mean, I know they've tried to look at it in the past, but it's time for them to do something in that area. 12:32 Hammeh, what do you think? 12:34 Is there anything else you think needs to be taken a look at at Mariucci? 12:37 Maybe about the atmosphere. 12:38 You know, we also talked about that in that thread. 12:41 Well, I mean, that's a constant bone of contention, I think, with fans. 12:45 And that kind of comes down. 12:46 Well, I mean, you know, we've had that discussion every year. 12:49 And I think a lot of it ends up being about, you know, who's sitting in the seats. 12:53 You know, oh, they're corpies, or they're this or that, you know. 12:57 And, you know, you can't have, obviously, all students at the rank. 13:03 I mean, that'd be wonderful in theory, but, you know, you gotta pay the bills, and students aren't necessarily paying all the bills. 13:09 And so, I mean, you have to think about it that way. 13:12 But for me, it's just all, you know, I guess I don't really pay a hell of a lot of attention to the extracurriculars when I'm at the game. 13:19 It's mostly just focused on the rank. 13:22 But, you know, definitely the scoreboard for me. 13:25 And the sound system, you know, I guess, yeah, I'm sure that needs to improve. 13:30 I personally don't care because for me, I'd prefer that other than, you know, telling who scored the goals and the assists and all that, I could give a crap less about that. 13:40 You know, I want to hear the band play. 13:41 I don't want to hear piped in music or anything else. 13:43 I just want to hear the band. 13:45 And so, I understand why people would want that to be, you know, kind of the most up-to-date stuff. 13:51 And hopefully someday that will be the case. 13:53 But as far as the rest goes, you know, I didn't really look carefully at that thread. 13:59 I saw some stuff about, you know, ATMs and this and that and whatever. 14:04 And I honestly don't even notice that stuff, you know, that minor stuff. 14:08 And I'm not saying that that makes me right and other people wrong. 14:11 But for me, it's more just the bigger picture stuff, you know, that adds to the actual quality of the entertainment as opposed to any of the other stuff. 14:20 Well, with how often the band isn't there and how often they have to pipe in crappy music, do you think they'd want to invest in that song system to make sure that it's just a seamless transition to Jock Jam's Volume 2 or whatever? 14:32 Oh, wait, careful. 14:33 There's some music they can't play. 14:34 So it's too offensive. 14:37 Rock and Roll, Part 2, wherever the hell it is. 14:39 Oh, yeah, boy, they get in trouble if they play that, you know. 14:42 I want to get the pedophile music. 14:43 Oh, jeez, it's awful. 14:46 Our favorite goon over there at Sioux Sports, and he's obviously got his own blog, he's got a suggestion for Mariucci. 14:53 He thinks we should just bulldoze it. 14:55 Whoa, it's a really insightful suggestion. 14:57 Yeah, I know. 14:58 That's just... 14:59 Well, what can you do? 15:00 He's a Sioux fan. 15:02 Oh, yeah, I'm sorry. 15:02 He's a North Dakota fan. 15:04 Sorry, there's not Sioux fans anymore. 15:07 Oh, what a bunch of crap that is, too. 15:09 Moving on, I could go on forever on that topic just because it's still there, and it just seems like they need to do something. 15:17 But obviously, nothing's going to happen until some money gets brought in. 15:21 And apparently, that new ticket program is going to bring in new money. 15:24 But apparently, that four plus million they make a year can't be put back into the rink very often. 15:29 So let's move on to this week. 15:32 This week, we'll start off with Anchorage Visiting Tech. 15:38 This doesn't sound too exciting to me, but what do you guys think? 15:43 Well, I mean, I think Alaska Anchorage is probably going to be a little rusty. 15:47 They didn't play it in a month. 15:48 They didn't play over the holidays or anything. 15:50 So I kind of have to wonder what they're going to look like when they come back and hit the rink for the first time, I mean, not the rink necessarily, but actual game in a month. 16:00 And, you know, Tech's lost four straight games. 16:03 And you kind of have to wonder, you know, if they finally hit the wall as far as, you know, we all are really surprised by their kind of first half early season performance. 16:13 And maybe now they're hitting a little bit of reality. 16:16 You know, it's hard to say, but it's hard to pick Anchorage on the road considering how they've played this year. 16:24 So I'd be surprised if Tech doesn't, you know, basically sweep the series. 16:29 Yeah, I'd have to lean with Tech too. 16:30 I mean, you look, like Hammy said, they've lost the last four games. 16:33 But, you know, big picture wise, they've only had two home games since November 6th. 16:37 And over the last few, I mean, they lost to the Gophers, of course. 16:40 And they split here, but then they played Michigan State and Boston College and the Great Lakes deal. 16:45 And those are never easy games. 16:46 And obviously Tech's, despite having a good deal of success this year for them, they're obviously the underdog big time in those games. 16:52 But they've been pretty good at home this year. 16:54 And again, like Hammy said with the last year with Anchorage, not having played for a while and the fact that they're usually atrocious on the road, you have to think Michigan Tech will do pretty well this weekend. 17:05 Okay, we've got Bucky Badger heading over to Mankato. 17:11 Obviously Mankato's had a dreadful season, but the Badgers have been also dreadful on the road. 17:18 What do you think, Hammy? 17:20 Yeah, I mean, that's the thing. 17:23 It's like pick your poison in this series. 17:25 I mean, Wisconsin has been terrible on the road. 17:28 Mankato's been, you know, iffy all over the map, and it's just like, you know, who's going to outweak the other team in a sense? 17:39 I just, you know, Wisconsin's got more talent, natural talent, and, you know, Mankato's pretty young. 17:46 I think that, you know, maybe a few of the key players for Wisconsin will probably tip the scales a little bit, at least in one of the games. 17:53 So I would probably go with a split, even though Wisconsin's been pretty terrible on the road this year. 17:59 I think that this is a series that they should at least have one win coming out of it. 18:04 Yeah, kind of go along those same lines. 18:07 I mean, I knew Wisconsin was bad on the road, but they haven't won a game on the road. 18:10 No, granted, they don't really go that much. 18:12 Oh, I didn't know it was that bad. 18:15 Yeah, I mean, on college hockey stats, 0-5 and 1. 18:18 And now, granted, they have taken the model of playing crap teams at home instead of traveling. 18:24 And the Gophers often do that. 18:25 I know I got into another little Twitter spat last week. 18:27 But I mean, at least the Gophers say what you want. 18:30 I mean, they still went to Michigan State this year, and they're not the ones that ruined the college hockey showcase. 18:35 And I mean, it's pretty clear by Wisconsin and playing Mercyhurst at home, RIT. 18:40 I mean, at least the Gophers played Northeastern at home and Vermont. 18:42 And granted, Vermont's not a world beater or anything, but they were in the Frozen Four a couple of years ago. 18:48 They're from a major conference. 18:49 And so, again, as a Wisconsin fan, I'd be kind of perturbed at the whole scheduling thing. 18:53 It's one thing if you want to play home games, but maybe mix in some legit competition if you don't want to go on the road. 18:58 But that being said, yeah, I mean, Wisconsin, they've won a few games here recently. 19:02 I think one loss in their last six. 19:04 And they have some talent. 19:05 They got the McCabe kid back on defense now. 19:07 And their top line was Angerly and Barnes. 19:10 And again, Mankato just doesn't have any of the high end guys, like Hammy said, whereas Wisconsin has a few key pieces. 19:15 So I wouldn't be surprised if Wisconsin got at least three points. 19:19 Of course, you have to look at who they've played since the end of November. 19:22 I mean, Duluth is a tough series, of course, at home. 19:25 But, you know, Mercyhurst and RIT were the other two series. 19:28 And, you know, I don't know. 19:31 It's like you were talking about. 19:33 It's kind of a little pathetic that Wisconsin can bring in a little bit better competition. 19:38 And actually, I watched some of that game, one of their games this past weekend, and it was pretty brutal. 19:44 So, but I still think that they'll split. 19:48 Yeah, I think Mankato is going to sweep them. 19:51 Yeah, you went to school there, didn't you? 19:53 Yes, I did. 19:54 They're always Mankato State to me. 19:56 So, moving on, we've got Bemidji heading to Denver. 20:02 Cardinal. 20:04 Well, Denver continues the up and down. 20:07 I mean, last weekend, home loss against Alabama Huntsville. 20:10 And I know Denver was still had the finish kid in that, the third stringer. 20:15 And I know, as Brad Schlossman of the Grand Forksville pointed out, that Jason Zucker definitely could have been around for this weekend, but they elected to let him head home to Vegas for the weekend to kind of recuperate or whatever after the World Juniors. 20:29 But I'm sure they could have used him on Friday because that's a horrendous loss for them. 20:33 And you wonder at the end of the year, I mean, there are three games over 500, so it's not like they're cruising through the year and can afford a slip up. 20:39 But I assume they got Adam Murray back for the Saturday game, which they won and Denver's been so up and down and Bemidji has been a little bit better. 20:47 But it wouldn't shock me to see Bemidji go out there. 20:50 I mean, they're definitely going to have the edge in that. 20:51 And, you know, Bemidji, they can play a tough game. 20:54 I know they split against Denver in early December. 20:57 So I'll say Bemidji will go out there and get maybe a point or two out of them. 21:02 Yeah, you know, there's nothing much I can really add. 21:05 I think it was kind of funny that Zucker is going to stay home in Vegas to rest. 21:09 You know what I'm saying? 21:11 That's the place to go to rest. 21:13 You know, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. 21:16 You know what I mean? 21:18 You know, I agree. 21:20 You can't, it's, DU has been a mystery team. 21:23 They're tough to get a handle on. 21:24 I know some of it's injury related and whatever. 21:26 But, you know, they have the ability to be as good as just about anybody is, you know, especially when they have all their main guys in the lineup. 21:33 But they continue to baffle you with losses to certain teams. 21:37 And well, isn't doesn't Huntsville only have two victories on the season? 21:42 Yeah. 21:44 Oh, I thought, OK, it was Omaha a few weeks ago. 21:48 They had four wins last year, and one of them was against Omaha. 21:51 And then they split against Omaha like a month ago or something. 21:55 A couple of big victories for Huntsville. 21:57 Oh, jeez. 21:58 I think it also kind of goes to show you how, you know, slipshod that WCHA has been a little bit this year, especially in inter-conference play. 22:06 It's been brutal. 22:07 I mean, we talked about it earlier. 22:08 I personally believe that we're only going to get three teams in this year or so. 22:13 And, you know, it's looking like UMD is obviously a certain going to be in. 22:18 And, you know, the Gophers, of course, they have to maintain some things here in the second half, but they've got a pretty good shot at being in. 22:26 And so it's, there's going to be some teams staying at home in this off season that aren't used to it. 22:32 And, you know, the Denvers and the CCs and the North Dakotas, you know, some of those teams are going to get left out. 22:38 And, you know, those fans aren't going to be used to that. 22:40 But, yeah, as far as getting back to the series goes, I think that, you know, I actually think it's going to be a split. 22:45 I really believe that Bemidji will probably go and, like, you know, Ryan talked about, just play them tough, you know, maybe one game. 22:51 And, you know, DU's showing that they're not, it's not beyond them to kind of take a game off in a series. 22:58 And so I think it's going to be a split. 23:02 Okay, we've got St. 23:03 Cloud heading to CC. 23:06 Obviously, what, did St. 23:07 Cloud lose another player this week, Hammeh? 23:09 Yeah, you know, it seems like it's one of those years for St. 23:13 Cloud where pretty much there's nothing going right for them, you know, both on and off the ice and, you know, their bottom half of the league and, you know, injuries with Lee and LeBlanc. 23:25 And then you have guys leaving, what, two guys now. 23:28 What was, one of the McMillans, I guess, left. 23:31 And one of them is going to North Dakota now, I think, to play with his brother. 23:35 And then, you know, they just lost Cam Reid, who is a, you know, pretty good player for them. 23:39 He is, he's a sophomore and not quite a point per game player, but certainly a quality forward for them. 23:44 And, you know, probably would have been a good player the next couple of years for them. 23:48 So that's kind of a big loss for them at this point. 23:50 And, you know, it's been rough. 23:51 So at the same time, you know, CC is another team that it's sometimes hard to figure out what's going on with them. 23:58 I mean, they lost to Air Force. 23:59 They barely squeaked by Union. 24:02 And then they get one tie out of two games with Cornell. 24:05 And so they haven't exactly been lighting the world on fire either. 24:07 Of course, granted, you know, their big gun was at World Junior. 24:11 So you kind of have to have a little bit of an asterisk by that. 24:14 But it wouldn't surprise me if CC sweeps the series. 24:17 But I think, you know, I kind of go with CC getting like three points. 24:22 Yeah, I'll kind of, you know, pretty much Hammy said it all there. 24:24 I mean, St. 24:24 Claude, they've been, I think, what, two, seven, one away from home. 24:27 And like Hammy said, I mean, with CC getting Jaden Schwartz back, I mean, he's arguably the top player in the league. 24:33 So to add him back to the mix, and I'm sure they have a little bit of a sense of urgency, as you know, Hammy noted, kind of stumbling through the non-conference game certainly after the Christmas break. 24:42 So, yeah, we'll see. 24:43 I mean, St. 24:44 Claude, again, it's just you wonder. 24:45 I'm not saying their players are going to pack it in. 24:47 But when you have so many things, just random stuff happening that you can't control going against you at some point, that's got to be dismounting. 24:53 Whereas CC, you know, they've had a reasonable year. 24:56 OK, but, you know, they have a chance to put something together here. 24:59 So I'll take CC for the sweep this weekend. 25:02 Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting decision for Cam Reid. 25:05 I really don't quite understand the logic. 25:07 I mean, I know he was sort of promised top line minutes, you know, if he went to the WHL. 25:12 But, you know, it's not like he wasn't getting lots of playing time at St. 25:16 Cloud and, you know, I know that the scuttlebutt was, he wasn't exactly the greatest academic, but apparently he was good enough to stay eligible for the second half and he just decided to bail. 25:27 So it's unfortunate. 25:29 You know, we've seen that. 25:30 Of course, it was a different circumstance a little closer. 25:33 But, I mean, we've seen some of that, you know, with a door, for instance, and we've seen it around the league. 25:38 It happens a little bit more now where guys are bailing out halfway through the season because they don't like something. 25:44 And it's kind of unfortunate. 25:45 And I don't know about you guys, but back in my day, you know, when you start something, you finish something, you know, as far as at least a season goes. 25:54 And, you know, it's kind of unfortunate. 25:55 It seems to be lost these days. 25:57 Way too much entitlement going on. 26:00 These kids think it should be all put right in front of them and they should have no trouble. 26:06 And there's just no commitment as there used to be, like you said, back in the day. 26:13 Duluth, heading to UNO this weekend. 26:16 I personally think this might be Duluth's biggest road test for the rest of the season, looking at their schedule. 26:23 Just a quick little note. 26:25 You can see the Friday game on the NBC Sports Network, which is, I believe, formerly the Versus Network. 26:31 Ryan, what do you think of this series? 26:33 You think it's Duluth's toughest road series, left this season? 26:38 Yeah, I mean, I think you look, real quick, on the NBC Sports, I think they got a Gord Miller from TSN, who is their, TSN's top guy to call the game. 26:47 So I guess, I don't know if everyone's a big fan of him, but I think he does an awesome job and props to NBC for, I'm sure that's not cheap. 26:54 So at least if they're going to try to do the college hockey thing, they're not just, you know, having some local asshole come and call the game. 26:59 I mean, they're getting somebody that's pretty renowned and good. 27:02 So, well, you know what I mean? 27:04 You've seen like how the CBS Sports does it when they had that, remember Cornell played a game in Madison Square Garden and they had them call the game from our TV studio down the road. 27:13 And if you're going to do it, at least try to do it right. 27:15 And if it works great, if not, whatever. 27:17 But anyway, I think, yeah, based on A, the competition, and obviously Omaha is not a great team, but they're pretty solid. 27:24 And Duluth after this has at Anchorage, at Mankato and at St. 27:28 Cloud. 27:28 And I would say it's pretty clear that Omaha is better than all three of those teams. 27:31 And you factor in this is the seventh and eighth games at the end of a, you know, granted it was broken up by the Christmas break, but I mean, it's silly, you play eight games away from home. 27:40 And, you know, they had a super impressive sweep last weekend at Western Michigan to win, you know, both those games by three goals in Western Michigan is far from a pushover. 27:49 So yeah, Duluth is the hottest team in the country. 27:52 And I know Omaha is doing the sellout thing and trying to, you know, you got the defending national champs coming to town and you're trying to put together a big crowd. 27:59 And I think they're doing a whiteout or something goofy like that. 28:01 So it wouldn't shock me if Duluth, you know, stumbled a little bit this weekend, but I mean, they haven't lost since the middle of October. 28:08 So I just can't pick against them right now until I see otherwise. 28:11 So I'll say the Bulldogs keep it rolling. 28:14 Yeah, I mean, I completely agree for actually, you know, for me, quite honestly, this is the most interesting series of the weekend. 28:20 And I'm even including the Gopher series because to me, I mean, you know, from a personal standpoint, obviously, I'm more interested in the Gopher series. 28:26 But in terms of an actual results and all that, I'm really curious as to what this series will be like, because, you know, of course, UMD is playing the best hockey right now. 28:35 And you always have to factor in Dean Blais, certainly isn't going to... 28:40 I mean, he'll have his team ready. 28:41 You know that he's the kind of guy that has his team ready for a challenge, especially on home ice. 28:46 And the big problem for me is, I personally just don't believe in Nebraska's goaltending enough to really believe that they're going to be able to put two nights together that are going to take UMD down. 28:58 I just don't believe in their goaltending enough to say that that's going to be the case. 29:02 And like Ryan said, I could see maybe UNO rises to the occasion in one of the games and maybe gets one or two points out of the series. 29:11 But it's really hard for me to bet against Duluth right now in the way they've been playing. 29:16 So I think the best bet is that the Bulldogs are going to sweep. 29:20 And that finally gets us to Minnesota heading up to North Dakota to play the Fighting Sioux. 29:28 According to Minnesota's records, Minnesota still leads the series 142, 128, and 14. 29:36 I believe the last five meetings, Minnesota, or last ten meetings, Minnesota actually leads 5-3 and 2. 29:42 So apparently they've been doing a little bit better against the Sioux recently. 29:48 The Gophers swept the Sioux. 29:49 That was probably about the last time the Gophers played as a team and played well. 29:55 And now the Sioux are playing better. 29:57 It's that time of year. 29:58 It seems like they've been picking it up. 29:59 Competition has been great, but you know what? 30:01 They've been winning. 30:03 And it seems like for the past three or four years, it seems like they kind of kicked off their second half rise by beating up on Minnesota. 30:11 Ryan, let's get your thoughts on the weekend. 30:14 Yeah, I mean, I know just doing the little preview for GPL today and you look at one thing the Gophers have kind of been blessed with this year as health and that's something we've definitely had our fair share of the injury bug in a lot of the major injuries the last few years. 30:26 But North Dakota this year, they've really battled it and you start with Grimaldi and obviously he hasn't played since that Minnesota weekend and I know they more than anybody kind of keep injuries close to the vest. 30:35 I'm not sure what if he'll be back. 30:37 And I know Corbin Knight, who is probably the make a case, he's the best center in the WCHA and with faceoffs and he wins 70 percent of his draws or something like that. 30:46 I know he didn't play in that Clarkson game. 30:48 So, I mean, they could be missing some key pieces. 30:50 And you look at their line chart the last few weeks. 30:52 And, you know, obviously, Brock Nelson and Christo. 30:55 And then after that, it's just kind of a hodgepodge of guys. 30:58 And, you know, but they've been getting the job done. 31:00 And, you know, I think there's a lot of ways to look at this weekend. 31:03 I think goaltending will be probably pretty even. 31:06 Dell has played pretty well for them. 31:07 He had a couple of hiccups in that Harvard series. 31:09 But, you know, other than that, since the Gopher weekend, there are things that kind of slowed down for them. 31:13 And he's been a little bit better. 31:14 But I think, you know, the real key for this weekend is going to be on the blue line. 31:18 And, you know, for the Gophers, I think that's one area where I kind of touched on it on GPL, where you're hoping to see some guys maybe take a step, and especially maybe Hall and Altware. 31:26 You know, they're both, you know, bigger kids, sophomores. 31:28 And you kind of hope that maybe one of them would emerge as, you know, hey, this guy's a real, you know, not necessarily the offensive stuff. 31:34 I mean, the offense is going to come from Schmidt, but just the shutdown, you know, physical pairing or whatever you want to look at it. 31:40 And neither one of those guys has really stepped up. 31:42 And, you know, this weekend, you know, in North Dakota, they're going to, especially if they're missing some, you know, key parts on the offensively, they're going to chip it in and forecheck hard. 31:49 And, you know, the Gophers definitely have an edge up front. 31:53 But I think North Dakota's blue line with, you know, Blod and McWilliam and, you know, those guys up there, I think it's, that's going to be the difference. 31:59 If the Gopher defensemen can, you know, they can't be turning it over at the blue line and, you know, giving up all the odd man rushes that we've seen recently and especially against Notre Dame. 32:06 I think if Minnesota's blue line can play smart, get the puck out, make that good first pass that we saw early in the year that, you know, I think that's been missing a little bit recently. 32:15 I think the Gophers will do pretty well. 32:16 But if the D struggles and, you know, Cofs pucks up at the blue line and turns it over, you know, I think it could be a tough weekend because the Sioux are, you know, finding ways to score. 32:24 And, you know, right now, the Gophers have tailed off a little bit. 32:27 And I think the offense will get it going eventually. 32:29 But, you know, on the road against a pretty good defensive team, that's a tough time for, you know, your offense to really get it going again. 32:35 But who knows, maybe the atmosphere up there and playing a big time rival and back into conference play, maybe that'll be enough for things to start turning in the right direction again. 32:45 Yeah, for me, you know, I just, it's one of the, of course, we always say, you know, throw out the records and all the recent performances and all that kind of stuff because it's a rivalry series and it's, you know, one of the biggest rivals. 32:58 And I think the scoring depth, you know, will certainly be in the Gopher's advantage. 33:03 You know, Ryan touched on kind of some of the injury issues and the overall depth issues this year for North Dakota. 33:10 I personally believe the Gophers need to just kind of really simplify their game, you know, just chip pucks out, do the little things, not try to make the big plays and try to be too fancy out there. 33:20 I think they really, especially on the road, you really just need to kind of, you know, maybe it might not be the necessarily their MO, but, you know, maybe play a little bit more conservatively. 33:29 And, you know, just because to me, you know, once you lose the momentum on the road, it's hard to regain it, you know, in a game or even in a series. 33:40 And especially when you're going up to, you know, a brink that's going to have a pretty hefty crowd support. 33:47 So I just think that the Gophers need to play smart, you know, play it maybe a little bit more conservatively on defense. 33:53 Certainly, we talked about not taking stupid penalties. 33:57 I'm sure that there'll be plenty of, you know, some stuff going on, you know, maybe a little bit after the whistle stuff more. 34:04 But, you know, you got to keep your cool in these games. 34:06 I'm sure that that'll be emphasized this week. 34:10 And, you know, it'll probably come down to goaltending, you know, how well is Kent going to play. 34:15 And if he plays well, you know, I think the Gophers will certainly come out of the series with, you know, two points. 34:20 And I think I said it on GPL, to me, you know, the rest of the season is all about the NCAAs now. 34:26 I mean, I, you know, to me, it's Duluth's, you know, it's their league title, you know, to win or lose right now because of their, you know, schedule is advantageous. 34:36 And I just think that right now, the focus, I know the players probably aren't and the coaches aren't looking at it that way. 34:41 But for myself personally, not that I have a stake in it, but I have to say, let's focus on making sure that we stick with where we're at in the pair wise and getting the NCAAs. 34:50 And to me, that means that you kind of have to go up there this weekend at least to get, you know, a couple of points out of it. 34:56 I'm going to go with a sweep for the Gophers. 34:58 No way. 34:59 I'm serious. 35:00 I, I know you're shocked, but I'm just trying to be positive here. 35:05 It's been kind of negative the past, you know, since we beat North Dakota, obviously they've been what, six, six and one since that sweep of North Dakota. 35:13 And I'm just trying to push a little positivity here. 35:15 That's all. 35:17 That is interesting how the things just kind of, you know, went a little bit, you know, I really believe that they emotionally peaked in that, for that series. 35:27 And afterwards it was, there was kind of a hangover effect for a little while because they definitely were not quite the same, you know, in their mental aspects of the game, you know, that kind of goes back to some of the penalties and all that. 35:38 And I really believe that that series for them, you know, especially that kind of hard fought second game for the team. 35:45 I really believe that, you know, that took a little bit out of them, you know, emotionally. 35:49 And I think that, you know, hopefully they'll be able to regain it at some point here in the next few weeks. 35:54 But yeah, hopefully they'll get there some of that mojo back this weekend. 35:58 Yeah. 35:58 And, you know, again, I think this is a pretty critical series. 36:01 I mean, I, I don't want to say, I mean, obviously, I don't know if the team's, you know, emotionally fragile or anything like that. 36:07 But I think, you know, most of these guys have been in the last few years and how things have gone south, it's kind of the wrong times. 36:13 And, you know, obviously, they're in first place in the WCHA. 36:16 So again, big picture wise, everything's okay. 36:19 But, you know, I think if things go off the tracks this weekend and then it's, you know, it kind of comes full circle back to the North Dakota series where they peaked, if they can go up there and, you know, even get two points, I don't care how it happens. 36:30 And then you come home from Colorado College and I think you can get things going. 36:33 But, you know, I have real concerns if they go up there this weekend and, you know, kind of an under man suit team takes it to them and, you know, a lot of these guys have been up there before and got their ass kicked in that building. 36:41 And yeah, I'm not saying it's going to happen, but I just, you know, they're not playing good right now. 36:45 And it's a tough place to go into it. 36:47 If that's the hornet's nest that you need to go into to kind of turn your season around to a degree, you know, again, we've talked about it. 36:54 There's not going to be a lot of WCHA teams making the tournament and, you know, they can't afford to take another two or three weeks where they play, you know, average to below average hockey. 37:03 It's, you know, again, this is a critical series. 37:05 And I think they need to go up there and kind of say that, hey, you know, all teams can have lulls. 37:10 You know, Lucia touched down on his radio show where Notre Dame lost to home to Northeastern, nine to two. 37:14 And, you know, a month later, they're beating the Gophers here. 37:17 So, you know, again, it's not the sky is falling kind of thing. 37:19 But, yeah, I'd be pretty concerned if they go up there this weekend and play poorly and get swept or even get one point. 37:25 I think you need to go up there against a rival who, again, this isn't a great version of the Sioux. 37:28 And they need to go up there and show that they can hang up those guys and say, hey, we're legit and going to be forced to be reckoned with here in the second half of the season. 37:36 And sometimes that does happen when you have a series like that where you kind of need a wake up call and maybe going on the road and kind of us against the world mentality, going up to Grand Forks for the players and the coaches. 37:51 Sometimes that stuff can wake up a team too when you have that kind of challenge ahead of you. 37:54 And hopefully that's the way they're looking at it this week and that they're going to go up there and battle it out and even if they don't necessarily get two wins out of it, certainly they'll play well. 38:05 And I think that he just wants to see that kind of emotional charge in the team. 38:11 And I really do believe they need to simplify things and certainly get some ugly goals as far as when you're on the power play and not try to get too pretty and stuff, kind of be more physical down low. 38:24 We've got some good size up front. 38:27 And North Dakota's got some beefy defense, many and all, like blood and whatever. 38:32 But nonetheless, it's still something that you got to really battle it out around the slot and the blue paint. 38:38 And I think that if we can do those things, we'll have some success. 38:42 Well, we've got a few questions for us this week via Twitter. 38:45 And we'll start off with Adam Piet. 38:48 He asks, UND has been decimated by injuries lately. 38:52 Do you think Lucia will have the team throw the body around more in this series? 38:58 Now, I think that was kind of one of the keys in the last UND series is that Minnesota was much more physical than they used to be, or at least in the last five years when they played UND. 39:07 They always got beat up. 39:09 That was one of the keys to that series. 39:11 I assume it's the key again in this series. 39:15 Well, I would agree. 39:16 I mean, I think, but it's one of those things where it's a fine line between being physical and being stupid, you know. 39:21 And I think that that's some of the problem we've seen with some of the players, that these guys sort of step over that line. 39:29 And the next thing you know, you got three, four penalties in a row, and that's just killing all your momentum. 39:35 And we've seen that a few times this year where that's really hurt the team. 39:38 I remember mentioning it on a past podcast that, you know, it's not uncommon sometimes for the Gophers to just reel off three or four penalties in a row. 39:47 And I mean, it's like, you're not going to win games that way. 39:49 So, yeah, you got to play physical, but you have to be smart about it. 39:52 And, you know, I'm not all that confident that some of these guys have learned their lessons for whatever reason. 39:58 So, yeah, play physical, but be smart about it. 40:03 Yeah, and I think just the whole, you know, you want to be physical. 40:06 And I think, you know, early in the year, they could do that because the penalty kill is so good. 40:10 So, you know, you kind of trade, you know, maybe a few penalties for the team that, you know, it's kind of been a knock on them for a while that they might be a little bit softer, you know, finesse or whatever word you want to throw in there. 40:19 But, you know, the trade-off was, okay, well, we're going to take a few penalties, but we're going to be aggressive, play on our toes, and that's going to, you know, pay off in the end by being more physical and generating turnovers. 40:28 But, yeah, I mean, I think, you know, a guy like Serratore, where, you know, he's never afraid to be physical and throw his body around. 40:34 And, you know, Budish, some other bigger guys that maybe don't throw the huge hits. 40:37 But, you know, a guy like Budish is going to be key in the series. 40:40 I mean, he's going to have to win some of those battles down low. 40:42 It's, you know, back to the small ice sheet where, you know, maybe at, you know, at Mariucci, the guys like McWilliam and Bludden, we've seen them struggle over the years, even back to Finley where, you know, yeah, those guys are pretty good on small ice, but you get to the big sheet and they start, you know, chasing a little bit and hooking and tripping. 40:56 You know, those guys are going to be a tough force to reckon with behind the net. 41:00 And, you know, so guys like Budish and Bugstad to a lesser degree and even Hanson, I mean, he's not a monster, but he's a senior and he's an older kid. 41:07 So, yeah, those guys, I don't necessarily think it's going to be the big hits and things like that, but just winning those one-on-one battles below the dots and along the boards and getting pucks out when you have the chance, just the little elements like that, it's got to think it's two pretty even teams right now, the way they're both going. 41:22 So, yeah, I mean, just kind of little things like that could be the difference. 41:27 Just notice the little Roman tweet that he's saying that St. 41:31 Claude Daley is saying that Mike Lee may make his return for St. 41:35 Claude this weekend from his injury. 41:39 So, yeah, well, I don't know personally how big of a deal that's going to be for them. 41:47 I mean, it's not like goaltending has been the big issue. 41:50 True. 41:51 I mean, you know, that Farragher kid has not played badly. 41:54 I mean, and quite frankly, if you look how Lee was playing early in a season, he wasn't exactly knocking it out of the park. 42:00 You know what I mean? 42:01 So, I mean, it's great that he's back healthy. 42:04 I mean, you want players healthy, of course, but as far as an actual performance standpoint goes, I don't know if that's going to help them all that significantly because I don't really think goaltending has been their issue. 42:16 Okay, we've got Proud Sue asking a question. 42:20 What's your take on the CHL taking away players from the NCAA? 42:26 Seems like the Gophers never have a player being stolen. 42:30 I had to edit Gophers because he used something a little more absurd. 42:35 Well, I mean, I think the big part of it for the Gophers is we do the vast majority of our recruiting within Minnesota and Minnesota is a college hockey state, you know. 42:45 I mean, you're going to have the odd few guys here or there that are going to be going to the WHL, but everybody here, kids here, they grow up with college hockey. 42:55 I mean, whether it's the Gophers or St. 42:57 Cloud or Duluth or whatever, that's what they grow up with. 43:01 That's what they aspire to be. 43:03 They don't aspire or have much interest in going to the CHL. 43:07 That's just not really in the fabric of the state of hockey. 43:11 And so I think that's a big piece of it for the Gophers and why they haven't really had that happen. 43:16 I mean, they had Loftquist leave, but I mean, that was more of a playing time issue than anything. 43:20 And so it's not like we've been totally untouchable, but I mean, nonetheless, I think it really has a lot to do with where we do our recruiting. 43:28 And quite frankly, if you look at the couple of kids at the Sioux Lost, I mean, their fathers were NHL guys. 43:34 And you know, you kind of have to think that that's kind of what they're probably used to doing, you know, that's what they hear more of. 43:44 And you know, I don't know if it was a bargaining chip deal or what it was for those guys, but you know, it's unfortunate. 43:50 And like we talked about earlier, guys just don't seem to have quite the same amount of, you know, they don't have the same character necessarily to stay true to their word like they used to. 44:00 So it's unfortunate. 44:03 Yeah, and you see kids, I mean, I know there was the rash of them before the draft and, you know, JT Miller, but I think Miami had the one kid. 44:09 And, you know, I think the CHL and in general, you know, they have a good package to offer. 44:15 I mean, you can't deny it. 44:16 And with kids, they can kind of get, you know, bright-eyed about, you know, how many kids they send to the NHL. 44:20 And I think they do a good job of covering up the fact that there's a lot of kids that go up there and kind of get lured in by the, you know, wow of it all in the whole, you know, sales pitch and they end up doing nothing where, you know, that's going to happen at every level. 44:32 But again, I think they send the most kids to the NHL and that's the selling point for, you know, a lot of the national team kids or, you know, they seem to be the ones that are leaving the most and granted, they're usually the most highly sought after both by college teams, but also NHL and thus, you know, major junior teams. 44:47 So yeah, I mean, I guess we kind of complain from time to time about The Gophers maybe not recruiting some other areas, but I guess that one of the trade-offs is you don't have to, you know, generally deal with a lot of drama with our recruits, whereas you kind of see it, North Dakota has been bit here a little bit, and you especially see it with, you know, Michigan and Notre Dame and a lot of those kids that are so close to the, you know, kind of the Great Lakes area with, you know, the OHL teams in Michigan and right across the border and being so close. 45:12 So I guess, you know, like I said, that's maybe one of the good things about our recruiting being pretty close to home. 45:18 Although I will say this, you might see a future Gopher recruit bail. 45:24 I mean, I mentioned this on GPL. 45:26 You know, I know that AJ. 45:28 Michelson kind of flirted with the idea of playing in the WHL last summer. 45:32 I mean, that was the rumor at least, and I believe it's accurate. 45:36 And, you know, he hasn't played that well in the USHL this year. 45:40 I mean, he's done OK, but certainly not to what you would expect, you know, when we first landed him. 45:46 And there might be a situation where, and I'm not saying this is what's going to happen or it, but, you know, maybe the Gopher say, hey, you know, you need to play another year in USHL. 45:56 I mean, we can't bring in you and you're not going to have that kind of impact and you're not going to enjoy sitting on the bench or up in the stands or whatever. 46:03 And maybe that makes a kid like him say, you know what, I thought about the WHO before and I think I am going to go. 46:11 So, I mean, I'm not saying that we're impervious to it just because it's all Minnesota kids, but I do think that because of the fact that we do most of our recruiting in the state, you know, and it's just a college hockey state and kids just don't really care that much about the WHL. 46:26 And, you know, a lot of those teams are a long ways away, too. 46:29 I mean, to be fair, I mean, when you see teams like with Michigan, you know, they lose players to the OHL and so forth. 46:35 I mean, that's not that far away from Michigan, you know, especially Michigan kids. 46:39 So, I mean, it's a little different for them as well, because a lot of those WHL teams, you know, they're kind of ways out there. 46:45 So, you know, we'll see. 46:49 Another question, we've got JJ Kreitzer on Twitter asking, who is the one player who has to be better if the Gophers want to make the NCAA Tournament? 47:02 Well, I already kind of touched on the defense, so I will go away from that. 47:07 And I will say Eric Howla. 47:08 And, you know, we talked about the power play earlier, and, you know, I mentioned this before, where Howla kind of, I don't know what role you want to call it, but it's the, you know, Kessel, Jordan Schrader, where, you know, the guy who kind of controls the puck a lot on the power play for Lucia and that top unit. 47:22 And, you know, I think him, and especially, I guess, and a one player, but, you know, part of the reason the team was doing so well at the start of the year was that, you know, the Rowan Buigstedt line was good. 47:31 But, I mean, you could almost say that the Hanson, Howla and Warning line was the team's top line for the first, you know, four or five weeks. 47:37 And those guys were producing at a huge clip. 47:39 And we talked on here about, man, Jake Hanson looks like a different player and Sam Warning, it's a good decision to bring him in this year. 47:45 And, you know, Warning wore down a little bit and I think he was going to scratch the one game and they've kind of bounced him around. 47:50 He was back with those guys and he did look pretty good, especially in the Niagara game. 47:54 But, you know, I think Howla is a guy where he's been a little bit inconsistent. 47:58 I think so much of the power play, you know, can be attributed to him. 48:01 Just, you know, he, again, he's the guy that, you know, either dishes it back to the point or, you know, kind of cuts to the middle with it. 48:06 And I think both, you know, in terms of the power play and getting that, you know, secondary scoring line going where I think you can count on Rowan Buks said to be, you know, the team's top scorers the rest of the way. 48:16 But if there's not a lot of support behind them, you know, I think they're going to struggle. 48:20 So I'd say how well if you can get back to, you know, being a point per game guy like he was at the start of the year, I think that'll help the power play and it'll help that, you know, second line and get a guy like Jake Hansen going and, you know, get some scoring from somebody other than the Big Two. 48:36 Yeah, you know, for me, I mean, I probably would have to agree with that, you know, you could probably pick out any of the guys on defense, but I don't know that any of them are, you know, improving a lot, a lot is going to make a significant impact on the team. 48:50 I really believe that when we were on top of our game, it was because we had, you know, two lines that were, you know, major threats and, you know, I didn't know if we were going to touch on it. 48:58 I know we talked a little bit about it after the Notre Dame game on GPL, but I think that, you know, you have to start wondering if maybe they need to, you know, change up the lines a little bit. 49:08 I mean, I think you kind of have to wonder. 49:10 We've been using basically the same lines and lineup for a number of, you know, series now and you kind of have to wonder if, you know, are things becoming a little predictable? 49:20 Are teams able to maybe clamp down a little bit better because they already know going in what our lineup is going to look like exactly and, you know, they can kind of game plan a little easier. 49:30 You know, I'm throwing theories out there, but for me, it's like, do you have to consider some of these kinds of things? 49:37 You know, I'm kind of wondering if maybe they need to shake up that second line a little bit and, you know, mix it up and maybe bring in a grinder up there. 49:44 I mean, I love how Saratari plays, and I think that, you know, he doesn't show a lot of offense basically on the fourth line, but, you know, he has the capability to do a little more. 49:54 And sometimes I wonder, maybe they need to, you know, throw a guy up on that line that's going to be real gritty and mix it up and get the puck to the, you know, the playmakers and maybe that's something they have to think about. 50:05 I don't know, but what are your guys thoughts on something like that? 50:11 Line changes? 50:12 You know? 50:12 Yeah, I mean, yeah. 50:14 I agree with that. 50:15 They have. 50:15 I mean, it's actually been pretty odd this year that the lines have stayed so static. 50:22 I mean, we've been so used to Lucia changing things almost on a weekly basis that it's been very surprising that he has stayed with the lines so long. 50:31 But obviously they had the early season success and he didn't want to mess with it. 50:37 But now is the time, is now the time, you know? 50:40 That's a valid point. 50:41 Ryan, what do you think? 50:43 Yeah, I don't know. 50:44 I agree that it could be done. 50:45 But I don't know if going into a road series where you're not going to have the last line change and it kind of, I don't know if it reeks of desperation. 50:53 That might be a little bit extreme of a statement. 50:55 But I think you might want to show some confidence in the guys and kind of pump their tires a little bit. 51:00 And maybe if things don't go well on Friday night and obviously if you lose 5-4 or something, maybe if you're scoring goals, maybe you don't change it. 51:08 But I think maybe if you have trouble scoring on Friday night up there and then you could react a little bit or maybe put a new guy into the lineup. 51:15 And obviously they tried that a few times where the fourth line guys got scratched. 51:19 But yeah, I mean, I wouldn't be totally opposed to it. 51:21 I know a guy that I love, Justin Bustam, he was a fourth line guy. 51:24 But I know every once in a while, back when he was here, they put him up with the Wheeler line or just to mix it up a little bit and give a guy like that some chance to go in there and make some hits on the floor, check and loosen things up. 51:36 So to Hammy's point, I mean, Serratore is probably one of my favorite players. 51:39 I mean, he's kind of in that booster mold where he's not going to wow you or anything, but he's physical and he makes stuff happen seemingly every time he's out there. 51:46 So yeah, I wouldn't be opposed to giving him a crack with some higher end guys and just kind of seeing what happens. 51:52 Well, and for me, it doesn't necessarily reek of desperation considering that they've, you know, they've been really riding those lines for so long. 52:00 And it's not like we had one bad weekend and now they're going to change up everything. 52:04 You know, that I would kind of understand. 52:06 But you know, they, like we've talked about, they've been kind of 500 basically since the last North Dakota series. 52:11 And then you kind of have to say to yourself, well, you know, maybe now is the time to kind of mix it up a little bit more and see what happens. 52:19 So maybe just a few tweaks then. 52:21 Right. 52:23 Move a guy up, move a guy down. 52:24 Just throw a few things out there. 52:27 Yeah. 52:27 I mean, I just think that you kind of have to, you know, what's the definition of insanity, you know, doing the same thing over and over again, inspecting a different result. 52:35 I mean, you know, you kind of have to say to yourself, maybe there is a little bit of a, you know, a need to kind of mix it up a little bit more and, you know, change a few guys here or there. 52:44 But I'm not saying you do anything drastic, but just, you know, maybe change a little of the chemistry up between a couple lines and, you know, see what happens. 52:51 I mean, what do you have to really lose at this point? 52:54 I mean, you're going to, you know, we haven't been playing 500 anyways in the last, you know, a certain amount of time. 53:00 So it's like, why not try a few things? 53:03 Yeah, I agree. 53:05 Well, let's start to wrap things up here. 53:07 But before we do that, we've taken a month off. 53:10 What's been going on in recruiting in this last month, Amy? 53:15 I, you know, it's been relatively quiet. 53:17 I mean, I know that they've been... 53:19 We did have a Christmas gift. 53:21 Well, I mean, yes, of course, fashioning was a big... 53:25 I mean, we landed them, of course. 53:26 And I think that... 53:28 I had been kind of thinking that all along. 53:29 I think most people kind of felt like that was the route he was going to go. 53:32 I know there had been talk about, you know, I had heard Cornell is a possibility. 53:37 And, you know, I had heard, you know, maybe he's thinking about going out east. 53:41 And... 53:42 But, you know, in the end, I mean, when a kid's got a backyard rink with the M on it, and, you know, he's got the family that he's real close, you know, with, and his siblings, obviously, you know, that whole story. 53:56 And I think it was kind of pretty clear that, you know, he was more than likely going to end up at the U. 54:01 So it's nice to land because he's a big time player, and he's, you know, actually really starting to seeming to come on and play real well. 54:08 You know, the one thing I've always said about him is, you know, he's one of those guys that you don't know for sure if you're going to see his max performance before, you know, he leaves college hockey. 54:20 He might be one of those guys that, you know, leave after a year or two, and you're kind of like, everybody's all excited, of course, and rightfully so, but you're also like, you know, you want to see him become an All-American and score 50, 60 points and be a great player and lead the team. 54:37 And, you know, he's one of those guys. 54:38 That just doesn't happen much anymore. 54:40 Yeah, I mean, you know, especially for a kid who's probably going to be, you know, pretty, he's going to be more than likely a first-round pick and maybe a high first-round pick, and you just say to yourself, well, it's nice to get those guys, but as we've seen before here, you know, that doesn't necessarily mean you're going to, you know, become a great team. 54:56 And, of course, they've done a better job of, you know, landing guys that are going to be more likely to be three- 55:03 or four-year types of guys. 55:04 So that will certainly, you know, and they're going to be good players. 55:08 So, I mean, that's going to help a lot. 55:10 So you can handle a guy leaving a little bit more when you have those kinds of guys also, you know, coming in at the same time. 55:17 So, yeah, I mean, it's very exciting to get them. 55:19 But, you know, other than that's been kind of quiet. 55:21 But that was definitely a big one to get. 55:24 I mean, is there really anything else we should be looking out for? 55:27 Are we pretty full for this year? 55:29 Is it going to kind of quiet down for now? 55:32 You know, I think all that I've really heard recently, I mean, I think that they'll be looking to maybe get some more size up front. 55:41 And, you know, because like I mentioned, they had landed some very, very skilled players that are, you know, basically five, you know, nine, five, seven, five. 55:51 I mean, they're smaller guys. 55:53 And obviously, you know, you're going to have to offset some of that with some size. 55:56 And, you know, Fashing, you know, he's not going to be a grinder. 55:59 So, I mean, you're not bringing him in to be that kind of a guy. 56:02 So, I think that, you know, they'll be looking at, you know, probably some guys with more of a, maybe a little bit more of a mean streak physical side to them that can chip in some goals or whatever. 56:12 I mean, that's the feeling I've had. 56:14 I don't have specific names I can give you or anything, but I'm sure that they're looking on that route. 56:21 Okay. 56:23 Guys, any other final thoughts? 56:27 Nothing too much for me. 56:28 I just hope the guys, you know, bring their A game this weekend. 56:32 Yeah, like I said earlier, I think it's a huge series for them. 56:35 And, you know, as a fan, either way, it's nice to, you know, have a team in first place heading into the second half. 56:40 And hopefully, they can, you know, make a little bit of a statement this weekend up there and, you know, not keep things interesting. 56:45 Obviously, they're going to be for the rest of the way, but inject a little bit of life and hold back into the fan base and, you know, make it a fun second half. 56:53 Okay, okay. 56:55 Ryan, we hope to see you next week, but we're not really sure right now. 57:01 Your wife is past due and we might have to bring in somebody to replace you. 57:06 Yeah, I'd keep the bullpen pretty warm for next week. 57:09 We're hoping before next week, but if not, it'll be on Monday for sure, which if that's the case, we definitely won't be home by Tuesday night. 57:17 But hopefully before then, although I'd prefer it not to happen during the games this weekend, but if that's what happens, I'll definitely roll with it. 57:23 That's why they made DVR. 57:25 But yeah, so hopefully by this time next week, we should be good to go. 57:29 Well, we see you should have been talking trash the whole night, so then, you know, if you're going to have the baby, you're not going to be on next week, so you don't have to play some music. 57:37 That's the beautiful world of Twitter, even if I talk a lot of trash, we'll still hear about it. 57:43 Well, the best of luck to the both of you on that. 57:46 Obviously, it's going to be a very exciting time for you. 57:50 Hammy, you can follow him at Hammy Hockey on Twitter, and obviously, you can always follow Ryan Cardinal on Twitter as well. 57:59 I assume you'll be on KFAN on Thursday, as usual, Ryan? 58:03 Yeah, usually I hear from PA on Wednesdays. 58:06 I know I haven't had a lot of time this week to listen to KFAN, so I know he's been in Vegas. 58:10 So if he's back, I would assume I'll be on on Thursday. 58:13 I don't know his deal, but should have some clarity by tomorrow, I would assume, either way. 58:18 Obviously, you never know what your schedule is going to be anyway, so just kind of listen in to KFAN, and usually we tweet out when Ryan's going to be on KFN as well. 58:27 Just a reminder, we do record these podcasts live on Tuesday nights, just after 9.30 or so. 58:33 So if you head over to the GPL Podcast page, you can listen to us record our podcasts live, and that allows us to take your questions live via the Twitter account, or you can always just send us questions at podcasts.govforpucklive.com. 58:48 So tune in live if you can. 58:50 If not, well, just listen later. 58:52 We'll be back next week to recap the North Dakota Series and preview the Colorado College Series, but until then, thanks for listening in.