0:08 This is The GPL Podcast, sponsored by Vintage Minnesota Hockey, your exclusive source for throwback Minnesota jerseys. 0:17 Visit vintagemnhockey.com. 0:32 Now, here's Hammy, Vegoe and your host, Jupiter. 0:44 Good evening, and welcome to The GPL Podcast, episode number 148. 0:52 Well, we got Veegs here, but we're without Hammy this week, so we thought we'd bring back an old voice to The GPL Podcast. 1:01 He was there back in the beginning. 1:02 Ryan Cardinal, how are you, kid? 1:06 Good, how you doing? 1:07 I'm doing well. 1:08 I mean, a lot has changed since the last time you were on. 1:10 I mean, you had just had a baby back then, and now you got a whole house full of kids. 1:16 Well, it feels that way, but yeah, we were just talking before we went live that part of the reason I had to kind of bail from it was dealing with our son when he was little, and now he just turned seven. 1:26 So things are kind of on the upswing a little bit in terms of availability and being able to do a few more things. 1:32 So yeah, it's good to be back. 1:33 You know, I talked about the Gophs. 1:35 I ran into you in Duluth earlier this year, and I saw your young lad was with you, and it made me feel instantly old. 1:45 Yeah, I can see how they have that effect, seeing the shenanigans I used to pull before. 1:50 And you had Fire Helmet Guy with you, and it must be tough for him to kind of keep his mouth closed with the youngster around. 1:57 Who says that he does keep his mouth closed? 1:59 Oh, bad influence on the children, huh? 2:03 Yeah, he also came with the Mankato, the three of us, so the Duluth Knight up there was a little bit easier to watch from a Gopher perspective than the Knight and Mankato, but yeah, it's good fun all around. 2:14 Yeah, well, what can we say? 2:17 This team is definitely jekyll and Hyde this entire season vexed. 2:22 I mean, Friday night may have been the worst period we've ever seen in that second period where they were, what, out shot 17 to almost nothing. 2:33 It was just ridiculous. 2:34 Didn't get their first shot until five minutes left in the second period. 2:38 That was their first attempt at the period. 2:41 It was not a good game, Veegs. 2:45 Yeah, Minnesota has had a couple of those kinds of periods the last couple of years and you thought this team was maybe turning a bit of a corner with their play. 2:55 The offense has been there the second half of the season, but that second period was just all the ugly mistakes are rearing their heads. 3:03 They were getting beat with stretch passes up the middle between the defenseman. 3:08 They were just running around their zone. 3:11 The forecheck completely disappeared. 3:13 There are tons of one undone opportunities when they did get the puck. 3:17 And it was just frustrating to watch. 3:20 And it was hard to really come away from that night with anything positive even though they had a chance to get some points in the third period when they got a power play goal. 3:30 But efforts like that have just popped up with this program from time to time. 3:34 And even with the new coach, they still show up from time to time. 3:39 Yeah, I mean, like you said, they got to the third period after that awful second period. 3:43 And things are looking up. 3:44 They got within one goal. 3:46 And then they just give up a bad one. 3:48 And that would that kind of sealed their night. 3:51 Yeah, it was kind of a typical giveaway where Minnesota just didn't quite have it to finish. 3:58 They took a couple bad penalties there in the third period that put them in a bad position and couldn't capitalize on the momentum that they did have. 4:10 Well, Cardinal, you've been away for a while, at least on the media side. 4:17 I'm guessing you may have become more of a fan again since you are kind of a little further away from it. 4:22 How have you been feeling about this year's team? 4:27 Well, I kind of said it when I was on with Paul Allen a few weeks ago, but I think one of the, I don't want to say worst things that happened to him, was that opening weekend against Duluth. 4:34 And when you go up there and tie, and then you hang seven goals on him on Sunday night, and then you have those two weeks off, that I think kind of maybe put expectations for the team a little bit further out of reach than what they actually were. 4:48 And you had a couple weeks to kind of chew on it. 4:50 And everyone was obviously excited. 4:52 And you look at the talent on the team, I don't think that's really, hasn't been an issue for 10 years, maybe close to that. 4:59 So you can look at the talent, the new coach, you do that to Duluth and people were pretty excited. 5:03 But yeah, I mean, I think, you know, the couple, the bad losses, you know, really the Ferris State one kind of sealed their fate in a few different ways in terms of showing that they're highly inconsistent, but also from a pairwise perspective, which we'll talk about later. 5:16 But I mean, those two losses essentially sunk their season outside of winning at maybe a 90% clip the second half of the year, they probably would have, what they would have needed to save things. 5:25 But yeah, I mean, it's been a bummer. 5:28 The Big Ten is, you know, a little bit down this year, obviously compared to last year. 5:31 So, you know, if you're looking at big picture wise, you know, between the fact the team has an awesome power play, which, yeah, another thing I kind of touched on with when I was on with PA is, you know, the power play essentially is all the same personnel, for the most part is last year minus Casey Middlestead. 5:47 And that's something that St. 5:49 Cloud has always been good at with Bob Matsuko up there. 5:52 And he's spun that magic here in year one. 5:55 I think that's a little microcosm of what he's going to be able to do with the program. 5:59 Now, some of the other things are going to take some time, but yeah, the rest of the way, they have a super tough schedule. 6:04 They have the next four on the road. 6:06 They have Arizona State, who I think Matsuko talked this week on his coaches show. 6:10 I mean, that's going to be, they're going to bring everything they have, because if they slip up that weekend, they might not make the NCAA tournament. 6:16 They're in pretty good position to do that now. 6:18 So yeah, it's going to be a tough go the rest of the way. 6:20 Hopefully, they can get home ice, and they have the power play. 6:25 And if Robson, he's been a little bit off maybe the last few weeks. 6:28 I don't know if that's he might be getting a little bit tired, or if the defense is just kind of taking a little bit of a step back here. 6:35 But yeah, I mean, they have those two things, which in theory could carry them. 6:38 But based on their schedule, I think it's going to be pretty tough to get home ice. 6:42 And hopefully, they can go on the road and win a few games for the next few weeks and prove me wrong. 6:47 Now, Vegs, Cardinal touched on it there. 6:49 The power play has been great. 6:51 But one thing that I know that Moscow was not happy about on Friday was that they couldn't get the five on five goals. 7:00 And besides the effort, I just kind of pointed out, though, they hadn't had a five on five goal in two games. 7:06 And Moscow kind of bit his tongue because you could sense his frustration Friday night. 7:12 And then he bit his tongue on quite a few other things. 7:15 You could tell he was quite upset with the team Friday night. 7:19 Well just five on five, they have a hard time getting a whole lot of continuity throughout their lineup. 7:25 The GPS line is a trio that's been decent, but most of their points are coming on the power play. 7:32 You just have a hard time with this team, seeing them generate a lot of offense in the offensive zone, because they don't get a lot of sustained pressure. 7:40 They are too quick to take the first shooting opportunity that comes to them, they miss the net a lot, and then it's out the other way and they're back on defense. 7:49 And I just think that's something that this team has struggled with a lot this year, is trying to find ways to have sustained pressure, generating scoring opportunities coming off the wall, creating traffic. 8:02 These are just things that they're not disciplined enough to create, and you're going to see some shakeups to line up this weekend. 8:08 I think the GPS line will stick together, but I think that freshman line will get split up a little bit here as they try to get that forechecking pressure spread throughout the lineup, because if this team is going to be successful in the Big Ten tournament, they're going to need more than just power play goals, because at that time of the year, their opponents probably will be a little bit more disciplined, and there won't be as many chances as there were this past weekend against Michigan or in the series before that against Wisconsin. 8:37 Jess in the Mixler chat, Jess0027 wants to know, does Moscow hate Jess Meyer so much, or why does he hate him so much? 8:45 And I really don't think he does. 8:48 Jess is just, he's not afraid to ask tough questions at times. 8:52 I mean, we've seen that for a while, haven't we? 8:54 Jess, he'll ask you the tough ones. 8:57 Jess sometimes likes to poke the coach a little bit to get a little bit of an emotional response. 9:02 I've seen it from him in post games, I've seen it in the NCAA tournament when they have those press conferences and they force the losing team to come out first. 9:11 Jess is not afraid to be a bit of a tough, tough questioner. 9:17 In those situations, so it probably looks worse on the Periscope than it actually is. 9:23 They were very friendly today. 9:24 Oh, they always are. 9:26 And I think we were all kind of giggling when Matsuko said, are you crazy to Jess? 9:33 So it was all... 9:34 Well, you were giggling, Jube. 9:35 Well, I know I was giggling. 9:36 And a couple of you were all giggling as well. 9:38 So I wasn't the old one. 9:41 Cardinal, it's a little different in the media these days. 9:45 Back in those days, we had Fiona Quick asking stupid questions. 9:50 Now we have the tough guys like Jess Meyers. 9:53 Well, remember, there's no such thing as stupid questions, which you fill in the rest. 9:58 Is anyone wearing rain boots with fish on them? 10:05 I don't wear mine anymore. 10:07 So there's no one there to represent anymore. 10:11 Who knows? 10:12 Well, you know, Vegs, at least on the other side of the weekend, they did pull out a win Saturday. 10:17 I didn't see the game. 10:20 Tell us kind of what happened on the rebound game, which we've seen a lot this year. 10:26 Well, they did have a rebound game because they got off to a 3-0 lead. 10:30 You know, it was one of those games where they seemed to capitalize on their opportunities. 10:34 That's one thing that this program has been able to do this year is when they get scoring chances, because they are able to capitalize. 10:40 The power play was successful again. 10:43 Tyler Nanny, in fact, got in on the rush and chipped in a goal 5-on-5. 10:48 But again, that second period just creeped up into them again, and they were making those poor mistakes again. 10:55 And I don't think it was quite as bad as the second period from the night before, just because they didn't get dominated for long stretches where they didn't touch the puck, but it wasn't far behind. 11:06 And we saw another soft goal let in by the goaltender, and Saturday night, Moscow did consider putting Shearhorn in between the pipes that night. 11:19 And the only reason he didn't is because Shearhorn picked up a bug on Thursday and probably wasn't really available to play that night. 11:27 And so you get through the second period, and I think they got read the riot act again between periods. 11:33 And in the third period, they played pretty clean. 11:35 They leaned really heavy on Nanny and Brinkman as a defensive pair. 11:40 I think that group probably played about 10 minutes in the third period. 11:44 Denman was dressed for the game, but I don't think he really took too many shifts. 11:49 Of course, Ryan Zuldorf got kicked out of the game for checking from behind. 11:53 So Samercini got some extra minutes. 11:56 And so we saw for one of the first times this season, now the Gopher defensemen bench get shortened a little bit. 12:03 And that paid off. 12:03 They played a good third period and pulled out the win with another power play goal. 12:08 This time from Tommy Novak, who was pointed out on the Gopher Twitter handle to all you haters out there, which I thought was well done by Brian Deutsch. 12:19 Yeah, all the haters out there. 12:21 But the fact is, he stunk for a long time, at least on the scoring end. 12:26 I mean, it took him until, what, a month ago, until he got a goal. 12:31 And I know you've said in passing, maybe it's not much of his game, but there's been so many times where I think he's tried to make the play instead of just get the puck on net. 12:40 So. 12:40 Well, you can be critical of Tommy Novak if you want, but he's a big reason that the power play is clicking as well as it is. 12:46 You know, he knows what he's doing up there. 12:48 And now that they're starting to honor that Pitlick spot on the off wing quite a bit and Sheehy McManus are heating up. 12:55 You know, he's getting more space and he showed that he can he can take the shot when it's there. 13:00 He's just not going to be a guy who's going to take a high volume of shots from where he is because that's that's really not his strength. 13:07 Frozen 4 Chance and Mixer Chat wants to know what are the chances that Pitlick returns? 13:11 Let's throw that one at you Cardinal. 13:12 You think Pitlick's going to be back? 13:13 He's he's doing pretty well right now. 13:16 Yeah, I mean, I wonder if, you know, Nashville not to switch it to NHL talk, but he's a Nashville draft. 13:22 And I wonder if they've had communication with him because, you know, he was drafted a while ago now in Nashville. 13:28 But, you know, I think they made a couple trades today. 13:30 And if, you know, it could be a kind of a thing where if he maybe isn't intending on signing with them, if he's going to maybe ride it out, if he could be someone that might be in play for them to deal to someone else. 13:42 But yeah, I mean, I guess I don't know any of the insights in terms of, you know, he seems like a program guy and someone that seems to be enjoying his time here. 13:49 So I think, you know, probably a lot's going to come down to if he wants to sign with the Predators, which they're, you know, pretty good organization now that that kind of cuts both ways and that they have, you know, a lot of talent at the NHL level and the minor league level. 14:02 So maybe he could be a situation where he rides it out here, finishes up, gets his degree. 14:07 And then, you know, we see plenty of, you know, players do the kind of Blake Wheeler was one of the first, but to take that route to where you could maybe look for a team where, you know, it might be a little bit of, you know, path of least resistance to get to an NHL roster. 14:20 So I certainly hope he does. 14:22 I mean, you know, you look at there, obviously gonna lose, you know, a lot of seniors after this year, I think. 14:27 And some of that could be addition by subtraction in some ways, just because I think a lot of people are of the mindset that, you know, let Bob get more of his guys in here. 14:34 And even if you're losing maybe some experience and, you know, maybe on paper, a little bit of talent, just getting again, Bob's guys in the fold quicker could, you know, lead to long-term success a little bit faster. 14:46 But yeah, I mean, if they lose him, they're going to have a lot of scoring to fill next year. 14:50 So hopefully for whatever the reason, he sticks it out and plays his senior year out. 14:56 You know, interesting, you mentioned Bob's guys. 14:58 And Veegs, you were just tweeting about that a few minutes ago on how Bob doesn't like that excuse. 15:06 No, he doesn't like to talk about it at all about, you know, waiting, get his guys in. 15:10 He's been through a couple of program turnovers, and he's really focused on what's best for this team now. 15:17 Even off the record, Bob is like, you know, I've only got one job right now, and that's to coach this program, and there's enough talent here where we can make something of it. 15:27 So he's very focused on how to figure it out for this year. 15:30 I think after putting Novak back on defense, you know, he kind of regrets he didn't do that sooner, or that he doesn't have more time with Novak because it's a player that, you know, could be pretty successful on the back end if he had time to commit to it. 15:45 He brought up Drew LeBlanc as a player that he transitioned from forward to D, and he did pretty well when he made that transition. 15:52 Yeah. 15:54 All right. 15:54 Well, we've got Skyra from Twitter asking earlier today, he wants to know what the new leadership in place at both the U and Minnesota. 16:03 Any chance Bob can flip brink to the Gophers? 16:07 What do you think, Veegs? 16:09 We've been kind of talking about this and how this is going to be a wait-and-see type of thing, but that's what Skyra wants to know. 16:16 Well, it's definitely a wait-and-see thing because brink is ready to come into college next year academically. 16:22 So if that is something that he was going to try to flip for next year, that's something that would take a lot of extra work. 16:30 I don't think it's in the foreseeable future that he'd flip, but maybe as we get closer to signing day next year for the following season, it's something that's going to come more heated. 16:41 Because I'm sure that the brink family is looking at DU and looking at how their new coach is doing and how that program shakes out with that transition as well. 16:53 Cardinal, I think brink would look good in maroon and gold, don't you? 16:56 Well, for the sake of longtime Pride on Ice and now GPL poster Davey Jay, I really, really hope it happens. 17:04 I think his heart is set on that more than anything else in the world. 17:08 I mean, we give him a hard time, but rightfully so. 17:11 I mean, I was thinking about this earlier today. 17:14 It's a little, obviously, you don't want to lose recruits to anybody. 17:17 It kind of bugs me if schools like Denver come in and pick out some recruits and that could be something that philosophical change that they might have with the new leadership and trying to recruit this area. 17:26 But yeah, they've got a couple of kids, Minnetonka base and obviously Brink is, he's tore up the USHL this year. 17:32 I think he's been missed maybe the last month or so. 17:34 I think he came back to action last week. 17:36 I'm pretty sure he was either player of the week or forward of the week in his first or second week back. 17:42 Yeah, I think he's the prototypical. 17:43 I mean, he's going to be drafted high. 17:46 If it was 10 years ago based on his size, he probably wouldn't be drafted where he's going to be, but he's probably not a one and done candidate. 17:52 He's the type that maybe a little bit rim-pick-lick-ish and that they're not huge size. 17:57 They've scored a ton at junior level, and if they get put in the right situation at the college level, it could make a very big impact. 18:04 So yeah, I mean, if you're looking at kids out there who seem like viable candidates to maybe go after to flip for a variety of reasons, he'd certainly be at the top of my list for Bob to set his sights at. 18:17 Definitely, that would be a big thing, but it's still a ways off, folks. 18:20 Was it maybe even January of next year, Veegs? 18:25 Well, if they were to try to flip them, they'd be trying to do it around December next year when signing day comes up, or November. 18:33 Well, it's a long ways away, and I wouldn't count out Major Junior as a possible route for Brink, depending on how high he goes in the draft, because NHL team might not want to stall his development for him to play another year at USHL. 18:47 Frozen4champs in the Mixler chat, he wants to know, I've noticed this year the visiting coaches entering from behind their bench. 18:56 The last few years, they've had to enter on the ice. 18:58 Did they change the hallway behind the visitor's bench? 19:02 Well, what had happened, they did all the remodeling back behind the benches, so it's all Gopher locker room. 19:08 It used to be the visiting locker room was just right behind there. 19:12 When they did that, the Don didn't want anyone coming in from the bench. 19:18 He forced everyone to come from the main end door, so even the coaches. 19:26 Vegas, the best I can tell, was kind of a Don thing. 19:30 He just didn't want anybody back there no matter what. 19:33 Moscow's a little different. 19:34 He's like, you know what, come through the door. 19:35 It's a little safer than walking on the ice. 19:38 It's just sort of the regime changed, and just a different view of doing things compared to Lucia. 19:46 Yeah. 19:46 You know, Moscow, his back is in shape, so he understands when people don't want to go along the ice. 19:52 So for now, it's easier access for them. 19:56 Yeah, it definitely is. 19:58 If they need to take a player off, they can go behind there now. 20:01 It's just a little different things going on these days. 20:04 So we're glad to see that because now even I have been able to go back there and take photos now. 20:12 They didn't let anybody except for you personnel back there when the down was in control. 20:19 So I'm glad that it's changed because I can get back in the photo box once in a while and get some decent photos. 20:29 And of course, Toms is saying I'm a creeper already. 20:32 Thanks, Toms. 20:33 We appreciate that. 20:37 Veegs, in a bit, we're going to be getting into your athletic story. 20:42 I know it's quite a bit. 20:44 It's right back on the kind of the attendance thing, isn't it? 20:48 Yeah, it sure is. 20:49 That always seems to draw a lot of attention from people in the comment section of pretty much anything Gopher Hockey these days. 20:56 And we saw with the Wisconsin series when everybody is very focused on Gopher Hockey for something with marketing and the alums and the team. 21:07 And they're looking like they have things rolling. 21:10 You know, they can still fill the building when they put all that into it. 21:14 But then again, we go into the Michigan series and, you know, the ticket sales probably run 9,000 for both those games and probably about half as many people. 21:25 Well, we're going to get into that in a bit. 21:26 But first, we need to hear from our sponsor. 21:31 vintagemnhockey.com is a proud sponsor of The GPL Podcast. 21:36 Well, what is Vintage MN Hockey? 21:39 Well, it's kind of the place to get all of your history of Minnesota hockey, from the pros to the minors, the collegiate teams to even the high school teams. 21:49 All information about any of those teams can be found on vintagemnhockey.com. 21:54 They also have great interviews with some historical Minnesota hockey figures, like John Mayessich and Lou Nanny, Glenn Sonmore, some of the greats of Minnesota hockey. 22:03 So make sure you check out those interviews. 22:05 It's a really great thing. 22:06 But as I always say, I think my favorite part is the store. 22:10 The store, you can buy custom historical jersey from the Gophers or the Bulldogs or some of your favorite high school teams. 22:17 And if you do make a purchase, just use the code GPL Podcast, all one word, and you'll get 10% off your order. 22:25 So make sure you visit vintagemnhockey.com and follow them on Twitter at VintageMNHockey. 22:32 Well, Veegs, this started a few years ago, or at least, keeping track of attendance and who's showing up. 22:39 It's kind of a project you've been doing for maybe almost five years now or something along those lines. 22:45 Yeah, since the Big Ten, we've kind of been getting the scanned attendance data, just sort of interested to see how fans would react to the scholarship seeding, to re-seeding the bowl, to the new conference, and just figure out actually how many people are showing up for the games, because I think it's a complicated thing to look at. 23:05 Yeah, and it's something you've been doing for GPL for a few years, and now you've kind of taken that and expanded it with your role at the Athletic, haven't you? 23:15 Yeah, and having that role at the Athletic kind of allows me to talk to people like Mike Weir's Bickey and Mark Coyle and a few people associated with the program to try to find out things that the university is doing to address this issue. 23:28 I think when you had a person like Norah Teague run in the ship, there weren't many eyes that cared. 23:34 They were just looking at the dollar amounts. 23:36 I've tweeted out this week the dollar amount with ticket sales. 23:40 The first year of the Big Ten, they actually set a high watermark for revenue for the program, and since then it's continued to decline. 23:48 Season ticket numbers have continued to decline. 23:51 They lose about 10 percent of their base every year, the last four or five years. 23:55 It's just an issue that they're trying to figure out and wrap their head around. 23:59 Because the hockey fans that they lost with the Norah Teague decisions are not coming back, and it's a problem for them to try to figure out. 24:08 Cardinal, have they lost you as a fan? 24:09 Because I noticed you tend to go more to the road games than the home games, don't you? 24:14 Well, kind of back in my glory days, it was pretty much both. 24:18 And nowadays with between work, you know, kind of taking up the fall on the weekends and then having my oldest in hockey. 24:25 So I split season tickets with my parents. 24:27 I'm there once every weekend, for sure, sometimes twice. 24:30 And no, I mean, you know, I'm still 110 percent behind them. 24:35 And there were, you know, it was fun to be at some of the I think like the Penn State game and obviously the Wisconsin weekend. 24:42 But there was a few early in the year, I think, you know, like the Michigan State for sure. 24:46 And I want to say the St. 24:47 Lawrence too, where it was pretty quiet and we can hear guys talk on the ice. 24:52 And, you know, but once, you know, Bob talked about it and Vegoe quoted, you know, everyone had the quotes about, you know, Bob saying, hey, there's some energy in the building against Penn State and Wisconsin. 25:02 And it shows that it can still be a pretty awesome place to watch a hockey game. 25:06 And yeah, but even on the Friday night against Michigan, like I knew it wasn't going to be Wisconsin. 25:11 But I mean, you would have thought they were playing the under 18 team. 25:14 And I mean, this is Michigan. 25:15 And I know not everyone's totally on board with the whole Big Ten concept. 25:19 But even before, you know, back in the WCHA days, like Michigan was pretty close in my mind with North Dakota and Wisconsin. 25:26 It's like this is, you know, as big time as it gets. 25:29 And to see the atmosphere on Friday night and obviously the performance didn't help. 25:33 But yeah, it was definitely a letdown to not have, you know, anywhere near that type of atmosphere. 25:39 But Vegoe can speak to it better than I can. 25:41 But yeah, it is, you know, the lack of people showing up that have spent a lot of money on tickets. 25:46 It's pretty crazy. 25:48 But again, hopefully they found, you know, obviously you can't let everyone into the building for cheap compared to the people who are paying for season tickets. 25:55 But hopefully there's something they can do there because it has to make an impact, whether it's recruiting or just the atmosphere in the arena and guys on the bench. 26:03 I mean, it's a huge difference between when there's people in there and when there's not. 26:06 It's an obvious thing, but again, if you've been going long enough, it's a real downer when you have the poor atmosphere. 26:12 So hopefully there's some little things they can do to keep chipping away and big picture wise the program getting back to, I mean, not like they bottomed out the last five years with Lucia, but I think it was pretty clear that something was a little bit amiss. 26:24 So if Bob can get them back winning consistently, hopefully winning a little bit in the postseason, that'll definitely go a long way as well. 26:32 You know how interesting you mentioned Michigan and I do recall those old days when we would play Michigan and Michigan State, you know, for the college hockey showcase over Thanksgiving weekend, which is tends to have, you know, at least these days, less fans. 26:47 But back then we still had quite a few fans showing up. 26:51 Are people just not interested in the Michigan thing anymore, Veegs? 26:54 Cause I'm with Cardinal. 26:56 I always thought those Michigan games in the nineties and 2000s were some of the best hockey and some of the best crowds. 27:03 And it's just, I was disappointed as well at the crowds this past weekend. 27:08 Well, I think when you look at the blue bloods of college hockey out west, Michigan definitely makes that list. 27:15 You know, they've won plenty of titles and they had the longest streak of ever making the NCAA tournament going for a while. 27:22 And I'm surprised that the fans didn't show up for those games. 27:25 You know, the games against St. 27:27 Lawrence and Michigan State, maybe you can see that with those programs being down. 27:34 But the Michigan series certainly surprised me. 27:36 And one thing I think with with ticketing this year is that the Wisconsin tickets were not cheap. 27:43 No, it's not like they were blowing out $10 seats for that one. 27:47 Like they were for Ferris State and Penn State. 27:49 And people still showed up for that. 27:51 And it is interesting when people talk about money for tickets. 27:55 There are plenty of opportunities for people to go to games for $10 to $20 this year. 28:00 And they're just not taking advantage of them. 28:03 And they like to point to the $70 ticket. 28:07 Well, I don't think that's necessarily the problem with fans right now. 28:10 It's just trying to generate a fan base that can fill the arena because they have so many more single game seats to move this year. 28:18 So, I do think you're going to continue to see season ticket prices drop a little bit around Marriott Arena. 28:25 I don't think it's going to be between the blue lines, but I think they are going to try to make tickets a little more affordable to get people in the door. 28:32 And then also, that allows them to have lower price points to get people in to fill the rest of the building. 28:38 Because when you do spite your season ticket holders by charging them $35, $40 a ticket, and then blowing those tickets out for an average of $20, those people aren't going to be happy, and they're not going to renew their seats. 28:50 No, they're not going to be happy at all. 28:52 You know, it's still interesting, you know, like you said, people complain about the price of the tickets. 28:56 Yes, they're expensive. 28:59 But like you said, the most expensive series had the most fans there. 29:03 And so it can't only be price, but like we've been talking about for years, Veegs, it's the 2,000 to 2,500 people not showing up. 29:14 They've purchased tickets. 29:16 That is a, that's, you know, that's a huge chunk of the arena that are just not showing up. 29:25 Yeah, it's interesting to see how that dynamic works. 29:28 I know that the university is going to have a mobile ticket partner for next year, and that's going to allow people to transfer their seats easier next season. 29:37 It's going to be like a click or two rather than seven or eight like it is now. 29:41 And hopefully, they're going to see a resale market that's a little bit more attractive to everybody. 29:46 And so people can get value out of their tickets when they can't go or when they're trying to give them to family or friends. 29:53 And that could impact the atmosphere in the building. 29:56 I know the Minnesota Wild, that's one of the things they do best is their ticket resale platform is quick. 30:03 It's easy. 30:04 It allows the season ticket holder to get value back when they can't use their tickets. 30:08 And that's a big issue right now at Minnesota. 30:11 I mean, what's your view on this, Cardinal? 30:12 I mean, we've got over 2,000 people not showing up on average every game. 30:17 That was never a case in the past. 30:20 What's happened here? 30:22 Well, I mean, I think it's just a lot of what, you know, people have kind of said over time. 30:26 I mean, I, you know, there's really, I can't put a finger on it. 30:29 It just blows my mind. 30:31 I mean, I know what, like, I'm paying. 30:32 Like we, our season tickets are on the red line, you know, row 20, I think. 30:37 I mean, it's not cheap. 30:38 And I just don't understand how so many people are in a position financially to just, you know, weekend after weekend, eat that amount of money and not, you know, whether it's they try to give them to people and they don't show up or they just say, you know, screw it, I don't want to deal with the hassle. 30:54 And to Vegoe's point, maybe, you know, hopefully the digital ticketing that if that gets, you know, implemented for next year, I mean, that can't hurt. 31:00 I'm assuming it's more of an older crowd. 31:02 So hopefully, or at least in terms of the people that aren't showing up. 31:05 So yeah, I mean, hopefully those people are, you know, kind of pick up the system a little bit, you know, quickly and be able to take advantage of that. 31:13 But yeah, it's really frustrating. 31:15 And, you know, again, like just the atmosphere in the building, recruiting guys on the bench. 31:20 I mean, you know, I don't know how you couldn't notice it. 31:23 I mean, I know when you're playing and you're a little bit more tiled in than when you're just sitting in the stands, but it's a big time difference. 31:30 And, you know, credit the university. 31:32 I mean, obviously, people have made some pretty big time mistakes and it happened at a bad time with the transition to the Big Ten and all the resentment that came with that to start and obviously still lingers to maybe a little bit lesser degree. 31:43 But, you know, they're obviously trying everything they can, short of slashing ticket prices by an insane amount to just fill the building, which isn't realistic, as Vegoe just explained. 31:55 So they're trying and I think between the efforts that the university is making, like I said earlier, and hopefully Bob getting the team back to, again, it's not like they weren't respectable under Lucia, but I think the new feel and new vibe winning NCAA games between those two things, I mean, I don't think it's gonna get back to late 90s, early 2000s, but I think it's gonna get a lot closer to that than some of the 4,500-ish people in the building that we've seen on an all-too-frequent basis the last few years. 32:25 Gopher Guy says, Team playing half-ass for periods and games doesn't help with the attendance. 32:30 Consistency is a huge thing. 32:32 Kind of speaking to that, Veegs, it's not just consistency, it's just win, baby. 32:38 I mean, I know you talked to Johnny Pohl and Jordan Leopold, and they had quite a few things to say to you, but they think it's, you know, with the parity in college hockey these days, it may take just get out there and win some games. 32:54 Yeah, and I think it's going to be hard for people to see some of the success that they're expecting. 32:59 You know, just look at the way college hockey is right now. 33:02 You know, the top four teams in the pairwise right now are franchises or programs that have never won an NCAA tournament. 33:09 You know, you look at some of the teams that are outside the pairwise right now, BC, BU, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota. 33:16 You know, it's not going to be like it was 20 years ago when you had all the best players in Minnesota going to one school. 33:24 And even though they were young when they were committing to the U and starting their careers, you know, they had enough talent to overcome. 33:31 There are a lot of nights where they're going to play someone who they could probably go out the night before, have a few barley pops and get on the ice and still win 6-2. 33:39 That's not going to happen anymore. 33:41 You know, Ferris State's not very high in the pair wise, but if you don't come with your A game or at least your B game, you're going to be in trouble and it takes a lot to be successful. 33:52 But I do think if they can start to the point where they can make a couple of frozen fours in a row here, maybe get a shot at a title, I think you will see some fans come back. 34:02 And it really looks like the wild are about to go through a tough time in their franchise. 34:08 And maybe that's going to time up with Moscow getting this program, I mean, and it's up to the university to capitalize and get those fans in the building if that happens. 34:17 Kevin Luckow, I hope I pronounced your name correctly, he was saying, why put all the promotional efforts behind the Wisconsin series and not spread it out throughout the entire home schedule? 34:27 What was the logic behind it? 34:28 I mean, obviously big rival, but actually they did something similar with North Dakota a few years ago. 34:33 They threw a lot of promotional stuff at that. 34:35 Is that kind of the goal? 34:36 Kind of go after the big series instead of maybe spreading it out? 34:40 Well, I think you also have such a limited budget at the university compared to like what the Wilder Vikings could do. 34:47 I mean, you look at the revenue that the entire university is getting in their athletic department. 34:52 It's like what, $122 million this last year? 34:55 That's probably what the Wilder Vikings just make in ticket sales. 35:01 So if you're trying to compare that to what the U is doing, those are two totally different animals. 35:07 And the U tries to take their shots where they can. 35:10 And they made the decision to take all their promotions, all their ticket sales in-house a couple of years ago. 35:17 And they're still learning how to do it. 35:21 Cardinal, I think it really does come down to just win, baby. 35:26 Yeah. 35:26 And I mean, they won for the most part. 35:28 I mean, you know, with under Luluchia in the early 2000s, I mean, those were the, sorry, the early 2010s. 35:33 I mean, there were some talent-wise, and there were some pretty down moments for the team. 35:37 But I mean, it wasn't that long ago that they were in the Frozen Four final. 35:41 And, you know, they had how many, between the WCHA and then the transition to the Big Ten, the five or six, whatever it was, conference titles in a row. 35:50 But I know like for me, and talking to some people that I'm close with that are diehard Gopher fans, I mean, the lack of NCAA success. 35:57 And I know I spoke about they were in the final, but I mean, I don't know what the record is outside of Minnesota, but in the NCAA regionals, I think they had one or two wins total with Luchia. 36:07 So I mean, just the lack of success in the postseason. 36:10 And it kind of got to a point where it's like, all right, we'll do good in the Big Ten, and then we'll end up going to the NCAA tournament. 36:16 And I think part of that is the NCAA tournament had morphed into basically every game being a coin flip as that happened. 36:23 You know, it used to be kind of slam dunks and we can talk about Holy Cross and everything else, but we see it every single year now where a four beats a one, and it's pretty much impossible to pick any single game. 36:33 So yeah, I mean, I think that's a big part of it. 36:37 And like Vegoe said, if they can, with Bob, once he gets, and we don't talk about getting his guys in here, but being realistic, it's going to take him having probably two recruiting classes before you can honestly expect this team to go into the postseason and do some damage. 36:52 Now, never say never, we see it's single elimination and blah, blah, blah, but it's going to take a little bit of time. 36:59 But I think if fans kind of stick with it, you know, between what Bob's done again with the power play this year and some, you know, recruiting that he's done, there's no reason to think that he's not going to get this thing turned around again. 37:10 Like we said, not back to domination every single year, but you know, back to making frozen four runs and being a one seed. 37:18 I don't think it's unrealistic to expect that, but it's going to take a little bit of time. 37:22 Veegs, what's going on with the alumni? 37:25 How are they reacting to all this? 37:27 I know we've heard some rumblings that some of them weren't happy with Lucia, and now that MAZCO is there, they're getting more involved. 37:36 What are you hearing? 37:38 Well, I think one of the things with the alums is I heard someone say something really interesting that when two parties don't talk to each other for a long time, each side kind of makes up their own narrative and that's what they believe. 37:53 And I think that's kind of what happened between Don Luchia, the coaching staff and the alumni. 37:59 There just wasn't a lot of communication back and forth and both sides just kind of dug in and were stubborn about it. 38:06 I don't think Don is very comfortable being out there a whole lot. 38:11 I think that's one of the things that's changed in coaching over the last 30 years is your head coach is just as much chief marketer as he is chief hockey coach. 38:20 That just wasn't a comfortable thing for him. 38:23 I think he grew into it a little bit here and there, but the walls are already put up between those two sides. 38:30 What we've seen here in the last year is Bob's really emphasized reaching out to the alums. 38:35 He's done a big thing talking to Ron Peltier, Jimmy Boo, Paul Osby and having those guys really be the conduits to network with all the alums. 38:48 They're establishing databases, group text message boards. 38:52 They're putting together a bunch of events for the alumni to get together. 38:57 They did one earlier in the season where they had at least 60 or 70 guys come back to the rink. 39:03 Jordan Leopold told me that he's been around the rink more in the last year than probably the previous 15 combined. 39:10 These guys are just more engaged coming back. 39:13 I think one of the things I hear from the alums most consistently is, they want the players now to have the experience they did 15, 20 years ago. 39:23 Well, how do they make that happen? 39:24 So I think you're just seeing a real engaged group there this year, and I think it's going to show. 39:29 I was looking at some of the donations for the university, and they're getting some big name people putting big name money into the program. 39:38 These things that are coming like the M Club, shrinking the ice sheet, redoing the strength and conditioning area. 39:45 I think those things are going to start to happen pretty quickly. 39:48 Well, that would be great to hear. 39:51 Back on the kind of the attendance issue, Skyuma Law is listening in, and he says, he put this on Twitter, but he says winning is not the only thing. 40:00 JVSU, as he says, is struggling with their attendance, and they're winning plenty, and they get UND and UMD at their home as well. 40:09 And I would agree with that. 40:10 I mean, they're winning really well, but you look at them against the Western Michigan or whatever, and it's maybe half empty. 40:16 It's not just Minnesota that's having attendance problems. 40:20 It's kind of all over. 40:22 Well, it's definitely all over college sports. 40:24 You look at schools like Clemson and Alabama football, they're having trouble with ticket redemption issues. 40:30 They're getting 70, 80% of their people attending, and that's why they use looking at things like the mobile ticketing and the resale market. 40:38 I know they're also putting out a bid for someone who's a parking expert to come in and help the university figure out how to make coming to games easier and how to make leaving games easier. 40:48 Anyone who comes around that area knows it's not well designed for getting in and out of very quickly. 40:55 Especially with an aging demographic as your season ticket base, those people need to get to the stadium safely. 41:02 So they've got to figure out those issues as well. 41:05 It's a complicated issue. 41:08 Cardinal, what would you like to see done first? 41:10 What do you think is, you know, obviously there's a lot of solutions, but what would you like to see happen first, either at Marriott, or what the way the team is, or just to get more atmosphere? 41:21 Well, I mean, again, as someone who pays for season tickets, like I wouldn't be super pumped if a bunch of people are getting in for cheap, but at the same time, like I'm not going to be canceling my season tickets, and I'd much rather have, you know, a bunch of, you know, might and squirt level teams and their parents on the ends, like had happened for Penn State and Ferris State, and not have me feel like I'm some sort of weirdo for being there with, you know, 4,000 other people and in this cavernous building. 41:49 So, you know, until they can get the on-ice product up to snuff, I guess, in terms of, you know, really drawing people back in for the prices they want to charge. 41:59 I mean, I'd be, have zero resentment if they, you know, X amount of tickets, even if it's, you know, 2,000 or whatever the number is for, you know, yeah, maybe not the Wisconsin Series and, you know, if they end up playing Duluth or North Dakota. 42:11 But past that, I mean, we saw, we just talked about it. 42:14 I mean, even with Michigan, you couldn't draw. 42:15 And just as, you know, get people in the building, get a buzz, like, let me bump into people in the concourse, you know, like, I want all that stuff. 42:23 And I think it makes a big difference from, like, just a fan enjoyment perspective. 42:27 When you're in a building that's full and there's a buzz, and yeah, you do have to fight a little bit for parking and all those little things. 42:33 I'd much rather have that than, you know, clean sailing around the concourse and no lines leaving because, you know, it just drops the enjoyment level so much when you're in your seats. 42:42 And there's, you know, just, yeah, no buzz, no activity. 42:45 It's just kind of a ho-hum atmosphere. 42:48 You know, and I think I'm not alone. 42:49 I mean, all the entertainment options people have these days, you know, providing more or less a sterile atmosphere more nights than not, which has been the case for several years now. 42:58 And even this year with Bob, I mean, there's been a few nights, but there's also been a few that have just been total duds. 43:03 So, find ways to get people in the building, and in a few years, hopefully, those people, you can convert them to whether it's season ticket owners, or they buy group tickets, or buy four packs, or whatever it is, get those names, collect market to them as time goes on, and hopefully you can justify charging a little bit more based on the demand due to hopefully the on ice product getting back to where we all want it. 43:27 Vig, is this beer coming? 43:29 Yeah, I think so. 43:30 I don't think there's too much holding it back. 43:33 Other than how to do it at Marriotry Arena, I've heard that one of the issues there is there's a lot of choke points in the concourse and trying to figure out how best to do it is complicated. 43:43 But I don't think that there's anybody in the athletic department that's holding back saying, I think that's a bad idea. 43:50 I actually heard that incidents of drunken fans and alcohol related issues at TCF went down once they started selling beer in the stands. 44:01 So, I think... 44:02 Less people sneaking it in? 44:04 Yeah, less people sneaking it in, less people getting too loaded before they come to the game because they know they can just get another one when they get there. 44:11 People get there easier and earlier because they know they can get there early and have a beer. 44:17 So, they're not waiting at Stubbert Herbs to finish their pint and try to get there for a faceoff. 44:22 There's just a lot of, I think, things that you can take care of by selling alcohol at the venue and I think it's coming. 44:30 So, you've kind of recapped most of this or with your article at The Athletic or is it the one that's still coming or the one that just came out? 44:37 Well, this is the stuff we've recap most of the part is, you know, in there in the first one. 44:42 The second one will be more about the alumni. 44:45 Yeah, about that group that Jimmy Boo, Paul Osby and Ron Peltier put together some of the perspectives from Johnny Pohl and Jordan Leopold as alums with the program and kind of what they're doing to move everything forward there. 44:59 Gotcha. 45:00 That's what I thought. 45:00 I knew it was kind of a two-part deal you were putting together. 45:03 There's even a third part that's going to be about how Motsgo is going to shape this program. 45:08 Interesting. 45:10 What's the timing on all of this? 45:13 We should have this part on the alums here pretty soon and how Motsgo is going to make his mark on the program will probably be more towards the end of the season. 45:20 Gotcha. 45:21 Gotcha. 45:22 Well, there's actually games this weekend, guys. 45:24 We're heading, or the team is heading out to Penn State to note that this is two four o'clock games, Friday and Saturday. 45:32 So it's earlier games. 45:33 I'm guessing maybe the Big Ten Network might be doing some double headers or something like that with either hockey. 45:39 It's five o'clock, right? 45:42 It's actually four. 45:43 It's five o'clock there, I believe. 45:45 College Hockey Stats has it at 6 Eastern. 45:48 Yeah, 6 Eastern for both games. 45:50 And Penn State likes to have those a little bit earlier games because they have so many fans coming from Pittsburgh and Philadelphia that come to Penn State. 45:58 Actually having a 6 o'clock Eastern game on Saturday is a little bit unusual for them. 46:02 They like to even go earlier on Saturdays. 46:05 I must have been looking at the wrong schedule then. 46:09 I'm losing it, guys. 46:09 I'm getting old. 46:11 It's all right. 46:13 But they go to Penn State and in Cardinal, Penn State's got a great atmosphere. 46:18 And we've seen some pretty good results there. 46:21 In past years, until last year, they kind of ran into a wall. 46:27 Yeah. 46:27 Hopefully, the team knows it's 4 o'clock, so they show up an hour early. 46:30 Because last year, they didn't show up at all for... 46:32 I mean, I guess they bounced back a little bit. 46:34 That first night was a total disaster. 46:36 And I mean, at least they were competitive in the other games for, again, compared to the first night. 46:41 But yeah, I mean, this is not a great Penn State team. 46:45 I mean, last year, it was almost a great, but I mean, they were a very competitive team last year, NCAA Tournament. 46:51 You know, this team is not currently on that path. 46:53 I mean, they didn't play last weekend, but they've lost four of their last five. 46:57 You know, I forget the kid's name, but the Finnish kid, one of their top players, and he got hurt in the World Juniors. 47:03 He's out for the year. 47:05 So this is not a team that, you know, I mean, I'm sure they're going to out shoot the Gophers. 47:09 I mean, essentially everybody does these days. 47:11 And especially when you factor in Penn State style of play and much talked about how they record shots there and what not. 47:18 But yeah, I mean, if I would assume based on Vegoe's comments that you're probably going to see split duties on the goaltending this weekend. 47:24 But yeah, I mean, it's going to be, you're not going to be able to probably afford too many soft goals this weekend. 47:30 And you know, I think it's going to be probably high scoring games if I had to guess just based on, you know, the Gophers have not been super great defensively the last few weeks and Penn State's definitely going to apply a lot of pressure on them. 47:43 And it's a small rink in that atmosphere. 47:46 But I mean, a lot of these guys were there last year where, you know, things really went off the rails. 47:51 And hopefully there is some pride with that. 47:53 And, you know, like Evan Barrett and probably Penn State's best player. 47:57 I mean, he really took it to Ryan Lindgren, I think, in that series last year. 48:01 And he's not there anymore, obviously, in Lindgren. 48:03 But hopefully the guys remember that. 48:05 And this is a little bit of a, hey, we've got, you know, X amount of games left, these guys, you know, ruined our season last year and ran our coach out of town, essentially. 48:13 And so, yeah, hopefully they show some resolve, go in there, play on their toes or physical. 48:18 And, yeah, it'd be, I think, probably not a great sign for the rest of the season if they go for his go out there and, you know, don't get at least one win and are badly outshot and pushed around. 48:28 So I'm optimistic on this weekend. 48:30 I don't think they're going to sweep, but I'd be pretty surprised if they go out there and lay down. 48:36 Moate wants to know, does Sheerhorn get a start this weekend? 48:39 We'll throw that one at you, Veegs, because, you know, we obviously last Friday night, he didn't even dress because he was sick. 48:45 And for one thing, I hope he's getting healthy, but does he get a start this weekend? 48:51 I think he does. 48:51 You know, they want to make sure that their goalies are sharp heading into the end of the season. 48:56 Who knows if they're going to need Sheerhorn to play one of those one-off games. 49:01 You know, they want him to be ready. 49:03 And I think Robson's been off a little bit the last couple of weeks, whether or not he's starting to think about signing a pro contract after the year and how that all shakes out or what's going on in his head. 49:14 You know, he just needs to be a little bit more engaged. 49:17 I asked him about what he has to do for playing against a team like Penn State and he said he has to be focused the entire time he's on the ice because he has a tendency to drift and stand up and start to look around screens and things like that. 49:31 And he really needs to be mentally engaged to have quiet feet and be ready all the time. 49:35 And so I think you'll see a split this weekend because it's not so much a physical fatigue with goalies playing in college hockey back to back nights but it's that mental fatigue. 49:45 And so I think you're going to want to see each guy get a night. 49:49 Well there you go. 49:50 I'm with you guys. 49:51 I'd like to see Shearhorm back in there just to, like you said, kind of mix it up a bit and yes to keep him fresh because like you said Cardinal, when you have the one-off games, you know, when you get into the Big Ten tournament, you could still make the NCAA tournament if you win your way in. 50:07 You just never know. 50:09 You know, we've seen this team play really well at times and we've seen them play bad at times. 50:13 But Cardinal, if this team that plays really well shows up in the Big Ten tournament, you just never know what may happen. 50:20 Yeah, I mean, it's a little bit of a tougher path now, given the Big Ten playoff structure and you're going to have to win a decent amount of games to, you know, find your way in and you're going to have to win probably, you know, at least a few on the road, given, you know, kind of the way the Gophers are trending and the schedule they have remaining. 50:37 But again, it's not like when you're looking for hope or looking for reasons, there's nothing to hang your hat on. 50:43 They have, you know, Shearhorn's a senior goalie who's proven it. 50:46 Obviously, Robson's kind of taken over, but I think you feel pretty good with both of them and both have shown on numerous occasions over their careers that they have the ability to steal a game. 50:56 And again, you know, I agree with Vegoe that you can't totally lean on the power play, but you know, you could see this team winning a couple of low scoring 2-1, 3-2 type games where Robson makes 40 plus saves and they get a couple on the power play. 51:08 Now, I mean, I don't know if they have enough in them to win four or five of those, you know, but again, there is a hope where I think is some other Gopher teams in past years, if they were in kind of the same boat, you know, you could essentially, you know, write things off. 51:21 So the talent's there, and again, they're gonna have to earn it because at Penn State, at Ohio State, Notre Dame is not great this year, but they're obviously a talented team. 51:30 And then we talked about earlier that Arizona State Series is gonna be extremely difficult given the high level of motivation that Arizona State's gonna have on top of being already a good and talented team who could give the Gopher's trouble. 51:43 So yeah, there's no easy weekends the rest of the way, and it starts this weekend. 51:47 Hopefully they can, this can kind of set the tone for the last eight plus games. 51:52 A lot of splits, Veegs. 51:53 We've had a lot of splits this year. 51:55 Well, it's been that kind of year, and I think you kind of expect that a little bit with a new coaching staff. 52:01 You see this team when they lose their focus, it's almost like they take the foot off the gas on the forecheck, and then they get stuck having big gaps. 52:10 And when that happens, you know, other teams can come at you pretty quickly and get good scoring chances. 52:15 And that's kind of how they've lost their games. 52:18 It's either that or they'll take too many bad penalties. 52:22 I think they've cut out some of those bad penalties here the last couple of weeks, or the penalty kill has just been so good that they've been able to overcome it. 52:29 But I think this team, you know, really needs to be focused on playing well and playing intense throughout the entire game. 52:36 You know, they can't take their foot off their forecheck because, as Bob Motska said, you know, when this team sits back and doesn't compete, they become average real quick. 52:46 And that happens because the other team is able to come with speed, and they just don't have enough defensive IQ to stop that. 52:54 And so I think in a game like this against Penn State, that's going to be really important for them to be on. 52:58 You know, they're going to either have to have that high pressure and forecheck hard right away so Penn State can't get going. 53:04 Or they're going to have to sit back and trap a little bit and let Penn State turn over the puck in the neutral zone and go the other way. 53:11 You know, Penn State's been giving up a lot of goals this year. 53:13 I think kind of their average score is like a 5-4 type game. 53:17 So we couldn't see a lot of offense this weekend. 53:20 Some people say they don't like the Big Ten, but this should be a really entertaining series. 53:25 I don't mind it. 53:26 I'd love to see some scoring. 53:29 I'm sick of the Big Ten BS. 53:31 Just you support the team or you don't. 53:34 Get on board, people. 53:38 Who knows? 53:38 We could just keep saying that. 53:39 People aren't going to listen. 53:40 So we'll just do our best. 53:42 Hey, Cardinal, thanks for filling in as Hammy was out tonight. 53:45 We appreciate you coming on. 53:47 Yeah, no problem. 53:48 Big shoes to fill. 53:48 But I could help out whenever you guys need it. 53:51 Well, yeah, I think we'll have you on more regularly when Hammy is out for business. 53:58 Because he's traveled and he has to do all that stuff and he can't always make the show. 54:01 So it's nice to have you back in the fold. 54:04 Yeah, thanks for the invite. 54:05 And remember, you could follow Cardinal on Twitter at Ryan Cardinal. 54:09 Isn't that correct? 54:11 You can, but just don't. 54:12 I don't really do that much. 54:13 If you want to see hockey gifts every once in a while that I recoup. 54:16 But past that, there's not much to see. 54:20 And Veegs, you know, we talked a little bit, but are you working on anything immediately this week for The Athletic? 54:26 Just that alum piece. 54:27 There you go. 54:28 See if it hits the web this week. 54:31 And you could follow Vegoe at eVegoe on Twitter. 54:34 You know, for those of you listening live, stay tuned for a bit of overtime coming up. 54:37 For the rest of you, you know, we'll be back next week to recap this Penn State series and preview another road series at Ohio State. 54:46 So until next time, thanks for listening.