0:03 This is The GPL Podcast, sponsored by Jerry Peters and First Class Mortgage. 0:08 Our expertise, your peace of mind. 0:10 Visit us at firstclassmortgage.com. 0:24 Now, here's Joop and Vego. 0:37 Good evening, and welcome to The GPL Podcast, episode number 187. 0:46 Well, Veegs, wow. 0:51 I'm not really sure what to say. 0:52 That was ugly against the BADgers. 0:55 Sure, Friday night, they played okay. 1:00 Much closer game than the score of four to one. 1:03 Saturday, oh, what can you say after that weekend, Veegs? 1:09 Well, we can tell why no guests wanted to be on our show this week. 1:13 Well, plus I didn't ask anybody. 1:15 Yeah, it's okay. 1:17 It's a tough weekend to take away. 1:18 I think going into the Wisconsin series, we knew Minnesota hadn't really been tested when they played Arizona State. 1:28 It wasn't a weekend where you look at what the Sun Devils are going through and you just go, eh, that's not really a good test. 1:38 Ohio State, not really a good test. 1:41 You're coming into a Wisconsin team that's playing really, really well right now. 1:45 You knew the speed limit was going to go up. 1:47 What we didn't see coming was all the little holes in their game that we had seen in the Notre Dame series and in the Wisconsin series earlier this year showed up. 1:59 And once that happened and they fell behind and they had some trouble to deal with, they didn't handle it very well. 2:07 And you definitely saw panic creep into their game. 2:10 And the goals just started piling up in bunches, you know, at the end of the first game and then midway through the second game. 2:16 And it didn't end well. 2:18 And if you think about it, I believe every first shot went in. 2:23 So the first shot Friday night, Cole Caulfield, breakaway goal. 2:29 Saturday, first shot on LaFontaine goes in. 2:33 The first shot on Moe goes in. 2:35 The first shot on Close goes in. 2:37 That's a lot of first shots, Vicks. 2:42 Obviously, by the time Close got there, the game was not close at all. 2:47 But Friday night, starting the game, you're jacked. 2:52 Before you know it, Cole Caulfield is behind the defense. 2:57 And what is LaFontaine supposed to do there to be probably the best player in college hockey? 3:02 Well, he's a first round pick. 3:03 And he's a first round pick because of his shooting ability, because he's such a dynamite offensive player. 3:10 He's not a first round pick because he's 6'3, plays a 200 foot game, plays the center position. 3:17 That's not his game. 3:18 His game is to be in there as a winger, create opportunities and pounce on them and give your team scoring help. 3:24 He's on the team because he's a really dangerous power play threat, not only at the college level, but probably at the pro level. 3:32 He looks like he's got the skill set that's really going to translate there. 3:36 And when you're in a tight college hockey game, like the Gophers were with the BADgers, you have to be aware of when he's on the ice and you cannot turn the puck over. 3:46 In the situations they were turning the puck over to Caulfield and Holloway, because those players will bite you. 3:54 And we heard about that from the coaching staff in the post game. 3:56 They're like, when you're playing ASU in Ohio State and you turn over the puck there, you have enough talent to negate the chance. 4:04 When you're playing against guys like that, you just can't give them opportunities like that. 4:09 You know, the sad thing is that I would say over the years, the Gophers have done pretty well defensively against superstars. 4:18 I mean, you can go back to all the big guns. 4:21 It seems like Minnesota always was able to kind of keep those guys down a little bit, not have big weekends. 4:28 And then you look at Holloway, how many points did he have Saturday? 4:31 Five? 4:31 Five. 4:33 Yeah. 4:36 Pretty good. 4:38 Pretty good. 4:39 Get healthy. 4:39 You know, when you play ASU, you might get a healthy night where you get a couple of points. 4:45 Didn't expect to see that against Minnesota. 4:47 Played Minnesota, get the same thing. 4:49 It was just... 4:52 And the funny thing is, I get people going on Twitter. 4:55 Of course, I deserve it because I just set myself up all the time. 5:00 But it amazes me how many Gopher quote, unquote fans just say, this team's embarrassing. 5:10 I mean, they're just terrible after every single loss. 5:14 And then you have other fans, every time they win, it's like they're the best team ever. 5:20 And the funny thing is that I want to say two or three former Gophers even replied and liked that tweet that I mentioned that people are just like, relax. 5:33 Yes, there's concern. 5:34 Yes, it was an embarrassing game, but this is not an embarrassing team, Veegs. 5:39 Nothing even close to that. 5:43 And it's college athletics. 5:45 I think that's one of the things that goes on at the college level is there is this inconsistency to their game. 5:53 They're not always going to be perfect. 5:55 They're not always going to be on their game. 5:57 The key is that these kids have to figure out when not to make mistakes. 6:04 And you heard that from Scott Reedy after the game. 6:07 You have to be aware of who's on the ice for the other team, especially when there are players like Holloway and Caulfield, and you can't give them offense. 6:15 Yes, we want to play hard. 6:17 Yes, we want to take advantage of our opportunities that are before us, but he knows enough to say, you know, percentage hockey is the smart play. 6:25 And I think we saw that at the end of last year when they got away with a great weekend against Notre Dame in the playoffs and sent them home for the season. 6:35 They played the game the way it had to be played for them to get a win. 6:40 It wasn't the most entertaining style. 6:42 It wasn't the style that was going to give them the most points and put them in position to be all conference and things like that. 6:48 Just win, baby. 6:49 That's all that matters. 6:51 Winning hockey. 6:52 And yes, these players are still developing and they're trying to figure out how good their game is. 6:59 But there's places to do that and places not to do that. 7:01 And a big weekend against Wisconsin where you're fighting probably for your NCAA tournament bid and your conference title potential and you throw it away by making turnovers in those situations, it's going to get you skated on Monday practice. 7:24 Yeah, I'm not really sure how to react. 7:27 I was just kind of smiling all weekend, going, it was bound this to happen eventually here, Veegs. 7:36 But what was also disappointing though was another weekend of two goals total, Veegs. 7:46 That's very similar to what happened against Notre Dame. 7:51 But Notre Dame didn't have the scoring punch, obviously, but Wisconsin did. 7:56 And then Saturday night, the biggest loss for Minnesota by total goals since how many years? 8:02 I mean, we were getting ready for postgame with the coach, and there's Jess Meyer saying, let me know your number when you figure it out, when you keep going looking back in the books, because you had to keep going back to, what, CC in the mid-90s or something like that to find out a big of loss? 8:21 Yeah, 1994 to CC, and they lost 9-2. 8:26 And I went back and I looked at some of the quotes from after that game. 8:32 And Royce was there, wasn't he? 8:34 Yeah, well, Royce wrote a column on it, and he basically called out the fan base. 8:40 He started the column with talking about Vikings fans and Twins fans, but don't forget about Gopher hockey fans. 8:46 He's like, after they got off to a 6-0 record, the Marriott Chief Faithful said, there's a feeling we'll never be out of a game. 8:53 We've just got so much talent. 8:56 And they went going, and they went into CC and got clobbered 9-2. 9:00 And at that point, Woog said, you know, we've got these players. 9:05 They're older players. 9:06 If they're not going to produce for us in games like this, maybe we should turn them into defensive players. 9:11 Maybe we need to go into a left-wing lock and shut everything down and play low-scoring hockey. 9:19 And maybe that's how this team's going to win. 9:21 And it's kind of interesting. 9:22 You look at that roster, Brian Bonnen, Mike Crowley, and they did go on to a frozen four. 9:27 So there definitely was like a show me week of practice after that weekend where they figured out a way to play winning hockey. 9:37 And maybe this weekend can have a similar impact with this team. 9:40 You know, as Bob sends the message on Monday, he said, you know, we owed the program an hour. 9:47 Based on the way we played this last weekend, we owed the jersey, the M, all the history of Pride and Ice, an hour. 9:54 And they skated and they got Tuesday off. 9:57 And today they refocused and said, OK, how do we move forward? 10:01 And I can't wait to see that this weekend because they need to reset. 10:05 They got to realize that they're not a team that's going to win 6-2, 6-3. 10:10 And that's the kind of style they play, especially when they fall behind. 10:14 And we saw that panic to their game. 10:17 We saw the panic on the power play where pucks are being juggled. 10:21 I've had a lot of conversations this week with the Gopher fan base about all this stuff. 10:26 It's not that they don't have talent. 10:29 It's just they haven't played from behind a lot. 10:32 And they really just didn't handle it very well in the Notre Dame series late and then this Wisconsin series. 10:40 I can't disagree with you there. 10:41 It was... 10:44 Well, the funny thing is that that's kind of one thing a lot of people were saying. 10:48 Yeah, for half the season, they hadn't been down in a game, much less lost a game. 10:56 They started out, was it 10 straight victories or something? 11:01 Since then, they're 500. 11:04 Well, and look at who they're 500 against. 11:07 Michigan, Wisconsin, the Notre Dame, some of the better teams in the Big Ten right now. 11:13 They have mopped up the bottom of the conference, Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan State. 11:18 They're averaging five goals a game against those teams. 11:22 Randy Johnson had this in his story, and it's like two goals a game against the top of the Big Ten conference. 11:29 So it's a tale of two teams right now, and they've got four weeks left here to try to figure things out. 11:35 But you watch their team, they're not a fancy team. 11:40 They have some players who can do some nice things on the rush, but they're not going to be able to do it on their own. 11:45 When this team was playing really well, I think we saw Reedy and Ranta just playing off of each other really well. 11:52 They were on the same page for checking, and Johnny Sorensen had some nice insights today. 11:57 He said when he looked at the film, there's things that we do when we're a good team. 12:03 We're hard on the forecheck. 12:05 There's two guys on the puck. 12:07 There's three guys in the TV shot. 12:09 You mean team play instead of individual play? 12:12 Exactly. 12:13 I went back and I looked at the first period of the Wisconsin game Saturday, seeing what kind of response they're going to have. 12:20 So many times, first guy late to the dance, puck gets moved. 12:25 The second and third guys aren't there. 12:27 There aren't three guys in the shot, so there's no pressure. 12:30 So it makes it really easy for Wisconsin to get going the other way. 12:33 I think that's the one thing they were doing even against a team like Michigan earlier this year. 12:38 We talked about this all throughout the beginning part of the season, the pressure they put on when they come into the zone. 12:46 If they dump it in, they're on that puck. 12:49 There's somebody there causing the defensemen to have to react quickly, and someone's there to either take it up off the boards or whatever. 12:57 And now that was completely gone because Notre Dame and Wisconsin figured it out. 13:04 And maybe also, like you said, they weren't playing as a team, weren't playing the team game, just too many individuals out there not hustling a lot. 13:13 And it shows, because those kind of teams, obviously Notre Dame's not going to come at you with offense, but Wisconsin did, and it really showed up, especially Saturday night. 13:24 Well, and one other thing I've noticed a couple times is that there are players out there chasing that second possession. 13:32 So they go in on the forecheck. 13:34 They aren't successful. 13:36 They don't get to spend any time in the offensive zone. 13:38 They have to backtrack, and then either there's a turnover in the neutral zone or kind of a quick one in the Gopher defensive zone, and they get a chance to go on the attack. 13:48 Sometimes as a player, you have to go, you know what? 13:51 I'm going to fold my way to winning hold them. 13:53 I'm going to go to the bench. 13:54 I'm going to let the next line get a chance. 13:56 But what happens when they chase another scoring chance is they're chasing a hand on the river. 14:02 If it doesn't work out, then they're out there a minute, minute 15, and they got to go play defense. 14:08 They got to do some back pressure. 14:10 And I just don't know if they have the legs to do that. 14:13 And boy, it does. 14:15 But that kind of brings you right back to day one media day at Mary Trina with Motzko. 14:22 I want 30 seconds of hell. 14:25 Something along those lines. 14:26 I want them out there. 14:27 I don't want them out there a minute, a minute and a half. 14:29 I want them out there busting their ass and causing havoc. 14:35 And that's kind of the key to success. 14:37 And when you don't do that, you see what happens, Veegs. 14:41 Yep. 14:42 And they just got into some bad habits. 14:44 And that can happen with college players. 14:46 I thought, you know, coming into this year, they had so much returning veteran talent, especially at center that this team was going to be in real good shape to take what they've learned, the experience they have, and make a push, especially after the start they had. 15:01 But, you know, even with veterans, you know, some bad habits can creep in there, and it's hard to find your game back, especially when you panic and you get away from what's made you successful to try to make up for it. 15:14 And we'll see how this season turns out, but, you know, in the couple moments of adversity here against Wisconsin and Notre Dame, it hasn't been great. 15:24 No, it hasn't. 15:24 I thought they answered the bell a little bit in Madison when they came back the next night and played better. 15:32 We'll see if they can respond this weekend, because they sure didn't on Saturday. 15:36 You know, that first period, I rewatched again, like I said, and they were just late to the dance at all the four check-in opportunities. 15:43 Then in the second period, the game kind of got away from them as they pushed, as they fell farther behind. 15:49 I noticed Cory's mentioning on the YouTube chat, he says, we need some more guys that can fly around and check somebody. 15:56 And we've seen with other teams, getting to have a good physical game, clean physical game, can really kind of inspire the team. 16:04 And it has been a little light on that against those teams, Veegs. 16:08 The physical play. 16:10 It can be, but it's got to be in the right time, too. 16:12 You know, Jackson Nelson's trying to be physical and send a message on Tarek Baker. 16:21 It's a long time. 16:22 I mean, sorry, you're gone. 16:23 It's college hockey. 16:27 It's college hockey. 16:27 You can't go into a guy like that in that position. 16:30 If the guy's coming up the rink, you're probably able to make that kind of contact with him, but not the race to the end wall like that. 16:38 But there are guys that are trying to do that, and sometimes they get caught in trouble. 16:42 We've seen that with Purbecks a little bit, with Brudzinski a little bit, with Walker McLaughlin a little bit. 16:48 They're trying so hard to make something happen that sometimes they commit those penalties. 16:53 It's just the wrong spot in the rink. 16:56 Well, it turns out, Veegs, now obviously they do not have control over their destiny. 17:02 We've talked about the key being, you want to be in the tournament, you're going to have to be in first or second place. 17:08 Now they're in second place. 17:10 BADgers are in first place for the first time by themselves since 2006. 17:15 If they get swept this weekend, Notre Dame will tie them in the standings. 17:21 Obviously take the tiebreaker because they would have beaten them four times straight. 17:28 And I guess, you know, it's out of our hands. 17:32 We're rooting for Michigan this weekend to beat the BADgers. 17:39 It wasn't that long ago when they had a pretty sizable lead in the Big Ten and now it's gone. 17:45 Yeah, we're just looking for a split for those teams. 17:48 You know, if you're a Gopher fan, you're hoping for some splits around the league. 17:53 You're hoping for Minnesota to maybe extend their period, to stay with it in contention as we go down the stretch here. 18:00 You know, this is a team that's got plenty of talent and you'd rather have them get this wake up message now than three or four weeks from now in Ann Arbor. 18:11 Or wait, it's at Mariucci, right? 18:13 Yeah, the end of the season against Michigan is at Mariucci. 18:17 You would like them not to lay an egg that weekend and all of a sudden have to deal with all this. 18:21 You'd rather have it now with some time left on the schedule to sort things out, get the message sent. 18:28 If they did skate really hard on Monday and take Tuesday off, hopefully they're able to build in enough recovery or that kind of message sending practice doesn't impact them down the line. 18:39 If you do that to them after eight straight weeks of hockey, it probably has a different kind of impact. 18:45 So it's probably a well thought out move by the coaching staff on how to handle it. 18:51 Well, let's see where the team goes from there. 18:53 We're going to get into talking about Notre Dame and a few other things here. 18:57 But first we need to hear from our sponsor. 19:01 Hey fellow GPLers, this is Jerry Peters from First Class Mortgage. 19:05 Interest rates are near all time lows and property values are on the rise. 19:09 Lower your interest rate and remove monthly PMI at the same time to save thousands of dollars. 19:14 Or use the equity in your home for debt consolidation and home improvement. 19:18 The housing market is still hot, so make sure you're prepared by getting a pre-approval letter from me before you start shopping. 19:26 Mention you heard about me on the GPL Podcast and receive a $300 closing cost credit. 19:31 Some restrictions do apply. 19:33 Call me today at 612-940-3291 or visit firstclassmortgage.com to fill out a free online application. 19:42 My NMLS number is 480200. 19:45 First class mortgage is 322842. 19:48 This is not an offer to lock into an interest rate agreement under Minnesota law. 19:52 First class mortgage is an equal housing lender. 19:59 All right. 20:00 Well, I always thank Jerry for sponsoring the GPL podcast. 20:08 Notre Dame kind of started all this not too long ago, Veegs. 20:12 And then they came into Mariucci and swept Minnesota. 20:15 And now we head to Compton Family Arena in South Bend, which has actually not been a house of horrors for them too much. 20:26 I mean, they did lose a playoff game there a couple of years ago, but it's not like they've struggled mightily at that arena. 20:36 My eight-year-old still talks about that horrible, horrible penalty on Tyler Sheehy. 20:41 It was very questionable. 20:44 It wasn't questionable. 20:45 It was the wrong call. 20:52 You know, when a six-year-old can see that it's the wrong call, to share that next time I talk to an official. 20:59 But they have played pretty well against Notre Dame in the past. 21:03 I think Notre Dame plays a style, whereas if Minnesota as a team have their heads on straight, they will have the opportunity to create offense. 21:12 It's not a program that's going to forecheck you really hard. 21:17 Now, sometimes Notre Dame has changed it up a little bit, has upped the pressure that they have and apply. 21:24 But I don't know if we'll see that this year. 21:25 They do have kind of a younger team. 21:27 They've had some kind of up and down crazy scores this year for Notre Dame. 21:31 It's been a little strange. 21:33 Giving up a lot of goals at times. 21:35 Yeah, and I don't expect that to happen this weekend, especially with the way Minnesota is coming off last weekend. 21:41 I think they should be playing more cautious. 21:44 I don't think they should double down and keep trying to trade chances. 21:48 You saw Bob Otsuko and his coaches show say, well, you know, in that third period, we out-chanced them seven to five. 21:56 They scored on all five of theirs. 21:58 I was like, I'm not quite ready to drink the Kool-Aid that says that's what you want to do and that's how you want to play. 22:07 You know, just saying, don't start trading chances with the other team's best players. 22:11 Now, I don't think Notre Dame has the kind of players that Wisconsin has to capitalize on scoring chances. 22:18 But they can shut you down. 22:19 That's not a recipe for success. 22:20 They can shut you down better. 22:22 And the thing is, if you get a couple goals on them, that may be all you need against Notre Dame. 22:31 But the problem is we've just struggled getting the couple goals. 22:36 And they get frustrated. 22:38 Maybe it is more of that, hey, we need to stick to the plan, stick to what Matzko is preaching to us, get out there and work as a team, pressure them, cause them to make the mistakes. 22:50 And like you mentioned earlier, when you do that, you're successful. 22:54 And they have been successful against Notre Dame previously. 22:56 And what Matzko said earlier this year, he took the full blame on the Notre Dame series. 23:03 He's like, I didn't prepare them. 23:05 These losses are on me. 23:07 Well, I can guarantee you, he's going to do his damn best to prepare them for this week, especially after what happened against the BADgers. 23:15 Yeah, I don't think he put the BADgers series on himself. 23:18 No. 23:19 No. 23:21 He mentioned there's a saying in coaching, you get to kick the trash can or shoot the bullet only three times a season. 23:27 I think you only get to fall in the sword as the coach one time a year as well. 23:33 So, you know, I think this weekend they're going to be well prepared. 23:36 And I even asked him today, you know, do you tell the players to put the yellow light on the fancy plays? 23:42 And he basically didn't say it explicitly, but he's like, we've got a red light on fancy plays. 23:48 He's like, the only time fancy plays should happen on the ring with our team is after you've competed hard and you've won a puck and you've created chaos. 23:57 That's when you can make something fancy happen, when there's chaos and teams are out of their structure because your blood's pumping, you're at the top of your senses, you're just reacting, you're using your talent. 24:10 You know, you're not trying to make something out of nothing. 24:13 And too often this year you see players trying to make something out of nothing. 24:16 And it comes back to bite you more times than it helps you. 24:20 Well, you know, we've seen this over the years, the frustration of, like you said, trying to make that extra pass, trying to hit the top corner. 24:30 Boy, is this weekend a garbage goal weekend. 24:33 This is one of those weekends where Ranta, close into the net, is going to get a goal or two. 24:39 And he has to think that way. 24:40 He can't just be just doing all these wandering all over the place. 24:45 We need to get shots on goals. 24:47 Shoot them low. 24:48 Get some rebounds. 24:49 Garbage goals. 24:52 That's a recipe for success. 24:53 Because, you know, I start yelling at the TV. 24:57 You know, you've had some kid taking a shot from an angle trying to pick a corner and you know where it goes, Veegs. 25:05 Around the corner and out the other end where there's nobody covering. 25:09 So, for me, the key this weekend is definitely teamwork, garbage goals. 25:17 Just get shots on goal and see what happens. 25:20 And the other thing is stopping on pucks. 25:22 You know, that's something that Motzko and Johnny Sorensen said this week. 25:27 You can't do flybys. 25:28 You can't just kind of swing in and swing out. 25:31 You know, you have to, if you're going to the net, stay there. 25:36 Don't just swing around or peel off. 25:40 Stop on the puck. 25:41 You know, if you're making a check on somebody, I was going to maybe put some clips together, but I chose not to. 25:47 But there are players who are engaged with somebody on the forecheck and it could maybe stop and make a play on them and eliminate them. 25:55 But they just keep swinging by and there's just wide open ice then. 26:00 So you got to stop on pucks and make it hard for the other team to break out. 26:04 You can't make the game easier for them. 26:07 So it'll be interesting to see if they're ready for that style. 26:10 Because I know Notre Dame is going to try to get the red line and chip it in and be hard on the defense. 26:15 Because that's something, you know, Jackson Lacombe talked about the last time they played is he said, you know, it was a little intimidating. 26:22 Every time you're skating backwards, you knew you were going to get hit. 26:27 And that's one of the hardest plays for a defenseman to make. 26:29 And I think even at the start of the year, Moscow is a little worried to see how his young defenseman would handle that kind of pressure. 26:36 Because if I'm Jeff Jackson, I'm like Mike Kester, Jackson LeCombe, Brian Johnston, you're going to get hit a lot this weekend. 26:44 We're going to dump pucks in. 26:46 We're not even going to try to be the first one there. 26:48 We're going to put you in the glass. 26:50 You know, they're not going to put you in the glass and take a penalty, but they're still going to get hit. 26:54 So that's something to watch this weekend as well and see how well the defenseman handled that pressure because it's coming. 27:07 It is. 27:12 I just don't know what to expect right now, Veegs. 27:15 You know, I keep thinking, yeah, predict sweep, predict sweep. 27:19 I'm not even thinking that this weekend. 27:20 Even after last weekend, I'm like, sweep. 27:23 I meant the BADgers, yeah. 27:26 So I'm kind of struggling because we just don't know how they're going to react. 27:31 We hope they react the right way. 27:32 And like you said, you can only kick down the garbage can a couple times a year. 27:38 Because from what I know, Lucia used to try to do that a lot too. 27:45 Or he'd let Gensel do the yelling. 27:48 And we know during those last few years, there was a lot of yelling going on because stuff, it just wasn't working right. 27:55 There's the old Jacques Lemaire line, you know, why don't you yell at the players? 27:59 Why don't you keep yelling at the players? 28:00 He's like, well, you know, sometimes you yell at the players, sometimes they yell back too, you know. 28:07 Then you got a real problem. 28:13 Oh, boy. 28:14 I don't know. 28:15 Corey's asking, any updates on the goalie situation from next year? 28:18 He says the kid from Cornell would be huge, but is it realistic? 28:22 And that kind of relates to also Tim Hapkeer asking on Twitter earlier today, do you think the Gophers will replace Laffer with a transfer goalie or just stick with Moe? 28:34 What are your thoughts on goaltending next year, Veegs? 28:36 Laffer's gone. 28:38 Or we think he's gone. 28:39 I guess he could stay, couldn't he? 28:41 He could stay. 28:42 Technically, he could be back. 28:46 Who knows? 28:46 I don't know if he would do that. 28:48 The one thing I will say with Jared Moe, Bob has not been super kind to him over the years here. 28:56 He's been quick to call him on goals like he led in on Saturday. 29:01 When he comes into a game and he's not sharp on the first shot, or when he gets a start and lets in a soft goal, sometimes you hear a coach go, he's just feeling the puck and it's a tough situation to come into. 29:15 Bob hasn't treated him with kid gloves, so it's been kind of sharp criticism tossed his way. 29:22 So I don't know what to read into that other than it's got to be a little uncomfortable, and I don't know if Bob would let that situation be a risk for next year. 29:34 Because if you don't have good goaltending, it's going to be tough to win the Big Ten. 29:38 There's just so much talent now in the league and a non-conference schedule that Minnesota hopes to play. 29:45 There are no easy games to work someone in. 29:48 You can only play Niagara so many times. 29:50 You're going to have to play the Duluths and the North Dakotas and Mankatoes, and you're going to get in the Big Ten against Michigan and Wisconsin. 29:59 It's going to be difficult. 30:01 A transfer does make sense because any player this year can get a free year basically and play that extra year. 30:07 So maybe the Cornell goalie like Gallada. 30:10 He's very accomplished in the ECAC. 30:13 Wisconsin tried that. 30:14 It didn't work out so well. 30:16 But he wouldn't be coming here to play all the games. 30:18 He would just be there as an option for Mo to compete with. 30:23 Monsko does like the closer. 30:26 He said, I wouldn't be surprised to see him see the net again, which kind of surprised me. 30:33 We hope not because that means Laffer had a bad game. 30:39 And it means he doesn't have confidence in Mo. 30:41 So what does that do then? 30:42 It gets pretty tricky. 30:44 Mo's got a lot of skills. 30:46 Does this go back to last season when he was alternating? 30:49 And Mo really struggled at the beginning of last year. 30:53 He would let in a lot of first shot or first tough shot goals in at the beginning of the season. 30:59 And that was his first experience as a Gopher. 31:04 Do you think it could go all the way back to then? 31:07 And then, funny thing is... 31:08 I don't know, because when they came back from break, Mo played pretty well in January and February. 31:14 It's just when he first started, yes. 31:16 Yeah, the first couple of games, it took him a while. 31:18 And you look at a goalie like Dubnik, very technique focused. 31:23 They're big guys. 31:24 They play their angles. 31:26 They play their gaps. 31:28 Timing comes into that a little bit when you're playing that style. 31:31 And if you don't get that kind of look in practice and you get in the game and everything's faster, as much as teams say they practice hard, they play faster and harder in the games, it can be a little bit different for a goalie. 31:43 And he might be a guy who needs some work to be sharp. 31:47 You know, he hasn't looked great sometimes when he's not played for a while and then comes in. 31:53 That just could be what you're dealing with. 31:57 Boy, I was just looking on Twitter and Sal Paradise asking, Gophers are 11th in the pairwise, almost borderline NCAA Tournament team. 32:06 I just want to, I want Sal to call in and be on the show. 32:12 Does he not know there's no pairwise this year? 32:15 I know he's not a very dedicated fan. 32:21 How long has he been following this program, like weeks? 32:24 Is he on Gopher Hole instead of Gopher Buck Live? 32:28 Maybe, maybe. 32:31 Maybe he needs to turn Pride on ice.com back on. 32:35 Maybe we could do a rivalry. 32:37 No, there's no rivalry. 32:39 He's too tired for that, I think. 32:42 Okay, so you mentioned earlier that we'll have a non-conference season next year. 32:46 Do we have any clue what's going to happen with non-conference? 32:50 Is it going to be something where it's kind of these contracts, like we were supposed to go to North Dakota this year. 32:57 Will they just delay everything a year, or will they just kind of maybe take this year and tack it on the end of other years? 33:03 Do we have any kind of clue of what they're going to do with kind of the pre-scheduled non-conference games that they've had in the past couple years? 33:11 From what I can tell in college football, everybody just shifted it out a year. 33:15 Because rather than have to pay the guarantees and deal with that kind of stuff, they just pushed it out. 33:22 So I think that's what we'll see in college hockey. 33:25 But TBD, this is the first time we've ever been through something like this that I've been alive for. 33:30 And like I said, we don't even know what the game times are going to be for the last game of the season. 33:37 Last game of the season, we still don't know. 33:39 TBD, we don't know anything at TV. 33:42 We think the regionals are going to happen in three sites. 33:45 Maybe, maybe the Frozen Four is going to be in Pittsburgh. 33:49 Maybe they're going to have 16 teams. 33:51 Maybe they don't need the fourth regional. 33:53 Maybe they're just going to do 12 teams. 33:55 Who knows? 33:56 We have no idea what's going on. 33:58 We asked Bob in the availability today, he's like, do you know what's going on with the NCAAs? 34:03 He's like, no, no. 34:04 Do you guys know? 34:05 Can you tell me maybe? 34:08 And then he had brought up on his coaches show. 34:10 He's like, you know, I'm not a big fan of three games in three days in the last week of the season with the NCAAs the next week. 34:17 It's going to be hard on the players that go through that situation. 34:20 I mean, it happened all the time. 34:23 We're talking about maybe... 34:24 It happened all the time in the past. 34:25 It never turned out well. 34:27 It never turned out well. 34:28 You know, the team that played three games in three nights, I think only one team ever won the WCHA Final Five doing that. 34:35 And then going on the NCAA tournament, if you play three games in three days, you're going to be tired going into that. 34:41 You've got to travel out to a regional. 34:43 You've got all these other commitments. 34:46 It's complicated. 34:46 These are just college kids. 34:50 Yeah, they just want to play. 34:51 They don't care. 34:54 They don't care at all. 34:57 But, you know, I still see so many people complaining about television and everything this year. 35:03 Oh, Sal must be listening because he's already replied. 35:07 Yeah, there is no pairwise this year, Sal. 35:09 There is no pairwise. 35:11 It doesn't work without non-conference games. 35:15 Maybe it's time to turn the television back on on pridonice.com. 35:19 No more color bars. 35:23 And Hockey East is doing some sort of pairwise type thing for their conference standings. 35:28 Did you see that? 35:30 I didn't read it, but they are going to do some kind of inter-conference. 35:35 I don't even care anymore. 35:36 It doesn't matter what the other schools do. 35:37 It sounds like it's basically pairwise for a conference. 35:41 So interesting. 35:42 Well, Steve is like, what the hell is there to complain about TV this year? 35:45 You know how people are. 35:46 A lot of people, they can't stream Fox or FSN because FSN doesn't stream on Hulu or YouTube and all this other crap anymore. 35:56 I literally had one guy who said, in a reply to the University of Minnesota when they said they were going to be on Fox, SportsNorth, that, why? 36:06 95% of your fans can't see games on FSN. 36:09 I'm like going, are you nuts? 36:12 I mean, seriously, are you that stupid? 36:16 The amount of people who stream only on Hulu and YouTube is still not even close to people who have direct TV, Comcast, MediaCom, whatever it has. 36:25 I've got Jaguar and I get the games just fine. 36:32 And it's funny to me, Veegs, is that people have gone the exact opposite way. 36:37 We don't want games on the Big Ten network. 36:39 We want them all on FSN. 36:42 What do you really want, people? 36:43 Because we're sorry, but people complaining at the U when a game is on FSN, shut the hell up, please, because FSN could just say, no, we're not going to carry the games. 36:57 Then what's Minnesota going to do? 36:59 Nothing. 37:00 If a network is going to say, we'll carry the games, it's not like Minnesota is going to say, no, Veegs. 37:07 Enjoy it while you can. 37:09 They have more games on TV than any other college hockey program in the country. 37:16 If you don't have... 37:17 And this season, all of them so far, one is going to be streamed. 37:22 That's this Saturday. 37:23 We're stream only, but actually, if you're not in this market, if you're liking some Chicago markets, you can see it on TV. 37:28 And then we just literally, we wait for the Michigan series. 37:32 Has that ever happened? 37:34 And if you have BTM+, you can get all the games there too. 37:38 So if you're a cord cutter, just get BTM+, and follow Minnesota. 37:42 It's like an extra 15 bucks a month. 37:44 It's nothing compared to tickets. 37:48 It's nothing. 37:50 We're very privileged with this program. 37:53 We always have been. 37:54 And you look at, as you said, a ratings record on Big Ten Network, which is not the greatest when they played Ohio State a couple of weeks ago. 38:03 This week, they'll be on NBC Sportsnet, or Sports Network, the network that's going away on Friday. 38:11 And then on Saturday, it's a stream only, but that stream is pretty darn good, Veegs. 38:17 NBC Sportsnetwork does a good job with their stream. 38:19 I think that with their Premier League coverage, they've got a lot of experience there. 38:24 They've got a good platform. 38:25 It'll be great. 38:26 It might even be pretty close to real time. 38:28 We'll see. 38:29 NBC Sportsnetwork is a much closer stream than some of the others. 38:35 I might actually be able to basically live tweet the game rather than being so far behind on my streams that I have. 38:41 The best part is that I used to love the fans who complained back in the day that Fox or MSC, either Fox or MSC, they don't go to Houghton. 38:51 They don't go to Alaska Anchorage. 38:53 We don't sell those games. 38:54 Yep. 38:55 Then there would be times when they still had one network that there would be tape delayed. 39:00 In fact, I would even put Gopher Puck live in the banner. 39:03 I put tape delayed over the live part just to make fun of it. 39:06 Every game you could stream, you could see it live anymore. 39:09 I mean, people talk about the good old days. 39:11 Do they forget that the good old days didn't include a lot of games or had games that were taped delayed? 39:17 I don't know. 39:24 We can look past it. 39:26 I just think a lot of these people are not real fans. 39:28 They just want something to complain about. 39:32 What else we got on Twitter? 39:34 Let me see here. 39:38 Oh, for us neophytes out there, how is the NCAA tournament field selected then? 39:42 Well, Matt, aka Sal Paradise, that's the big question. 39:48 We don't have an answer. 39:49 The schools don't have an answer. 39:51 We don't know. 39:52 For all we know, it's going back to the old smoky room days where a panel will meet and decide who gets the tournament and who doesn't. 40:04 Bob keeps saying, don't worry, they'll get it right. 40:06 It's like, well, we'll see if you guys keep splitting down the road here. 40:11 You might want to be one of the teams that left out. 40:15 Oh yeah, we're poking fun at you, Matt. 40:19 We're going to do that. 40:20 We poke fun at anybody here. 40:23 We're equal opportunity offenders. 40:27 Feel free to poke fun at us too. 40:29 Oh yeah, totally. 40:32 We hear it all the time. 40:33 We get thrown under the bus. 40:34 I don't care. 40:36 It's all good. 40:36 You started this all, Matt. 40:38 You started it with your little website. 40:42 So we blame you for everything. 40:44 Just like we blame Rick Pizzo for everything that goes wrong in the Big Ten network. 40:49 It's just a running joke. 40:50 We just have fun with it. 40:53 But yeah, NCAA Tournament, we just don't know. 40:56 We might not know for a little while. 40:58 I wouldn't doubt if they just, you know, you got your conference champions and maybe if there's a different, you know, regular season champion, that's a good start, Veegs. 41:11 And then go by rankings, which mean very little. 41:20 Right now, anything we think of is just speculating. 41:22 We just have no idea. 41:24 Yeah, and they're not setting out any standards. 41:27 And I think they're going to have a hard time getting a consensus of what standards should be in this kind of year, being the fact that the East is just a mess this year. 41:37 That's why Hockey East is doing this crazy pairwise thing for their conference tournament, because they're not going to be able to compare teams very easily, objectively. 41:46 So they're just putting that out there. 41:49 So it's even harder to compare teams out East to teams out West. 41:53 It's going to be a mess. 41:54 I think if Minnesota wants to assure themselves a spot, win the conference tournament or just win the league. 42:03 I don't think you can finish third in the league and not win the conference tournament and guarantee yourself a spot, even with the first half Minnesota had. 42:12 If they're third in the Big Ten and they don't win the tournament, the way they've looked against Wisconsin, I don't know if you can count them in. 42:21 It's going to be tough to just count one weekend as a big negative, but that could very easily happen in a national committee trying to figure out a tournament because they've historically been anti-Big Ten, I think, a little bit. 42:34 Everybody loves the NCHC. 42:36 They've had plenty of teams in because it's pairwise. 42:41 So, all the more important, win some games this weekend. 42:47 Better yet, sweep the weekend. 42:51 I'm not going to say it. 42:52 I'm going to call a split this weekend, Veegs. 42:55 I think that's optimistic. 42:57 But kind of like how Cappy said a few weeks ago, if anyone's going to sweep, it's going to be Minnesota. 43:04 I'm just going with it. 43:10 Just going with it. 43:13 I don't know what we're going to see this weekend. 43:15 I really don't. 43:18 I worry that we're going to see more fancy pants hockey. 43:21 Don't say that. 43:22 You got to work hard. 43:24 You got to. 43:26 But I don't think that that's going to be taken out of them by one skate on a Monday. 43:32 I think personally with the modern athlete, the way you can get their attention is take away ice time, take away special team time, and I don't know if that's going to happen. 43:45 If it does happen, like look at Torz, what he did to Lainey this week. 43:49 Lainey talked back to one of his assistant coaches on the bench. 43:54 Torz benched him for the rest of the game. 43:56 Said, you can't do that. 43:58 I know we've heard instances of players talking back to Gopher coaches over the last five or ten years. 44:04 I have not seen a player publicly just benched for a game because of that. 44:11 We've called for it. 44:12 We've called for a lot of players need to sit. 44:14 And they never did sit. 44:16 Right. 44:18 I think if you want to send a message to the modern player, that's one of your best ways to get through them. 44:24 If I see that happening when players start to do things that are fancy pants hockey, that are costing this team some trouble, I will be a believer in what's happening. 44:36 If I see them not even have to go there, then I'm convinced. 44:42 They've flipped the switch and they're going to be a competitive team down the stretch. 44:47 But I'm waiting to see what happens. 44:49 This is a big weekend for me in where to evaluate this program going forward. 44:54 And it'll be must watch TV for Gopher hockey followers. 45:00 I can't disagree with that, Veegs. 45:03 I'm thinking split. 45:04 I don't think this team has the consistency yet. 45:06 I think they'll get a lot of learning lessons at the family arena. 45:12 Quick question. 45:14 How do the players react to boards on opposite sides of the ice? 45:19 We have that at Compton. 45:20 We have that at Michigan State. 45:22 Did you ever play in a rink like that? 45:24 Does it throw you off when teams are on opposite sides of the ice coming on and off? 45:30 I think it's easier to see what the other bench is doing when you're on opposite ends of the rink. 45:35 You can see what lines are coming up next, how they're positioning themselves. 45:40 Usually groups who want to go out next, they shuffle towards the end. 45:45 You get to see the other coaches, who they're talking to. 45:48 Sometimes you can get some stuff that way. 45:50 I like that if you're into that kind of stuff. 45:53 I know Bob likes to just roll his lines. 45:57 That's one thing I would like to see him try to match up lines a little bit more here and there, but it's just not his philosophy. 46:03 He wants to roll his guys out against anyone. 46:05 He'd rather manage fatigue levels than get matchups. 46:09 I'm kind of a matchup coach. 46:11 I want to put my top defensive pair out against their top offensive line, at least. 46:17 I want my good centers out against their good centers. 46:20 I'm kind of a strategic guy that way. 46:23 Bob just wants his team rolling. 46:25 So, I get that. 46:26 But I think when you're across, you can see that more. 46:29 It's easier to coach. 46:30 You know, I'm seeing a couple of mentions of Brodsinski in the chat here. 46:34 Brodsinski, borderline D1 player, Hapge saying, what's up with Brodsinski? 46:44 You've seen the coach quasi-discipline him at times, making him the extra skater, throwing him on the fourth line. 46:54 He's set out a game or two, hasn't he? 46:55 He's set out a game and he was told to watch and see what's happening on the ice and get some perspective. 47:01 He's done that with players at the bottom of the lineup, like Brodsinski and Nevers, to try to send micro messages. 47:09 It doesn't happen to top players. 47:11 Brodsinski, he's got another level to his game. 47:14 He definitely needs to be stopping on pucks and being dangerous offensively. 47:18 He made a really nice play on the Myers goal against Wisconsin, where he got a seam pass, but there's also holes to his game too. 47:27 He's got something more to his game and offense that he has, you want to try to develop and you want to be patient with it. 47:36 But sometimes, maybe it's next year for him. 47:39 He did come into the season with an illness. 47:43 Maybe there's something to that as well. 47:47 Did he have COVID? 47:50 They'll never tell us. 47:52 Only one player has admitted to it. 47:55 Right. 47:57 But Johnny Sorensen said today that the team is aware that people are getting reinfected with COVID as these variants get out there. 48:05 On the dry erase board this week, all the wild cases were well publicized among the players to let them know, hey, be careful, but don't let your guard down. 48:16 Even though, you know, we're in February and vaccines are coming out, we still have season left. 48:21 And if we have COVID cases hit us, they could derail things. 48:25 Because, you know, the Big Ten, you know, a little bit more stringent on when they allow players to return to action. 48:32 So they're not out of the woods of this yet. 48:34 The Boogeyman is out there, as Bob said today. 48:40 Yes, it is. 48:41 And like you said, you know, it's affecting Big Ten games this weekend. 48:44 Was it, uh, isn't Penn State shut down for the weekend? 48:48 Penn State shut down for the week. 48:50 So Boogeyman found Guy Garassi's squad. 48:52 Yeah. 48:54 And it could happen to Minnesota. 48:55 It could happen to any of these teams. 48:56 Boom. 48:57 Just like that. 48:59 And mess everything up. 49:00 So, you know, I would say so far they've been very fortunate. 49:07 Knocking on wood on that. 49:08 Definitely going to knock on wood. 49:09 Just hoping every game is a gift. 49:11 Yes. 49:12 Enjoy the ones coming up. 49:13 Exactly. 49:15 Well, I think that's going to do it for this week's GPL Podcast. 49:19 We'll be back next weekend to hopefully recap a much better series against Notre Dame than what we had against the BADgers. 49:29 That would be great. 49:30 And then we'll probably preview the series with Michigan State coming to town. 49:36 For those of you currently watching live on YouTube, stay tuned for some overtime. 49:39 For the rest of you, we'll see you next week.