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. 0:37 Good evening, and welcome to The GPL Podcast, episode number 192. 0:45 Well, it was a good weekend for the Gophers a couple weeks ago, when they won three games in three days, winning the Big Ten tournament, automatically qualifying for the NCAA tournament, which we thought was gonna happen no matter what. 0:59 But we're gonna cover all that in the NCAA tournament, and one of our favorite guests is back with us, Nate Wells, Mr. 1:07 Gopher State himself. 1:09 Nate, how you doing? 1:11 I'm good, and it's good to be back with you guys. 1:14 I miss being around the rink, I miss hanging out with you and Veegs. 1:20 Well, we miss being at the rink, too. 1:23 It's been over a year, hasn't it, Veegs? 1:26 It has been a long year. 1:27 We are getting closer to the finish line. 1:29 I miss seeing Nate at the games. 1:31 We used to be pretty close together in the press box, and we can bounce ideas off of each other, like each other's tweets, give each other a little thumbs up, talk between periods. 1:41 It's a little different this year not having those conversations. 1:44 So good to have you on the show, Nate. 1:46 It looks like we've already got quite a few people in chat. 1:49 So go ahead, Nate. 1:50 I didn't hear you there. 1:50 Nate's a little soft tonight. 1:52 I was just saying, really, it is. 1:53 I think the last time I was on was right before everything went haywire and shut down. 1:58 So hopefully opposite happens this time. 2:01 So we have you to blame? 2:04 I mean, I blame global pandemic, but timing-wise. 2:12 Well, I see we've got a full chat and I already see that Eric Brewer says he is watching us from Maui right now. 2:18 I bet the time zone change watching from Maui is a little bit better than time zone being a guest from the East Coast. 2:31 It's like happy hour right now for Brewer. 2:33 I mean, I thought about going to Maui, my kids are on spring break right now. 2:38 I thought about this would be a good year to go with a kindergartner and a second grader. 2:42 Why not go to Hawaii? 2:44 Pandemic shut that idea down, but Brewer could take advantage. 2:48 I'm jealous. 2:49 He's a jerk. 2:53 This is just preparing me for the 10 p.m. 2:55 Saturday start. 2:59 Well, let's talk about it, guys. 3:01 The boys are back in the tournament, they pulled off a couple key specific type of wins during the tournament. 3:12 Both times against the Michigan teams, they were down, had to come back, had to win in overtime, things they hadn't done all season. 3:20 And it got them to the championship game. 3:26 Well, I thought it was important that Minnesota got that experience. 3:29 This has been kind of a weird year for them. 3:32 Either they've been front runners and have got the early lead and run away with the games, or they've kind of let the other team take advantage and they've been behind and haven't been able to shake that mistake and turn it around. 3:46 So this past tournament, they had a couple of games where I didn't think they played particularly well mentally in the first periods. 3:56 Physically, I thought they were engaged, they were trying to play hard, they were skating well, but they just weren't mentally making the right decisions with the puck. 4:05 They were giving away pucks in the slot, blind passes, just not creating consistent offense. 4:13 And both nights, they found their game. 4:15 And the reason they were able to do that is they've got great defensemen and great goal-tending. 4:20 And that allowed them some time to find their game, and it paid off at the end with some smart plays. 4:26 Like some of the goals that they were able to score came off of patience, ground game, and then things would open up a little bit. 4:33 And Vig, you actually asked Motzko this, I believe almost two nights in a row, and even the players you asked, typically earlier in the season, you guys get down, you're quiet on the bench, there's not much excitement, you've kind of given up. 4:45 And you were asking the players and Coach Motzko, what was different this time? 4:49 How did the bench get past that? 4:54 And I don't know if I got great answers either when I was asking these questions. 5:00 I think they acknowledged that it's been a problem this year, and they just got away with it against Michigan State and Michigan, and they stuck to the game plan. 5:10 And I think it's enough players stuck to it and made the right plays. 5:15 Bob maybe changed the lines around a little bit, changed the power plays a little bit to maybe change things up, and the message did eventually get through to the guys. 5:23 And you look at Sammy Walker's OT goal against Michigan, that's coming off a play where a player put the puck down along the ice, a rebound was there, Walker got free and was able to get the game winner. 5:38 Those are the kind of plays that they need to make. 5:40 And we saw Blake McLaughlin maybe play his most engaged back-to-back nights against Michigan and against Wisconsin because he was engaged in playing the right way. 5:49 And so maybe when you get enough guys feeling that, you don't have those lulls on the bench that happened earlier in the year. 5:58 And I was trying to get some more perceptive things back from the players and coaches about why that's happening because they did call it out without prompting earlier in the year saying, hey, guys, we need to fix this. 6:11 Maybe it's fixed. 6:12 We'll see. 6:14 And then, you know, so they move on, two overtime winners against Michigan State and Michigan. 6:18 And Nate, they hit Wisconsin with a mighty punch in that second period and really kind of took Wisconsin out of the game. 6:27 They hung on at the end, but they really took care of Wisconsin at the beginning until they ran out of legs. 6:36 And they needed to have that extra game, having the extra time with the two over times, just coming out strong. 6:44 And we've seen all year with the Gophers, when they get one, they are very capable of getting another one and keep going and just building on the momentum. 6:54 Yeah, second period, especially against a Wisconsin team that ended up being slotted as one of the top four teams in the country. 7:03 Just what they're able to do against the Badgers in that second period might be the most impressive 20 minutes that we've seen from Minnesota all season. 7:11 And then, you know, you get to the third period, Wisconsin gets a couple of goals. 7:15 It's obvious their legs are going there, but their brains are going too, Veegs. 7:20 Matzko calls a timeout, tries to calm them down. 7:23 It seemed to do the trick, you know, until that late goal by Cole Caulfield was just pretty, you know, they did a really good job stopping him in the entire game. 7:32 That was off a faceoff, so more credit to him on that goal, but they had done a good job keeping him down. 7:38 But Matzko took the timeout, got him calmed down, and it seemed to be pretty effective in that third. 7:44 Yeah, I thought Wisconsin's second and third goals of the game were kind of like wakeups for Minnesota. 7:50 The first one, there was just no back pressure. 7:52 There were bad gaps. 7:54 Those are things that can happen when you're up big. 7:57 You're not as engaged in a game. 7:58 You're just kind of like, oh, this will be easy. 8:00 We'll give a big gap. 8:01 I won't let them get behind me. 8:03 No problem. 8:04 And then the forwards may be taking long shifts. 8:06 And then the other one, bad line change, puts them behind. 8:10 And Bob made the right call there, getting the timeout, and saying, hey, let's finish this thing and get the win and maybe get our number one seed locked up. 8:22 And you can't really hold Caulfield off the score sheet the entire night. 8:24 That was just a great play by him, a great shot by him. 8:27 But they held on. 8:28 So important, important game, I think, for Minnesota, because if they let that slip away and it goes the other way, that could just be the other side of the roller coaster. 8:39 Bob's talked about that. 8:40 You get into this weird part of the season where you're getting a regular season title, conference title, NCAAs, you're on a roller coaster. 8:47 You don't want that. 8:48 You just want to have a steady, calm presence. 8:51 So, Nate, they got away with it. 8:52 So, Nate, they really took care of quite a few things. 8:54 They had their overtime game this weekend. 8:56 They had their comeback game. 8:58 They had their game when they were way ahead and they almost blew it, but it all seemed to go their way in the end and maybe they learned quite a few lessons. 9:06 Yeah, especially that championship game was like a best of previous conference tournament games that we've seen, just thinking like, okay, well, there's the Moscow timeout. 9:15 Okay, you got that one going on. 9:17 All right, we've seen leads evaporate. 9:19 We've seen the third, going back to the old WCHA Final Five format, that third game in three days. 9:28 It's really tough to win those three against the team that's playing the bye. 9:31 And yeah, Minnesota was able to hold on. 9:34 They got the banner. 9:35 I think that's important. 9:36 Moscow's first banner is Gopher's head coach. 9:40 Anytime you're able to do that, that's a sign of a successful season. 9:42 And they're able to just end up being the top Big Ten team entering the NCAA tournament. 9:48 And they also went in, they defeated the two teams that they were kind of competing against for that top spot. 9:55 They all entered, along with the Big Ten schedule, they all beat up on one another. 10:00 They entered the Big Ten tournament pretty much even facing one another. 10:06 That they did. 10:10 Well, Veegs, I just think it was an all-around good tournament. 10:16 They faced everything. 10:18 They didn't face a loss. 10:20 Obviously good. 10:21 But they faced a lot of adversity and hopefully they could build on that moving to the NCAA tournament. 10:30 I think the biggest thing that came away from the weekend of the Big Ten tournament was Minnesota had the best goal tending. 10:36 Obviously, Michigan State, they made the crazy move to take Derrida out of the net and put in their freshman. 10:43 I can't remember his name right now. 10:46 Charleston. 10:48 And he was really good. 10:51 But I thought in the next two nights, Minnesota's Jack LaFontaine outplayed Michigan's goalie, Strauss-Fan, and then outplayed Wisconsin's two goalies, Vadoon and Cameron Rowe. 11:04 And I thought that was the difference between Minnesota and these other teams in the Big Ten, is they got better goal tending. 11:10 And I think that bodes well for them coming into the NCAA tournament, as they're going to be one of the teams that's had pretty consistent goal tending all year long, and allows them to maybe go through kind of a feeling out process of a game. 11:25 And that's going to be important for them. 11:30 It is going to be important. 11:32 It's an exciting time, Nate. 11:33 That's all I care about. 11:34 You know, my favorite weekend's coming up. 11:36 You know, we just got a tie. 11:38 You know, like you said, we just hung a banner. 11:40 We're two one thousandths of a point from getting another banner in regular season. 11:46 How are you feeling just kind of general after that Big Ten tournament? 11:48 Are you feeling good about this team or are you a wait and see type of thing? 11:55 I'd say if it's a stock, it's trending up. 11:58 I agree with a lot of what Vegoe just said there where Minnesota enters the tournament. 12:02 I mean, it's a crazy tournament. 12:03 We all know that. 12:04 We've seen enough games, both good and bad, that we can go off in the memories of just crazy things happening in the NCAA tournament. 12:13 I mean, in a regular year, let alone a year like this one. 12:17 But Minnesota enters it with just showing off the many ways they can win, having the goal tending necessary to get through four games. 12:27 It's really important to me to kind of see the Gophers be able to come back from a game that they were down, both get up the first goal and against Michigan where they're down 2-0 there, would make that third period come back against a Wolverines team who was undefeated at that point, being up 2-0 all year. 12:45 Minnesota, I think for the most part, in that first half, where they just continued that run of the second half from last season, of just proving everybody wrong and continuing things going their way, it was almost like a first world problem. 12:58 It's like, I want to see the Gophers face a little bit of adversity and see how they're going to face and challenge it. 13:03 And we saw in that second half, and you know the tournament time, you're going to have to play hopefully four games, and if everything goes well, odds are that, at least in one of them, that things will be playing from behind, you'll have some challenges. 13:20 These are the best teams in the country. 13:22 They really aren't easy games, so seeing them be able to come back and win these games and just show off some resilience, build up on it, improve from the second half, I think it's just an important thing, and for me that's why Minnesota is turning up. 13:38 I don't know what this weekend has in store. 13:40 I'd be lying if I was 100% confident in anything. 13:44 I wrote about 500 words in Notre Dame, and then two hours later they got... 13:54 They are no longer in the tournament. 13:57 So, I mean, it is really nothing that you can be certain about in this tournament, but I am at least certain that there are many ways for Minnesota to win, and that's the best place you want to be entering this weekend. 14:10 We'll get to the tournament here in a bit, but we kind of touched on it a little bit, you know, Veegs. 14:15 A couple one-thousandths of a point from winning a regular season title, so Matsuko missed out on that bonus, but he did get a nice little bonus for winning the tournament, didn't he? 14:26 Yeah, a nice $15,000 for Bob. 14:28 You know, chump change for him. 14:31 I'm sure he would have liked the $30,000 for winning the regular season title. 14:36 I hesitated whether or not I was going to bring that up in the press conference when we started talking about, you know, do you wish they would have gone point percentage instead of win percentage? 14:47 And then did you know you had a $30,000 bonus the other way? 14:50 Oh, he knows. 14:52 Maybe it would have campaigned a little harder for one way or the other. 14:55 But I think Minnesota deserved to get the number one seed and the top seed in the Big Ten, that they were just more consistent, start to finish. 15:04 You can look at their record against Wisconsin and maybe poke some holes there, but I think they played very well against Michigan and then they proved themselves in the neutral site tournament. 15:14 Minnesota is hitting on all cylinders. 15:17 And I think when they come in the NCAA tournament, they're a team that their opponent can only beat them if they're on. 15:25 If their opponent's off, I think it's going to be really hard to beat Minnesota. 15:28 We saw that Wisconsin during that second period when Wisconsin had that sag to the game, there was no back pressure. 15:35 That was just like chum in the water for Minnesota, and they took advantage really quickly. 15:41 I think a team to beat Minnesota is going to need to play a full effort and compete really hard to stay in it with them. 15:51 All right. 15:51 Well, it's an exciting time of year. 15:54 It's my favorite time of year, so I'm pretty excited about it. 15:58 We're going to talk about the NCAA Tournament coming up next, all the regionals. 16:01 That's why we have Nate on, because he's our guy for all the regionals. 16:05 But first, we need to hear from our sponsor. 16:09 Great to hear from Jerry. 16:11 Hey, fellow 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get this screen to stop sharing. 17:16 There we go. 17:17 Finally got it to work there. 17:20 Okay, gentlemen. 17:24 St. 17:24 Lawrence was in the tournament. 17:27 Then St. 17:27 Lawrence wasn't in the tournament. 17:29 I mean, they win their league, Nate, and then all of a sudden, oh boy, they didn't get into the tournament. 17:38 So that allowed Notre Dame to sneak in because they were the last team out before that. 17:45 And now just this afternoon, Notre Dame is out. 17:51 And like you said, you just wrote all this about Notre Dame. 17:54 It never fails. 17:59 Is more coming? 18:01 I hope not, but is more coming. 18:03 I know, a big question mark. 18:09 Those hints that maybe there's some cases coming out of North Dakota and maybe there's a difference with how in North Dakota rooms or travels or whatever. 18:19 They said they passed all those tests. 18:22 Well, Butcher Gross has been hinting that maybe there could be some players that might be testing positive. 18:27 So we'll see what's going to happen. 18:30 It's going to be interesting this weekend, waiting for those line charts and seeing if everybody's going to be there because they're not in bubbles. 18:38 So anything can happen. 18:39 The Boogeyman's out there, as Bob is fond of saying these days. 18:43 So what were you going to say about Notre Dame there, Nate? 18:47 Oh, I was going to basically go on about how pretty much they are the quintessential last team into the tournament. 18:54 Honestly, my bracket, I had them go to the first and four out of that. 19:05 We think about Yale won a national championship 2013. 19:09 Providence won in 2015 as the last team in. 19:11 Duluth won as the last team in 2018. 19:13 And we always kind of forget that these teams had some really crummy conference tournament weekends. 19:17 But we don't remember that. 19:18 We remember that they won a national title. 19:20 And the road to Notre Dame is a tough team to play against. 19:23 For some reason, they really struggle in South Bend this season. 19:27 But I mean, they swept Minnesota at home or on the road. 19:30 They swept Michigan on the road. 19:32 They're a really different team on the road. 19:34 And I kind of thought they matched up well with BC and even going against whoever the St. 19:40 Cloud State BU winner would. 19:42 And I thought it was kind of just a good, it was a good regional for Notre Dame. 19:48 And making the most of their opportunity to get in. 19:49 Unfortunately, that's not the case. 19:52 We all kind of, honestly, it would have been a surprise to get through this entire tournament without having any issues. 19:56 I'm actually shocked the women's tournament was able to go off as smoothly as it did. 20:02 I thought they did that when it all in one location, but that's just the way things are this year and in the world that we live in. 20:11 Well, so here's my thing on Notre Dame. 20:15 People were saying them being able to sweep Minnesota at Mariucci is like a high resume piece for them. 20:24 It's a big reason why you can include them in the tournament. 20:27 I go back to that weekend and it kind of goes back to what I was talking about where the Gophers can be off and still be in a game and can turn it on and can win a game. 20:37 You look back at that Notre Dame game, Minnesota mentally just off the entire weekend, just making really bad decisions with the puck, throwing pucks away, hoping to make backhand passes towards the slot, just giving the puck back. 20:54 The year before, Bob talked about it as the rock fight. 20:57 You know, you hit the rock, you throw it over the wall, and the other team has to pick up the rock and throw it back. 21:03 Well, Notre Dame wasn't really throwing any rocks. 21:05 They were just kind of battering the rock away. 21:08 Minnesota kept having more chances to do something with it, but they never were able to throw the rock in the net. 21:14 They just wouldn't do that. 21:16 And I think that weekend, to me, it kind of showed both sides. 21:20 Notre Dame is going to be a tough team. 21:22 They can play a tight lockdown game with you, but I think it also showed Minnesota, they can have a lot of things go wrong and can still win a game if they're able to turn the switch like they did against Michigan State and Michigan. 21:38 Thoughts, Nate? 21:41 I mean, I agree with Vego. 21:45 I don't know why I wouldn't, because Vegoe knows what's going on. 21:50 But that's, yeah, I mean, it does also go to show, yeah, what Minnesota is capable of, and I mean, that's why they are the top 14 in the country. 21:58 I was also going back, I was kind of thinking about this when everything came out, how Notre Dame was probably fortunate that the committee put BC2 and Minnesota 3, because if you switch that around, they're putting Minnesota is going, is ending up being the spot where that 15C would have been, where Notre Dame was. 22:21 Do you think they put Providence in, or do you think they put Providence in that spot because you don't have the conference matchup? 22:30 I would have thought so, that Providence deserved to be the next team in. 22:35 I know some people say Denver was taken out of the consideration because of their record and things like that, but it's probably Providence that's the next team in. 22:43 They were the bubble team that was on alert five. 22:49 Yeah, I went Providence just because the committee said that they're the next team in in case there's anything before Monday. 22:58 But yeah, that bubble, the final spot or two, I think you could have made arguments for about six or seven different teams. 23:06 The way things turned out, it wouldn't have been a big surprise. 23:11 The only way that there's only a few ways would be major head scratchers. 23:16 I think you can't really complain too much with how things ended up. 23:22 No, I think they did a great job picking the teams in the situation they were in. 23:28 Veegs, what do they do if there's more cancellations? 23:33 I mean, let's say BU wins against St. 23:38 Cloud State, and also BU's got a couple the next day. 23:40 Does that BC just goes automatically to the frozen four without playing? 23:43 That's the way they... 23:46 But what happens when you get to a frozen four, all of a sudden... 23:51 North Dakota, they got some corona. 23:53 They can't play, so the team they're playing goes right to the championship game. 23:57 I mean, that's the way they set it up with their rules. 24:02 I mean, they're playing with a slippery slope here. 24:06 And I think that's the problem with trying to play sports during the pandemic, is things like this are going to pop up. 24:12 And the way the NCAA has figured this out, there's not going to be a postponement. 24:18 They're just going to let the next team go through. 24:20 So imagine being St. 24:23 Cloud State BU right now. 24:25 They're going to be playing a team that's going to get to rest up. 24:28 And if they have a long game the night before, it's not exactly a fair skate for them the next night. 24:34 So it'll be interesting to see how that resolves. 24:38 I do think BC is a pretty darn good hockey team. 24:40 They've got great goaltending and great scoring forwards. 24:44 But they have got a big advantage in that regional final already. 24:49 And Nate, it sure does mess up the probability of a number four beating a number one like we have almost every year now. 24:57 You've already taken one of those out. 24:58 So now it's up to North Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin to lose to keep that string going. 25:07 AIC, undefeated against number one overall. 25:13 We're going to the homeland of Fargo. 25:16 But yeah, it certainly takes away one of the games that I think if you're betting on a trendy favorite of Florida advance, it probably would be Notre Dame. 25:30 AIC has lost three games all year. 25:35 They have one of the best records. 25:38 It's Atlantic hockey has done really well in the last few tournaments, but they're facing North Dakota and Fargo. 25:46 AIC has played two games since the end of January, both for last weekend. 25:51 Omaha is probably, of all the teams that are in here, have struggled the most entering the NCAA tournament. 25:59 In fairness, they also played North Dakota four of the last five games. 26:05 But I was looking up when I was going through, just previewing all the teams and stuff. 26:08 One of the things I thought that kind of ended up working out well was the 15 of the top 16 teams were in goal margin over the last 10 games were NCAA tournament teams. 26:21 The only one that wasn't in that list is Omaha. 26:24 They're way down there. 26:25 They've probably not shot a bunch. 26:26 So they're down there. 26:29 And then Bemidji State ended up being, they lost Lake Superior State. 26:35 So they're coming off of that. 26:36 Although, you know what? 26:41 Who's going to bet against Tom Sertori, right? 26:44 So, I mean, there's a lot of great stories in this tournament. 26:46 These, you know, we've got all five Minnesota teams in. 26:49 We've got Lake State being in for the first time in a couple of decades. 26:55 We have some great stories here. 26:57 Besides the COVID story. 27:00 Well, yeah. 27:01 And you look at the number of players from Minnesota who are playing in the NCAA tournament. 27:06 I mean, it blows every other state out of the water. 27:11 Like, I think it's 122 or 124, something like that. 27:15 Minnesota players are playing in this tournament. 27:18 It's just a phenomenal job that Minnesota hockey does, producing players, community hockey works. 27:24 It keeps everybody involved longer and look at all the success that they're having in college hockey right now. 27:29 And I think it's going to be fun to see the five Minnesota schools in. 27:33 You know, now we've got a bar set. 27:34 So when St. 27:35 Thomas starts playing, now we got to hope for six teams getting in someday. 27:39 But it's going to be a lot of fun to watch. 27:42 I'm interested to see if Minnesota State can get their first tournament win. 27:47 I don't think this team is as good as Mike Hastings' team last year. 27:50 I thought last year his team was really set up. 27:54 You know, some teams like that, they kind of cycle their rosters. 27:58 And every couple of years, they get a team that's like, wow, this is the special team. 28:03 The right guys came back. 28:04 They've got the right pieces at goaltending, defense, forward, special team to make a run. 28:09 And then COVID hits and we don't get to see what happens. 28:12 I don't think they're quite as good this year, but I'm going to be watching that game against Quinnipiac because I don't know what ECAC has this year with only a handful of teams in their league and Quinnipiac getting through kind of luckily, I think. 28:28 Yeah, they definitely did. 28:29 Let's go through the regions. 28:30 Let's head out where Wisconsin, I believe that's in Bridgeport, isn't it? 28:36 They'll be facing our Bemidji State Beavers up from the northern side of Minnesota here. 28:40 And then we've got Lake State and UMass on the other side of that bracket. 28:46 Nate, I think Bemidji with the style they play could give a team like Wisconsin, who's a one line team, could give them fits. 28:57 There are a lot of really fun matchups in this NCAA tournament that ended up happening the way it did. 29:03 This is one of them where, yeah, you have a Wisconsin team that pretty much, as everyone has struggled to find a way to slow down their offense, Cole Caulfield is having one of the best goal scoring seasons for the last 20 years. 29:17 Dylan Holloway is taking a major step up. 29:20 Wisconsin, again, speaking of teams that probably don't have the talent compared to last season, the Badger lost like three guys who are playing in the NHL right now and turned things around from worst to first. 29:33 Sometimes it's just getting the right guys in the room. 29:36 But then you go and get to a midget team that older, bigger, more experienced. 29:41 They're able to slow teams down. 29:42 They're able to make the most of little opportunities. 29:47 They beat Minnesota State this year 4-1 despite being outshot something like 36-10. 29:54 And they're set up well for facing Wisconsin. 30:01 If they can make this just a gritty game and kind of keep things close early, get through and get through the opening 20 minutes or something, I'm curious to see how things go. 30:13 Wisconsin, and I think honestly we're talking about storylines. 30:17 One of my favorite storylines is when you look at the number one seed. 30:21 It's a return to blue bloods. 30:22 We've had a few years where you haven't had these teams, the Minnesota, North Dakota, Boston College, Wisconsin, be in the NCAA tournament. 30:31 They've all missed the last few. 30:33 Obviously last year North Dakota would have been in. 30:35 Minnesota was making a push late before everything was canceled. 30:40 But you have these teams that are full of talented players who have been the top teams in the country, but are expected to do well year in, year out, but have absolutely no NCAA tournament experience. 30:51 I think Jack LaFontaine is technically the only player who has any tournament experience among the number one seeds. 30:57 So it's just those all interesting things. 30:59 And then, yeah, putting Wisconsin, a very skilled offensive team against a defensive juggernaut, like Bemidji State, it's going to be a fun matchup. 31:11 What do you think, Veegs? 31:12 I mean, that's a fun regional... 31:14 Not too often you hear the term... 31:19 Oh, Vegoe just froze. 31:22 Look at that. 31:23 You hear the term defensive juggernaut, but I think that probably describes it pretty well. 31:33 Cack? 31:33 Hold on, Veegs, are you there? 31:35 You kind of were hot. 31:36 We paused there for a second. 31:39 Man. 31:40 I think we lost Veegs. 31:41 Am I back? 31:43 All right. 31:44 I think what I was talking about the defensive juggernaut. 31:46 Yes, there we go. 31:47 We heard it. 31:48 It was just really delayed. 31:49 Defensive juggernaut. 31:51 How many times can we say juggernaut? 31:52 Go for it. 31:53 I know, it's so hard. 31:54 But the juggernaut thing for Bemidji State will be interesting to watch against Wisconsin because as dominant as Caulfield has been this season, I thought the difference in the series of Minnesota earlier in the year was Dylan Holloway. 32:10 And he is a player that can drive play and looks totally different than the player that we saw last year. 32:17 And in the Big Ten tournament, Todd Molesky noticed that Holloway wasn't taking draws for Wisconsin. 32:24 And he was like, Holloway is one of their better centermen for winning face-offs. 32:29 Him not taking draws? 32:31 Yeah, that looks like there could be something going on. 32:33 Like we saw with Scott Reedy, you know, something not feeling right. 32:37 Elbow or shoulder. 32:39 Somewhere, you know, for draws, you know, your bottom hand is your power hand. 32:43 If that's not feeling good, and you're out of it, that kind of changes the recipe, I think, for Wisconsin, and you can totally focus on Caulfield. 32:52 And that's what Minnesota was able to do against Wisconsin. 32:54 You can see screenshots of him in transition where the deer gapped up and there's back pressure right there, just choking him off and not allowing him to get space to shoot. 33:04 And so when you do that against Cole Caulfield, it's going to be really hard for him to produce unless they can get some faceoff plays or power play time like they often do. 33:13 But five on five, if you can really focus on him, you can really take him away. 33:20 Anyone interested in Lake State and UMass? 33:22 UMass is really good this year. 33:25 Could be a team that could easily come out of that region. 33:27 And then obviously we've got Lake State who haven't been there since they won a tournament back in the mid 90s, Nate. 33:33 I like that Wisconsin and UMass are ended up in the same region because you can make an argument for either team to be that last number one seed. 33:44 And why not have the two kind of play for it, if you assume both when they're opening game. 33:50 UMass is a really interesting team. 33:54 They've kind of come through the two years ago. 33:57 They were the Cale McCarr show. 33:59 But obviously he's not there. 34:03 And obviously they've survived losing one of the top players at college hockey the last decade and they and just continue to grow. 34:12 They have a lot of veteran players. 34:14 They have a lot of upperclassmen. 34:17 Flip Lindberg, who is a wild prospect, has been one of the better goalies in hockey this season. 34:25 Zach Jones is the next big defenseman kind of coming out of that program. 34:30 The job that Greg Carvel has done recruiting and coaching and getting players out of out of Massachusetts is just beyond impressive and they have that tournament experience. 34:43 They have that mixture of skill and experience and it makes for an interesting group come NCAA Tournament time. 34:51 And then on the other side, you have Lake State, who has been one of the hotter teams also in the country lately. 34:57 I think we won 12 of 14 to get into the tournament and get the WCHA Conference title, sadly the last one on the men's side for the future. 35:09 But they've been the teams that they have. 35:14 It's a great story to be returning after 25 years. 35:18 That's two tournaments in a row that you've had a long time team that's returned to the NCAA Tournament after Form of Glory, Bowling Green. 35:27 It's another one or two years ago. 35:29 I don't really know how that's going to go. 35:35 Lake Superior State's goalie, Merrick Minns, has been outstanding when needed to. 35:40 You can see the game, how it goes. 35:42 Honestly, I do like UMass out of that group. 35:47 I think they're kind of a 20-pick out of there, but it wouldn't surprise me to see them in the frozen floor. 35:53 It wouldn't surprise me to see all of those teams enter hot. 35:57 It should be two fun games. 35:59 It should be a fun weekend. 36:00 Who do you think comes out of that region, Veegs? 36:06 I just don't know what to think of UMass in Lake Superior State. 36:09 I haven't really seen them play this year, so it's really hard for me to say much about that series. 36:16 You can tell that UMass is a program that's pretty well run. 36:20 I really like their coaching staff and the job that they do there. 36:25 I feel like they would be my pick to come out of there, even without having seen them very much. 36:31 I just worry about Wisconsin's goaltending, and especially this Holloway deal that he could be dealing with. 36:37 It totally changes their team. 36:39 I don't think Wisconsin has the dynamic defenseman to really compete over four games in an NCAA tournament, so we'll see what happens. 36:48 I mean, you look at their power play, it's five forwards. 36:51 They don't trust the defenseman to be on that unit. 36:53 Their best players are forwards, so you get in these kind of tight NCAA games. 36:58 Sometimes that doesn't work out for you. 37:00 I like Bemidji State coming out of this region. 37:04 I like their veteran team. 37:07 I like the style that they're playing. 37:08 I think that they're going to be able to do well against the goalies that are in this region, and they're a plus 175, according to the Vegas-type odds on the weekend. 37:18 I think that's a really good value for anyone out there that wants to ruin their family, betting on college hockey. 37:24 But I really do like Bemidji State. 37:27 Just side note, betting college hockey is impossible. 37:31 We've seen this tournament. 37:32 It's so tight. 37:33 And not very smart. 37:34 It's not very smart. 37:36 I swear, one of these years, I want to just practice if you take the underdog in every game, if you make money, because I swear that that has to be... 37:44 You can swear, but I've been looking at this, and AIC is really the only big, big underdog. 37:50 The rest of the four seeds are all kind of in this plus 170 or the plus 190 range. 37:56 And so the spreads are pretty tight. 37:59 I'm going to go with UMass out of that region. 38:04 Though I'd love Lake State to come out. 38:06 I love the teams who haven't been around in so long. 38:10 Come back and I think their uniforms are maybe the best. 38:16 I love their uniforms, their color combo. 38:19 But I'm picking UMass. 38:20 And then elsewhere else in the East, in Albany, we have St. 38:27 Cloud and BU to face BC Veegs. 38:32 Notre Dame just took a rain check and decided to get the hell out. 38:36 Just a weird situation. 38:38 I would like to see what happens if St. 38:42 Cloud plays BC, just because I think that's a real measuring stick for how good is Hockey East and how good is NCHC. 38:49 We don't really know this year. 38:51 Obviously, NCHC has been the league that's dominated the postseason with all their NCAA champions. 38:58 They've dominated the tourney bids, the frozen four bids. 39:03 It's going to be really interesting to see, can they beat two Hockey East teams to get to the frozen four? 39:09 I don't see that happening from what I've seen of BC. 39:12 BC is a team I've actually been able to see a little bit this year. 39:15 They have elite talent everywhere, goalie, defense, forward. 39:20 They're well coached. 39:21 I think that's a team that's going to book their ticket to the frozen four. 39:27 Maybe by default. 39:30 Well, and they got the huge advantage, too. 39:32 They're only going to be playing one game this weekend. 39:34 I will be rooting for the other side of the bracket. 39:36 They probably won't win, but I will be rooting. 39:40 Nothing against BC. 39:41 I'd like to see them. 39:44 The Notre Dame thing really was handed to them, Nate. 39:51 I mean, that was going to be a tough matchup for BC. 39:55 Oh, it was. 39:55 Yeah, I went into it. 39:56 Yeah, so basically in the battle of dogs versus birds, you're going with dogs. 40:04 Better than picking puppies, right? 40:06 Because we all know what Tony Granado thinks when you got a bunch of puppies on your team. 40:10 No, Mike Eaves. 40:12 Or Mike Eaves, sorry. 40:13 The Eaves joke. 40:15 That's a long joke between you and me, Nate. 40:19 Oh, I miss Mike Eaves. 40:21 I miss it because it came up like three different times. 40:24 I think I went to you after it was like, does he do this every week or does it just come up like when we talk to him? 40:34 Different years, too. 40:35 Yeah, it was over a two-year stretch. 40:40 So are you picking BC, too, there, Nate? 40:43 I think just for circumstances, I was really curious to see how they go against Notre Dame and having that going against experience of the last team, especially after just the way that the hockey semifinal against Lowell went, where they're up 4-1 in the third and then they end up losing in double overtime. 41:04 I think we've seen with the Minnesota, we've seen with several teams, a lot of NHL-ers, NHL prospects kind of towards the end of the year, where when things go bad, they kind of go bad quickly. 41:15 So I was really curious to see how Boston College would go against Notre Dame in that end. 41:19 But I think, yeah, maybe having the one game is going to really help the Eagles. 41:23 Being a little more fresh, BU played 15 games all season. 41:27 They didn't start until January. 41:29 They're still kind of a bit of an enigma. 41:31 They're the third place team in the hockey East by default. 41:35 I really want to see more than anything. 41:39 I'm curious to see St. 41:40 Cloud State how they do without having heavy expectations after the last few tournament trips that we've had. 41:46 I feel like the Hockeys play their best when they don't have them, when they're a two or three seed and they're able just to kind of play their style and not get caught up into, hey, we are one of the best teams in the country. 41:58 We should be able to win. 42:01 We should be able to get this win easily. 42:03 And I feel like I wouldn't be surprised if St. 42:07 Cloud State goes to the Frozen Four when it turns to Pittsburgh. 42:10 But also at this point, after seeing the moves to Ferris State and Air Force and AIC and them pretty much hanging in the wind in Brackets for like two years in a row, I believe in when I see it, but it would be nice to see St. 42:26 Cloud State kind of get that 800-pound gorilla off their back. 42:32 And I mean, kudos to Brett Larson. 42:34 I was a little worried about him last year after the way St. 42:38 Cloud handled their season, you know, with Bob leaving, pulling some recruits with him to Minnesota, leaving the cupboard maybe slightly bare at St. 42:47 Cloud coming in. 42:48 I think kind of that existing roster are now upperclassmen. 42:52 And I think that's some of Bob's handiwork there. 42:55 But Brett's done a nice job kind of reshaping things and getting them to this point of the season. 43:00 So I was impressed with that coaching job this year. 43:03 And they certainly do have a good chance to get through the frozen four. 43:06 Yeah, I agree with you there, Veegs. 43:09 Again, I think you saw last season before everything went down end up kind of being maybe the consequence of that cupboard being a little bit bare. 43:19 And just they're able to get players a year older, bringing in the end in there. 43:24 I mean, you bring in the NCHC Rookie of the Year in that conference. 43:28 That speaks well to your current abilities, that speaks well to your coaching abilities. 43:32 And yeah, St. 43:32 Cloud State, they're still tough out. 43:36 I think it's easy to kind of take a little look away from them based on what North Dakota did this year winning both the regular season title and the conference tournament. 43:47 Minnesota Luther is still the two-time defending champion and remained just a crazy tough out in the first round of that tournament. 43:55 And I mean, until they lose, they're still the defending champs. 43:59 But St. 44:00 Cloud State finished in second in both of those times. 44:02 You can't fully overlook them. 44:05 Well, let's move to the West, guys. 44:07 In Fargo, we've got some great matchups kicking off. 44:11 One thing that's a little different, though, in the East compared to the West, though, is that the number one seeds are playing later and get less rest than was originally planned in the East. 44:22 So we're flipping it here. 44:24 We've got those Bulldogs, twice national champions in a row, facing the Big Ten in Michigan, Veegs. 44:33 I am looking forward to that matchup tomorrow afternoon. 44:37 I am well, probably of all the first round games, this is the one I'm most interested to watch, just because Michigan has so much talent. 44:46 We've seen that in all their games with Minnesota, that they have players who can really just take over a game and make plays happen out of nothing. 44:56 They've got so much there. 44:58 And then we saw Strausband have a really good series of play against Minnesota. 45:02 It wasn't always there, and we'll see what happens. 45:06 They've got a good young backup behind them, big kid. 45:10 But that's a game I'm looking forward to, because I just don't know if UMD has the scoring punch this year. 45:15 They did pretty well against the bad teams in the NCHC, but I just didn't see them play well when they were in the spotlight, when they were playing the big games. 45:25 I didn't see that kind of UMD style where they can squeak out the games by getting goals from the players they need to count on. 45:34 In the lower tier games, I thought UMD was clearly in that top half of the NCHC, but when they were playing the top teams, it just wasn't there for them. 45:44 What do you think about that matchup, Nate? 45:45 Michigan and Duluth Bulldogs. 45:48 I love it. 45:50 The good news for Duluth is Michigan might be the matchup that favors the Bulldogs the best in there. 45:58 It's not a big team. 45:59 It's not somebody that is going to kind of slow things down. 46:04 They really struggled against Western Michigan this year. 46:08 I love the contrast in this. 46:10 You have the two-time defending champions. 46:13 You have a team that lost a lot of players from those teams, but still has a wealth of experience. 46:19 Scott Sandlin has never lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament. 46:26 You can see maybe it's a little bit of a reloading year in Duluth. 46:30 They don't have 100 Shepard and Gull. 46:33 You have Nick Swayney who has to have a good year or so of Kepke. 46:39 But at the end of the day, Duluth knows how to win. 46:41 Duluth knows how to find ways to limit mistakes and take advantage of the opportunities a team like Michigan is going to give them. 46:48 On the other hand, you have Michigan who is by far one of the most, just by far just one of the most talented teams that are coming out of there. 46:58 I mean, it's a young, talented team. 47:01 You put this group together in like three years and, holy crap, like they're going to run over everyone. 47:06 But I'm really curious to see how that goes. 47:09 This team doesn't really have, other than the seniors, doesn't have NCAA tournament experience. 47:16 I want to see just how you have those young freshmen and underclassmen play when it comes to NCAA tournament time. 47:26 It's important that they're not, that they've never played before and how they're able to adjust. 47:36 And then, you know what, you throw it again in the history, that's always a nice thing to have in there. 47:39 So it hits a little bit of everything. 47:43 You got pretty much every side of that, and then you kind of get to figure out, hey, where the Big Ten and NCHC kind of stack up against one another this year, too. 47:54 For me, I think it all depends on which Michigan team shows up. 47:59 If those freshmen are jacked up, if those freshmen are playing well, I think they win this game. 48:04 If it's more of a typical game for them, I think Duluth's going to have their experience that shines through on that, Veegs. 48:11 You know, I just don't think we've seen too many times where Michigan, when they're at full strength, not come through. 48:16 I think we've seen some shaky goaltending from them at times, but I think they've been able to score goals pretty consistently. 48:24 If you're going to have young players, you want to have them up front and with as much talent as those Michigan players have. 48:30 And then they've got Cam York and Owen Power on the back end, and those two are pretty darn good. 48:36 You know, Power, he might go number one overall, and Cam York, he's the first round pick who won a gold medal. 48:40 You know, two good guys to rely on. 48:43 So I like Michigan in that matchup. 48:46 And then on the other side, we've got North Dakota playing in Fargo against AIC, who has never lost their number one seed. 48:53 Of course, they've only played one time. 48:56 That's kind of the big joke, folks. 49:02 In any other year, Nate, I would say this is a blowout for North Dakota. 49:07 Just from the crowd. 49:09 There won't be as many people there. 49:10 I still think they're going to win. 49:15 But I think they'll be nervous at times. 49:19 AIC can make it. 49:20 It will make it a good game. 49:21 I have that feeling. 49:22 I don't know if they can pull off the repeat and get the upside going. 49:29 It's funny, we were talking about Minnesota and what they needed to do in their Big Ten tournament. 49:33 I thought North Dakota had a similar thing where they've been ahead so often. 49:37 You haven't seen them face so much adversity. 49:39 They're able to do that in the NCHC semi-finals and championship game. 49:46 I can kind of think a little bit better about North Dakota there. 49:50 I'm sure that people love hearing that in this podcast. 49:56 But I think that the Fighting Hawks are a team that they have a lot of ways to win. 50:03 It's kind of the group. 50:07 They're probably the most veteran laden of the number one seeds. 50:14 Adam Schill might be a little bit underrated in gold too. 50:16 I don't know if he matches up to what Jack LaFontaine's done. 50:20 But it should be a good game. 50:23 And on AIC you still have a couple players from that 2019 team. 50:28 You have a rested up team. 50:29 You have a Yellow Jackets group that they've only lost three times all season. 50:33 And I think they lost once in 2021. 50:36 So they're going to be a tough out. 50:39 It's always tough to end someone's season. 50:41 And there are no easy games come this time of year. 50:46 Veegs, I still see North Dakota coming out of this region. 50:49 I think it's going to be tough for anyone else to get in there, Veegs. 50:55 Uh oh, Veegs looks frozen again. 51:00 Okay, Nate, do you think, does North Dakota come out of this region? 51:04 Yeah, I don't know what to make of Adam Scheele. 51:10 Veegs is freezing and unfreezing all at one time. 51:14 You know, I missed this. 51:15 Now at least I have the video visual of a woman. 51:17 Of these three. 51:21 I'm going to be frozen. 51:27 Yeah, I mean, really, I mean, sure, there could be an upside, but I really think this is North Dakota's region to lose there, Nate. 51:39 I think of them, of the group, they're probably the most favored, the number one seed. 51:43 I mean, also, just throwing into Fargo, it's an easy trip for them. 51:47 You have a group that already is playing for the unfinished business, they weren't able to end up there. 51:54 They weren't able to go in the NCAA tournament last year before things went down. 51:58 They're going to be the number one and number two overall there. 52:02 They had high expectations in the regular season, they met them. 52:07 So I think it wouldn't surprise me to see someone upset. 52:12 North Dakota, we pretty much laid out a game plan for all three of those teams to play their best games and end up being the fine hawks. 52:22 But, yeah, if you ask me who's putting an advance out of that, I would easily favor North Dakota. 52:28 Okay, hopefully he's unfrozen. 52:30 I've been hearing him do some clicking there, Veegs. 52:32 Are you back with us? 52:36 I'm getting ready for the Frozen Four. 52:37 Getting ready. 52:43 We're almost there. 52:44 I think we're still talking about Fargo, right? 52:51 Do you see anyone else coming out of there besides North Dakota? 52:53 I mean, they're really good right now. 52:56 I mean, if you were to look at the best set of defensemen in college hockey, it's hard not to look at North Dakota ahead of Minnesota just because I think they have a little bit more offensive flair from their back end. 53:09 So I have a hard time seeing anyone come out on top on North Dakota until someone proves me wrong. 53:16 They are the biggest favorite in the first round matchup, according to the Vegas odds. 53:21 AAC is like a plus 450 right now, which is not a good bet against North Dakota. 53:27 I'm surprised it's actually not higher. 53:29 North Dakota is a good team. 53:31 They've got experience that came back, experienced players who are college hockey players too. 53:37 Like they're invested in wearing that fighting hawk jersey. 53:39 I'm sure they grew up as little kids hoping to be fighting hawks. 53:43 And I think they're going to deliver in Fargo from their hometown. 53:48 Stream only, by the way, for that first game with AIC in North Dakota. 53:52 I'm not sure what ESPN was thinking. 53:57 That is true because it is clear. 54:00 North Dakota, Minnesota bring the highest ratings to any of these regionals. 54:06 Isn't that pretty much bare out, Nate? 54:08 I remember a couple years ago, Minnesota played Notre Dame in that regional. 54:11 They lost. 54:13 That was the highest rated game among all of the regional games that season just because Minnesota was in it. 54:19 Yeah, it's Minnesota. 54:21 If there's a team that would top North Dakota, Michigan, Michigan might be it. 54:26 Ohio State has a sneaky good TV when they're on. 54:32 The Minnesota-Ohio State game on BTN, then being higher than any of the Big Ten Championship conference tournament games this year. 54:40 It's really tough to find Ohio State fans online and discuss the sport, but the other casual following is better than none. 54:49 It's a good thing we have Cabby then. 54:55 I get why Michigan would get the TV spot. 54:57 It's always disappointing when they get those regions. 54:59 I only have the one. 55:00 The AAC St. 55:01 Cloud State game two years ago, same thing. 55:03 It was the stream. 55:04 Actually, I think Ohio State was the team in Fargo that got the TV game. 55:11 Well, it's unfortunate that the number one overall seed again is getting streamed. 55:15 I believe this happened to Mankato a couple of years ago, or maybe it happened to St. 55:18 Cloud a couple of years ago. 55:19 It happened to St. 55:20 Cloud two years ago. 55:21 Yeah, so there you go. 55:23 And then we moved to Loveland. 55:25 We're also being streamed only. 55:28 Minnesota State Mankato has not won an NCAA tournament game yet, Veegs. 55:34 They're playing a Quinnipiac team that kind of backed in. 55:39 To the tournament, but has tournament experience as well. 55:46 So it's kind of an interesting matchup there. 55:49 It is kind of an interesting matchup. 55:52 I do like Minnesota State getting their first tournament win out of this one. 55:56 I just think that that team has been through so much the last two years that they are going to be ready to go in this game. 56:03 I feel like Quinnipiac is a tough dough team. 56:07 He is the guy that drives the ship for them, stirs the drink, whatever analogy you want to use, simile you want to use, you can use it with them. 56:16 I think if Minnesota State with their veteran players takes him out of it and gets good goaltending like they have in 95% of their games this year from Dryden McKay, they are going to be just fine. 56:29 I would be shocked if Minnesota State loses that game. 56:32 There you go. 56:34 What do you think, Nate? 56:35 This game is really interesting because it's kind of the opposite. 56:39 I think I might enjoy watching this game more than the Michigan-Minnesota Duluth game, but kind of for completely different reasons. 56:46 I don't know what's going to happen in this game. 56:49 Minnesota State comes in off that terrible loss to Northern Michigan. 56:53 Quinnipiac comes in off the terrible loss to St. 56:55 Lawrence. 56:55 They've both been really good, other than that. 56:58 I watched Quinnipiac play a few times last season, and it kind of felt like they're in that Minnesota stretch for the Gophers, where you're like, okay, next year is their year. 57:07 They're putting things together. 57:08 They're figuring things out. 57:09 It looks like everything's going, and I can't tell. 57:14 I can't tell if that's the case this year. 57:16 The ECAC has just been so weird and so hard and everything with Quinnipiac. 57:25 They have a lot of really good pieces. 57:27 Big's mentioned Tuftoe, who for me, for my money, is the most underrated player from Minnesota. 57:32 I did a feature on him for Minnesota Hockey Magazine last year, and I think I pretty much just called him a sleeping giant. 57:39 He's Matt Barzell of New Haven County. 57:42 He creates plays out of nothing. 57:46 He runs to power, he runs to even strength. 57:52 They got probably one of the most underrated freshmen there, and Smilanek. 57:56 Keith Petruzzelli had a really good season and goal. 57:59 And again, it's all this stuff around, like I don't know what to make of Quinnipiac just based on who they play, and I really want to see them play Minnesota State for this reason. 58:06 And then on the other hand, you have the Mavericks, who Dryden McKay has been fantastic. 58:12 If any goalie can win a game on his own, it looks like it's him. 58:16 I mean, he has nine shutouts on the year. 58:19 Yes, it's WCHA, but that's nine shutouts. 58:21 That's not easy to do. 58:24 They keep reloading. 58:26 They keep getting players to play above their weight. 58:30 They find these diamonds in the rough. 58:31 You get Jones kind of coming into his own as a sophomore. 58:35 I liked seeing Akira Hirose as a freshman there on that Mavericks blue line. 58:40 You have all these really good pieces. 58:42 And every time you're like, okay, this is going to be the year that the Mavericks win that first NCAA game, it doesn't happen. 58:49 And it's kind of that same thing. 58:50 Like, I want to see them happen. 58:51 I really think that this is a good opportunity for Minnesota State to have it happen. 58:55 They didn't go east. 58:57 They have about four different chips on their shoulders for not being the number one seed after running through the WCHA for all the years of being upset. 59:07 And it's a good matchup. 59:09 It's probably like one of the best matchups that the Mavericks can get. 59:13 But until they win, I'm still going to end the Mavericks win a game in the NCAA tournament. 59:19 I think it's just tough with Quinnipiac. 59:21 They basically played the schedule that Penn State does in their non-conference. 59:26 They have not played hardly anybody this season. 59:29 It's just so hard to know what to make of a team that has a schedule like that where they're playing LIU and Colgate. 59:35 It's just tough. 59:40 Basically, everyone in the ECAC at some point had a COVID pause. 59:45 It's so hard to put everything together. 59:46 This does have the one common matchup where they both played Bowling Green, but I think it was Quinnipiac played them very early, when they were beginning their own and they got swept. 59:58 Mankato beat the Falcons way late when they're notes diving. 1:00:04 Maybe that's a bit of a comparison. 1:00:06 Maybe it's not. 1:00:07 It's a weird year. 1:00:08 Who knows? 1:00:10 Then by the time 9 o'clock Central comes around, when Minnesota plays Omaha, Veegs will already have two teams in the Frozen Four. 1:00:23 This is where there's the definite goofiness. 1:00:26 It should have been flip-flopped with the number one seed playing early. 1:00:29 I've heard that Matzko was not very happy about that. 1:00:35 Listen to his radio show. 1:00:36 You'll get a good breakdown of it. 1:00:38 But nonetheless, Minnesota playing those Omaha, Nebraska, Omaha Mavericks. 1:00:51 This is going to be fun. 1:00:53 I love this matchup. 1:00:54 I love that Minnesota has one of the tougher matches because I think Omaha could stick with pretty much anybody. 1:01:02 Yeah, it's going to be a tough matchup for Minnesota. 1:01:04 I think they can be off their game a little bit and still hang around and figure things out during the course of the 60 minutes. 1:01:12 But this isn't a game where Minnesota wants to do a parade to the penalty box. 1:01:16 We've talked at times over the year where Minnesota takes these bad offensive zone penalties. 1:01:24 Do not do that against Omaha or you will let them in the game and you'll get in a special teams battle because they take a lot of penalties. 1:01:30 They play a physical game. 1:01:32 So you don't want to get into that kind of matchup that maybe the Babs want to get into. 1:01:39 So just avoid that. 1:01:40 I think Minnesota would be okay. 1:01:41 But I think it's going to be a good measuring stick. 1:01:43 You know, it's probably the hardest matchup between a one and a four in terms of premier conference teams playing each other. 1:01:51 What are your thoughts, Nate? 1:01:55 It should be a good one. 1:01:57 Again, as I kind of mentioned earlier, Omaha enters a bit on a downslide. 1:02:04 They do present a lot of challenges to Minnesota. 1:02:06 If you kind of look at North Dakota being in a similar position, they're able to beat the Feinhocks twice in the six games that they played. 1:02:13 So it's not going to be easy. 1:02:15 No one's handing Minnesota a win. 1:02:17 The Gophers going on the road outside Minnesota in the NCAA tournament. 1:02:23 It hasn't been kind to them lately. 1:02:28 It's a new year. 1:02:31 I think Minnesota is able to get something going early. 1:02:35 If they're able to score, if they're able to just kind of control possession, especially against an Omaha team that gives up a lot of shots. 1:02:43 I think of all the tournament teams, their shot margin is by far the lowest. 1:02:49 If they're able to do that and just control pace and control possession, it's going to be tough for Omaha to keep getting it, to stay in it and without taking penalties and just kind of create more opportunities. 1:02:59 I think it's an opportunity for Minnesota to just kind of create their own success and build upon it, but there's no guarantees in that and there's no guarantees in anything this weekend. 1:03:08 I don't think Omaha has particularly strong goal-tending either from what I can gather from watching. 1:03:15 Especially when you compare to the three other teams in that bracket. 1:03:18 Right, the other three teams in the bracket or the other teams in the MCHC. 1:03:22 I don't think Omaha has a particularly strong defensive team. 1:03:24 They're a deep team. 1:03:25 They're a physical team. 1:03:27 It should be a fun game to watch. 1:03:30 That's what I'm thinking. 1:03:31 I've seen a couple of Omaha games this year. 1:03:34 It's a little more like they're deep. 1:03:35 And the defense that Seville has in front of him, it's not compared to some of the other teams. 1:03:41 He came into Omaha being the USHL goalie of the year. 1:03:46 I want to say he's like a Vegas draft pick. 1:03:51 He makes the saves when needed. 1:03:52 He certainly can keep Omaha in the game. 1:03:57 But I almost feel like he's a year away from kind of hitting that next level. 1:04:01 We've seen it with goalies where they take a little longer to develop. 1:04:06 And I see flashes of it with him, but I don't know if he has it yet. 1:04:13 All right, guys, what's your prediction? 1:04:14 Come on, Nate, what do you got? 1:04:16 Who do you got coming out of that Loveland region? 1:04:21 If Minnesota wins the first game, I think they're frozen four bound. 1:04:27 We've seen them struggle the most and kind of build momentum just in the first game of two game series this season. 1:04:35 So it's always that first game for the Gophers and NCAA tournaments play is always something that kind of scares me when watching them play. 1:04:43 If they get through that, I think they're going to Pittsburgh. 1:04:47 If not, I'm going to say if not, I'm going to say if not, then Mavericks do. 1:04:54 Which one? 1:05:00 The Mavericks. 1:05:03 All right, Biggs. 1:05:05 I've got Minnesota going through the Frozen Four. 1:05:08 This is one of the better complete teams we've seen the Gophers put together in a long time. 1:05:13 I just think that their consistency at goal-tending and defense gives them a chance to win even when they're not playing well. 1:05:20 And I think this weekend, they might go through a stretch where they struggled to do the right things with the puck and put pucks into goalie's feet and try to get dirty goals. 1:05:30 We've seen them do that a lot in first and second periods. 1:05:35 I think they'll have enough time to shake out of it. 1:05:38 You do worry if they get into a penalty-filled game with Omaha. 1:05:41 They could go sideways. 1:05:43 Especially, they're going to get Eastern refs. 1:05:45 There's going to be nothing but Eastern refs in that region. 1:05:47 You know, it's going to be ECAC hockey, something like that. 1:05:50 You're not going to have any WCHA. 1:05:51 You're not going to have anything like that. 1:05:54 And usually, the Gopher penalty kill has been good, but their power play has been up and down. 1:05:59 So, we'll see what we get this weekend. 1:06:00 I think Minnesota will get through, though. 1:06:03 I'm nervous about this because, as we've seen, they haven't advanced from a regional outside of Minnesota since 2002. 1:06:17 That's your stat. 1:06:18 You go with... 1:06:19 I thought it was 2002 out of Michigan. 1:06:21 They played in Michigan. 1:06:23 They only had to play one game. 1:06:24 They beat CC to go to the Frozen Four. 1:06:28 I think 2003, wasn't that here in Minnesota? 1:06:31 2003 and five for Mariucci. 1:06:35 That's the last time they've advanced from a region outside of Minnesota. 1:06:40 That's always weighing on my mind. 1:06:44 Of course, I'm picking the Gophers, but I still think it's pretty daunting. 1:06:51 Hopefully, Matsuko doesn't have that in his head, but it's been weighing on me because it's just fact. 1:07:00 It will be interesting to see how the coach handles a tight game this weekend. 1:07:04 He's had some struggles with St. 1:07:06 Cloud in the tournament. 1:07:09 It'll be interesting to see how he manages things, because this team has had issues on the bench that we've talked about that have popped up when things aren't going well. 1:07:18 So if they're behind, it'll be interesting to see if they're able to continue to bounce back like they did in the Big Ten tournament. 1:07:24 Because, you know, no second chance is here. 1:07:27 The time for lessons is done. 1:07:29 Our boy Steve, he confirmed it. 1:07:31 It was 2002, was the last time they advanced to a Frozen Four through a regional that was not in Minnesota. 1:07:40 They're going to have to get used to that if they want to get to Frozen Fours, because it doesn't look like Minnesota is going to be hosting any regionals for the time ahead here. 1:07:50 Any final thoughts, guys? 1:07:51 I see there's some questions in Twitter from earlier. 1:07:53 We just had a lot to go through today. 1:07:54 We'll cover some of those in overtime here. 1:07:57 Any last thoughts, Nate? 1:08:00 I'm really looking forward to this weekend, sitting down and watching a lot of hockey. 1:08:06 It's honestly one of my favorite weekends of the year. 1:08:10 It's probably just some World Juniors, that little stretch at the end of December. 1:08:17 I guess I'd also throw in the state tournament as well. 1:08:22 I like those little stretches where you can just sit and you have games going on all day. 1:08:27 Veegs, any final thoughts? 1:08:30 I think it's fun for college hockey to have the Blue Buds back at number one seeds and playing well. 1:08:36 I think it will be interesting to see the ratings that come out of this weekend in a pandemic season where the passionate fans aren't going to be able to go to many of the sites this year. 1:08:45 I know that some people are able to get frozen four tickets this week and are hoping to see Minnesota play in Pittsburgh. 1:08:53 I think they've got a really good chance to get through and do some damage this year. 1:08:57 It's going to be interesting. 1:08:59 We're looking at some of the teams that could advance through. 1:09:01 I really like North Dakota. 1:09:04 I like Minnesota and I like BC, and that's good for college hockey. 1:09:08 Can you imagine if Wisconsin gets through as well? 1:09:11 Holy blue blood is frozen for. 1:09:13 That'd be a fun town. 1:09:17 And Nate, you say it's one of your favorite weekends. 1:09:20 This weekend is my favorite weekend, bar none. 1:09:25 Just flip on the TV Friday afternoon and just soak it all in. 1:09:31 Then you could stay up late. 1:09:32 You hope there's a big overtime game Friday night because then you can sleep till noon the next day. 1:09:38 And then it's just solid hockey the rest of the weekend. 1:09:41 I love it. 1:09:44 It's great. 1:09:44 The only downside, at least for me, is just in this pandemic year. 1:09:49 Normally, I would probably find my way to go up to Albany. 1:09:52 I'd go up to Bridgeport. 1:09:54 I'd be going between some regionals. 1:09:56 But you know what? 1:09:57 If the alternative is sitting down and watching every game on TV, I'm not going to complain. 1:10:05 Well, of course, we're going to thank Nate for coming on the podcast with us again. 1:10:08 It's always great to have you on. 1:10:09 You're like number three on the list all time now. 1:10:13 I was getting worried. 1:10:14 People were passing me. 1:10:15 Well, it's kind of tough with Molesky. 1:10:19 Molesky and Cappy now have really moved up because they're kind of regulars whenever we play Wisconsin and Ohio State. 1:10:27 It's nice. 1:10:28 I was telling Veegs this earlier, but I was listening to the podcast on my runs, and it's always good to kind of catch up and listen to your guys' thoughts on the season. 1:10:40 I tried to text some of you guys, and I ended up watching pretty much every Gopher game. 1:10:47 We had the BTN Plus for the Fox Sports games, and BTN is great for them. 1:10:53 I even had the one Notre Dame game that was stream-only in Minnesota that was on TV here. 1:11:00 Well, it's great to have you on the podcast again. 1:11:06 Let's just hope for a good weekend, folks. 1:11:08 Either way, it's going to be great. 1:11:09 So that's going to do it for this week's GPL Podcast. 1:11:12 We'll be back next week to recap Regional Weekend and just hope for that big Frozen Four. 1:11:20 For those of you listening live or watching live on YouTube, stay tuned for a bit of overtime. 1:11:26 For us of you, we'll see you next week.