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. 0:38 Good evening, and welcome to The GPL Podcast, episode number 195. 0:45 Well, we've got Nate Wells back with us this week from the East Coast. 0:49 He's doing a lot of national coverage these days. 0:52 Nate, how are you doing? 0:53 How you been? 0:55 I'm good. 0:56 I'm glad to be back with you guys. 0:58 I think I jinxed the Gophers the last time I was on, but that's Minnesota sports. 1:03 Yeah, that's just kinda how it is. 1:05 But we're glad to have you back at me. 1:06 You're one of our top guests. 1:08 I mean, you're almost up there at the top of as many shows as you've been on, so we definitely enjoy having you on. 1:19 VEGS, planned all last week. 1:21 I was enjoying being able to talk to you guys at VEGS. 1:24 Yeah. 1:25 Nate's having little issues with the Internet. 1:27 So VEGS got all prepped for last week. 1:30 You even had an article ready to go for last week. 1:34 We're done with the show a couple of days later. 1:37 Alaska's got COVID, Matzko signed an extension, all this stuff happening, no hockey. 1:44 What the hell? 1:45 A lot of action, no hockey. 1:48 I guess we can't be surprised if we've been paying attention to COVID numbers in Alaska. 1:52 I mean, they are still right in the thick of things. 1:56 So I think, you know, better safe than sorry. 1:58 You're hoping to have a nice crowd in the arena. 2:01 You know, you don't want to be bringing extra cases of COVID to that crowd. 2:06 So I think they did the smart thing. 2:07 You know, they'll play hopefully in January when they rescheduled the series. 2:11 And we get to start the season over kind of and welcome Mercyhurst to Marriott Cheer Arena. 2:20 Yeah. 2:20 You know, we were kind of back and forth with Nate earlier today and Nate's kind of like, what are we going to talk about? 2:24 There were no games, but Nate, there's always something to talk about with Gopher Hockey. 2:28 There's either there's something always happening, Nate. 2:34 As that is true, there is something that's always happening. 2:36 There's something always happening in college hockey as well. 2:38 And we did have the good opening first weekend of the men's hockey season. 2:43 Got a lot of good exhibitions, a lot of games that counted. 2:47 It's just really nice just to see my feed filled up with highlights and people talking college hockey. 2:51 I kind of missed that after the last six months. 2:54 And of course, really, the kind of the big match up naturally last week was Massachusetts and Minnesota State, Mankato and Dryden McKay, another shutout. 3:06 And then the next night, they come back, five unanswered goals or something like that. 3:10 And they're the number one team in the nation right now, Nate. 3:16 They are. 3:17 And I mean, really the impressive thing with you, you expect Minnesota State to come out strong with returning everybody from a Frozen Four team. 3:25 Um, and UMass is having, UMass brings back a good portion of the, you know, national championship. 3:31 But I mean, they're missing Lindbergh. 3:33 You're missing Zach Jones. 3:36 You're missing a few other guys and bringing in some transfers. 3:38 I may need to take some time to put together. 3:41 But yeah, Minnesota State, I mean, Dryden McCain shows he can shut out anybody. 3:47 Gopher fans know it all too well. 3:48 He's won from the NCAA record, which I mean, you can probably get that by November at this rate. 3:56 And I was really just impressed by Mankato being down against UMass, at UMass and coming back to win with five, six straight goals on the road. 4:08 As much as Mankato has had the demons of playing Providence and having some leads disappear in the other way in the NCAA tournament, it just kind of felt like it was right that this Mankato team is able to come back and win at anywhere, anytime. 4:27 Well, kind of on the flip side, Neil, this weekend, Veegs, that gives us a very nice matchup with St. 4:33 Cloud heading down to Mankato. 4:36 And I think the part I just love is that we finally got some excellent college hockey back. 4:44 Yeah, this weekend is going to be kind of one of those premier bragging right series in the state of Minnesota. 4:50 I think you're looking at four teams in the state right now who all are right tight together. 4:56 I mean, I think you have to give Minnesota State tons of credit right now. 5:01 They are deserving of being a top team. 5:04 And until you knock them off, they're king of the hill. 5:08 And Ryan McKay, very strong goalie. 5:11 I don't know if you could have gone last year either way wrong picking McKay or LaFontaine. 5:17 I know a lot of Minnesota State followers are very fanatical about their team and feel like McKay got robbed. 5:26 It's such a close battle when you look at the two and you just look at the schedules and things like that. 5:31 And when you go into evaluating this year, McKay is ahead. 5:36 I mean, he played great against UMass. 5:38 He gave his team a chance to win and that Minnesota State roster is starting to develop itself where, you know, being down to nothing on the road to UMass isn't that big a deal. 5:48 They know how to handle it and come back from it. 5:49 So I think that's good for them to show their resilience. 5:53 And, you know, we're going to have a battle in the state this year. 5:58 And one thing people need to remember is that the voting for that happened right after kind of the league tournaments. 6:04 And right at that time, Dryden McKay kind of had, he didn't get even to the final game of the WCHA tournament. 6:15 Obviously Lafontaine kind of they went on his back and played well. 6:18 I'm guessing, Nate, if they would have voted maybe a little later after the regionals, they may have felt different about Dryden McKay. 6:29 Oh, very much. 6:30 Yeah. 6:30 And yeah, you mentioned, yeah, it was near Northern Michigan, like put up like a five or six spot on him at WCHA. 6:36 Yeah. 6:39 I don't think it's really final. 6:40 I don't think it's final five anymore, but it doesn't really matter. 6:42 All right. 6:42 All right. 6:43 Dead League. 6:45 Yeah. 6:48 But I mean, you can't say that. 6:51 I mean, at worst, you can't say that McKay hasn't been a top two goalie in College Hockey in the last two plus seasons. 6:59 Yes. 7:00 I think any other team besides Minnesota State having to play UMass and St. 7:06 Cloud to open the season would be in a lot of trouble. 7:10 There's only a few teams where you look at it. 7:12 Everyone's figuring things out. 7:13 It's a really weird year. 7:15 A lot of transfers, a lot of people are figuring out their teams to begin the season. 7:21 They're not going to be where they start. 7:23 They're going to be really different where they end. 7:25 There's a few teams that bring enough back. 7:28 They have a core. 7:29 You know what they are at the start of the season. 7:32 Minnesota State is one of them. 7:34 They play St. 7:37 Cloud, who's another one. 7:39 UMass, they miss a few, but they're the national champions for a reason. 7:45 I think you're seeing that with these great series to start the season where these teams that are ready right out of the gate, at least are playing one another. 7:57 So what? 8:00 So it obviously sets up something nice next weekend, possibly Veegs, if you know, if St. 8:04 Cloud and Mankato have a great, like a split or a couple ties or something along those lines, it could really set up for a nice weekend, you know, with home and home with Minnesota and St. 8:12 Cloud. 8:14 Um, but you know, you were at media availability this week, you know, for Minnesota, how disappointed were the boys in not playing? 8:23 I mean, obviously you get sick of practice, you want to start hitting some bodies, but that must have been a kind of a disappointment to them. 8:31 I think it's more of a letdown than a disappointment. 8:35 You know, you're getting real excited to go to the show and you've got your tickets and you've made your plans and maybe your family's come in. 8:41 You're so excited to show off maybe your new stick or your new skates or something. 8:46 Then you're getting ready and it's just like, oh, we don't get to play. 8:50 We're going to do a scrimmage. 8:52 We get to wear our game jerseys, but it's a scrimmage. 8:54 And, you know, it's really hard to draw that intensity up after that kind of letdown. 8:59 And so I think the players are just like, you know, out of our control, let's reset. 9:05 You know, we get a good run here with Mercyhurst to hit somebody else and show our intensity and our forecheck and get all the jitters out. 9:15 So I don't think it was so much of a disappointment as just kind of a letdown like, OK, here we go again. 9:20 Let's just get ready for the next week. 9:22 Well, one thing it does do, Vig, so is it kind of takes a weekend off that would have happened in January. 9:30 So in reality, you know, they're going to hit, you know, early January, they've got an exhibition against Team USA U18. 9:37 But then after that, it's every weekend. 9:41 And they're going to be missing guys from World Juniors for that series. 9:44 With Alaska about that time, because I expect a couple of guys from this roster are going to be playing for the red, white and blue around that holiday time. 9:52 And usually that gold medal game is right around that January 5th, 6th, 7th. 9:56 So, but I believe the games are going to be like around the 15th or 16th. 10:01 Yeah, the following weekend. 10:03 I'm not sure. 10:05 Let's take a look at 15th, 14th, 15th. 10:08 You're right. 10:09 That's when they slumped them in. 10:10 But Michigan State is the 7th and 8th. 10:13 And then there could be some fatigue issues. 10:15 And then the U18 is actually the 3rd on a Monday. 10:20 Just a chance to get all the goldies in. 10:23 Nate, you cover the national scene a bit more. 10:26 Do we know how Alaska Fairbanks is doing? 10:29 Are they going to be able to play this week? 10:30 Do we? 10:31 It's been really quiet. 10:32 It's just all of a sudden they're not coming. 10:35 But I haven't really heard anything in the college hockey world, about how they're doing, or what's going to happen right away here. 10:44 Yeah, as of now when we're recording, I really haven't heard much either to see how things are going. 10:51 Yeah, it's a tough time up in Alaska, just with the COVID cases. 10:58 It's a tough time. 10:59 And I feel bad for Alaska because they took off. 11:01 They're off all last season. 11:03 The league that they're in pretty much all left to form another league without them. 11:07 Kicked them out. 11:08 They're the only ones remaining from the WCHA that is still playing this year because Alabama Huntsville is taking the year off and so is Anchorage. 11:23 So it's up to being independent and coming up with that schedule and trying to find teams and fitting things in when they do. 11:30 So hopefully they're able to play this weekend. 11:34 I again haven't heard anything, but I mean, health and safety comes first. 11:38 It's not possible that they're able to get games in when they can. 11:42 But you kind of hope that it's great to see so many teams step up and schedule Alaska kind of the same way that we're seeing with Arizona State and Long Island. 11:54 It's kind of amazing how many independent teams that we have in college hockey right now. 11:58 And then we got Augustana coming soon too. 12:01 But you know, we've been talking about these Alaska schools though, Nate. 12:08 It could be the beginning or the middle of the end here. 12:13 You can be an independent probably, maybe a little bit. 12:16 And there's more independent teams now. 12:17 But boy up there in Alaska, Nate, it's tough. 12:22 It's real tough. 12:25 It is tough. 12:26 And they do have the advantage of teams that go up there. 12:29 You get the extra game. 12:30 So for some schools, you can take advantage of it. 12:33 That's why I'm in Minnesota, probably happy to do that when they can fit in once every few years. 12:38 Those two extra home games can certainly come in handy financially or just being able to fit in another opponent. 12:47 For as far as the Alaska schools and Huntsville and just all the independents, they're almost banking on getting more teams in the college hockey world. 12:57 So you have enough to either form a conference. 13:00 I was thinking about this when I wrote last week about the WCHA, just writing a eulogy about the WCHA mentally going away. 13:07 One of the things that stuck out, just realizing while writing was that the WCHA strength was, it was always there for teams that needed a home. 13:16 It's higher than the 50s, you had all the six state western schools who were outside of the northeast, needed a home, it evolved. 13:25 You got more schools in Michigan, Ohio and just went out to more of the upper Midwest. 13:31 You took in the Alaska schools when needed, took in Bemidji when you needed, and then of course with realignment, it took in pretty much everybody who wasn't in the Big Ten or NCHC. 13:42 We're at a point where that's not exactly what's needed in college hockey, it's evolved to that. 13:48 But there's still the possibility, especially for again, those schools that are just right now in dependence that you're going to need a few more schools to fit in that spot. 13:57 It looks like Arizona, I mean, Arizona states can be a bit more lucrative for another conference once their new rink opens next season. 14:06 But you're still going to have the Augustana, you're going to have the Alaska schools. 14:10 There's probably a couple more on the horizon. 14:13 We'll see how much COVID makes, and the pandemic makes a difference. 14:16 But you're still seeing that there should be more college hockey teams that are on, or schools are going to sponsor men's college hockey on the horizon. 14:25 Like Illinois, right Veegs? 14:27 Illinois, right around the corner. 14:29 They keep threatening to do it. 14:30 You know, they just got to get those donors lined up and maybe get the sausage king of Chicago involved. 14:37 Nobody's better at finding those Illinois announcements than you, Nate. 14:44 You can find them just like that when it's coming. 14:46 It's right. 14:47 It's next week or whatever. 14:50 That guy blocked me. 14:51 He's going on. 14:51 He's going on like a good decade. 14:53 But yeah, I think it's when August, I was trying to think of like, I think we're on the fifth school that made announcement. 14:59 And that doesn't even include, Lindenwood wants to do it. 15:02 Tennessee State's doing a exploratory. 15:06 You have a couple other schools that are kind of quiet about it. 15:08 But yeah, Illinois, I don't know what's going on with them right now. 15:14 But I mean, there really should be college hockey in Illinois. 15:19 The fact that there's not is just a very, someone is missing out. 15:23 The first school that gets Illinois, that gets college hockey, and they're going to have a very big recruiting pond for themselves. 15:32 Veegs, I'm thinking what really kind of could save, I should say, maybe the Alaska schools is another Western team. 15:40 There's just not any Western teams out there. 15:43 Some people in the chat were talking about maybe a BC team, you know, some British Columbia bringing some Canadian colleges. 15:51 There's a potential of that. 15:52 But I'm thinking without something more Western, or maybe even like an Air Force and like CC, or maybe Denver splitting off from the NCHC, which probably won't happen. 16:06 But that's what they would really need to happen. 16:08 They need a Western type of conference, probably to save their fate. 16:14 It would help, I think, even if they got into a lead that could maybe do kind of like a Western division, and a more central division. 16:22 You know, there get to be more college hockey teams that becomes maybe a little more feasible. 16:27 And maybe you could see Atlantic hockey kind of splinter off a little bit and get into a more manageable group. 16:33 And then it allows those teams also to play maybe some more non-conference games, and maybe boost their budgets a little bit by getting some paychecks for playing bigger teams. 16:43 But I think there's definitely enough players to make it happen. 16:46 You see, especially this year, with so many players being pushed back into juniors, and kids who maybe would be going to play juniors, play extra year high school, and the pipeline is there to fill these college programs. 16:57 There definitely is. 17:00 You kind of sat on this for the last week, Veegs, you were going to put this year. 17:05 I've maybe sat on this for almost a year. 17:07 Okay, you have. 17:09 But you know, obviously, you mixed in kind of a little bit of a preview of this season a little bit. 17:14 You talked about a few other things. 17:15 But your most popular article, kind of yearly, which took the year off is attendance, season tickets, tickets scanned, that whole thing. 17:28 And what you're seeing is a little encouraging, at least on the ticket scan, when the most recent year. 17:33 But one thing jumped out right to me is season tickets now are below 4,000, I believe was it 3,700 ish. 17:42 Yeah, I mean, they're going to be trying to sell tickets through the end of the non-conference games before they play Notre Dame. 17:49 But when you see season ticket sales under 4,000 for Gopher Hockey, it just kind of makes me shake my head a little bit. 17:56 They've been trying to reduce prices for season tickets, make basically tickets under $30 a game for a fan. 18:05 And it's not making a big impact. 18:07 And they've got a good coach right now. 18:09 And they've got a good team right now. 18:11 Then it's not the cost. 18:13 I don't think it is the cost. 18:14 It's not the cost. 18:17 It's people, honestly, they're still angry about the Big Ten thing. 18:22 That's the only thing that kind of really explains it, doesn't it? 18:24 That really kind of started the bigger slide of season ticket sales. 18:29 Yeah. 18:30 I mean, Lou Nani once said with the North Stars, he's like, he would fight so hard to keep a season ticket holder renewing every year, because once you lose a fan, they're almost gone for good. 18:42 And so Minnesota's got a big challenge on its hand to recruit new fans who don't miss the old WCHA, maybe don't know so much about the old Final Five and embrace the current era of Gopher, you know? 18:56 And this year, I think will be a good example of whether or not that's possible, because the games should be entertaining. 19:04 They've had good non-conference games scheduled. 19:07 They've maintained. 19:07 They're not playing a bunch of cheese puff games throughout the fall here. 19:12 They're gonna ramp it up here pretty quick. 19:14 And it'll be interesting to see if the fans come back. 19:17 You know, you talk about the non-conference games. 19:20 There's a potential of St. 19:21 Cloud doing very well next weekend and coming into Mariucci number one in the country. 19:28 That is your next door neighbor, number one in the country coming into Mariucci. 19:33 That's pretty darn big, Nate. 19:35 That should pack the house, but will it? 19:41 Yeah, you'd think it would and worst case, as long as you assume Minnesota doesn't get swept or something crazy against Mercyhurst, it should be two top five teams no matter what happens. 19:55 I was reading Vegoe's article as well. 19:58 I always got to read Vegoe's stuff, plug it there. 20:02 But it was interesting where some of the teams and some of the names that came up as reasons why people wanted to watch or teams that people wanted to watch were the ones that didn't have great scans or numbers in them. 20:21 I was really surprised at that St. 20:23 Cloud game. 20:23 I remember being there at the rink and just looking around the building and saying, this is Minnesota St. 20:29 Cloud, two very highly rated teams playing well and the building is half empty, legitimately less than 5,000 people there for the game. 20:41 It just baffled me, especially with Minnesota St. 20:45 Bemidji playing earlier that afternoon and you could buy one ticket and see both games. 20:50 Isn't that basically like North Star Cup, what people had been clamoring for for a long time? 20:57 It baffles me that people made other plans that day. 21:02 Do you also recall how bad? 21:04 Oh wait, go ahead, Nate. 21:06 I was going to say, I agree. 21:08 I feel like there's been times in past seasons before, the most recent one of fans, that it's been kind of similar with non-conference, where the ones that maybe you think would pop up would be the ones that would be games that don't end up well. 21:21 Yeah, I was completely surprised when reading that, that the St. 21:24 Cloud one was pretty much the worst of the season because, yeah, it's two fan bases that are close to one another. 21:33 There's a huge twin cities base for three, or even all four teams are playing at Mariucci. 21:39 You think that'd be an easy one to get people into the building, stuff that people are climbing for. 21:44 Yeah, it just didn't happen. 21:45 Then you look on the other side, that maybe the Gophers were doing better that season, that you get more people in there. 21:53 Maybe it might do just a little bit more thinking about, just worrying about how the team is on the ice. 21:59 Again, we've also had times where the Gophers have been the top five team in the country, and we've been having the same conversation. 22:06 It almost feels like just it's, Rich is talking in circles about attendance. 22:11 We're talking circles about it, Veegs, but it's a legit concern for the school. 22:19 I mean, you know, when you have basically almost half the season tickets not happening like it used to, that's a ton more tickets you have to sell each and every night. 22:34 So instead of 7,000 to 8,000 season tickets already sold the entire season, you've got to cover 3,000 a night. 22:43 Now you're covering more like 6,000 a night, and that is a huge number. 22:48 I mean, and it can't be just, oh, we don't have the rivals, we don't play with rivals. 22:53 North Dakota came in here a couple years ago. 22:54 The Gophers weren't that great. 22:58 The place was pretty empty. 23:00 I wouldn't say fully empty, but it was not packed. 23:04 And the North Dakota fans easily outnumbered the Gopher fans that night. 23:10 And, you know, North Dakota fans have always been able to get married. 23:14 They always make noise, but they've never outnumbered them. 23:17 But they clearly outnumbered them that night. 23:19 So it's not the rivals. 23:22 What is it? 23:25 Well, you mentioned it. 23:26 You know, when your season ticket base starts falling, now your marketing department has to try to sell way more seats than they've ever tried to sell before. 23:36 And it's really a marketing department that's not staffed to do that. 23:40 I think even worse now, even worse now, I think if you look at the University of Minnesota, they're trying to sell tickets to Huntington Bank right now. 23:48 They're trying to sell football tickets for PJ Fleck because there's 50,000 seats to sell in that building and it's once a week, you know, prime time, PJ Fleck show, that's where their effort is to try to sell tickets there. 24:03 Once football season comes to a close, that marketing staff now has time and availability to maybe help sell hockey tickets. 24:12 And we saw that a couple of years ago with the Wisconsin Series when they welcomed back the National Championship team and they did the throwback pricing. 24:20 You know, once you have that team available, you can start to put some of those things in motion, but they are just not staffed to try to sell 6,000 hockey tickets a night. 24:30 And so this weekend, you're probably going to see 4,000 fans in the building. 24:37 And I know the players have been talking, you know, there's going to be a good crowd. 24:42 It's going to be fun to be in front of the band and the fans again. 24:46 And it's going to be a little bit of a shock, I think, this first weekend for people watching on TV. 24:50 I'm just prepping myself for my tweet deck feed to be full of comments on Friday night about the building. 24:58 And, you know, is COVID still going on? 25:00 Yes, it is, you know, but it's a separate issue for the half empty building. 25:05 I think for St. 25:05 Cloud, we'll probably see a better crowd. 25:07 I think for Minnesota, we'll see a little better crowd, but it's going to be a slow start for the hockey program for attendance this year, I think. 25:16 And yes, we keep talking about it. 25:18 We've been talking about it for years, but it's, like you said, it's the article each time you do it that gets the most attention, Veegs. 25:29 Yeah, there are passionate fans. 25:31 Yes. 25:32 You know, but another thing we could talk about, though, is they're fully electronic tickets this year. 25:38 And I saw someone even posting on GPL the night. 25:41 He was trying to get his, send his tickets this weekend to his 70-year-old uncle. 25:46 And he's gonna have to go over his house and do all this stuff to figure it out. 25:49 So, you know, I don't know how many other places do electronic. 25:54 I don't know. 25:55 Is that another concern we may have with trying to get, you know, people who don't have a smartphone or a way to print out an electronic ticket? 26:06 Is that a legit concern? 26:08 I don't know if it's a legit concern because it's such a small minority of the fans. 26:13 I'm pretty sure the ticket office has ways to help people who are trying to figure out how to get tickets in the hands of people who don't have a smartphone or can't have that technology. 26:22 But that's the way things are headed. 26:24 It's so much easier to transfer tickets with these electronic ones where you can just text it to somebody and they can see the text and add it to their wallet. 26:33 It's pretty seamless. 26:34 It works pretty well when you go in the building to get the scan. 26:38 And that's just the way things are headed. 26:42 Definitely the way things are headed. 26:44 Nate, this season is the 20th anniversary of that miracle season, I would say, when they won the national championship after however many seasons. 26:56 It was over 20 years. 26:58 But I'm thinking we'll see some celebrations this year for that team again. 27:04 Maybe around that Wisconsin series, who knows? 27:09 Yeah, it's very doable. 27:11 And plus, I mean, they also are able to do all the 100th season celebrations this year that they weren't able to do for the 100th season of Gopher Hockey. 27:21 So there's a lot that Minnesota can do to get fans in the building. 27:28 I think also just, yeah, it's going to be important to get people excited about this team. 27:32 There's a lot to be excited about this group who are being brought back, pretty much the vast majority of the Corps of Returns. 27:42 And it's always been, we've kind of like, I know I've been on here multiple times where we talked about attendance and everything, and I always find the disconnect between the struggle between to get people in the building and the number of people who will click on anything that's a Gopher article. 27:58 And it's always just, one is always, one is always much higher than the other compared to pretty much any other team in college hockey when you mention Minnesota. 28:09 So there's interest in Minnesota hockey. 28:13 The tough part is getting that interest to be spending money and paying tickets, especially now if we're talking about the prices and everything, there's also now the option for fans in the Twin Cities to go down to Mendota Heights and watch St. 28:26 Thomas. 28:29 That will be a choice for quite a few fans, especially once they get themselves a nice little building. 28:36 It will be interesting to see. 28:37 Well, I mentioned, you know, hey, they can bring back alumni and things like that. 28:40 And one thing that the alumni didn't get to take advantage of last year was kind of an alumni area for those guys at Mariucci Veegs. 28:49 And I actually texted you about it today. 28:53 That's up and running now, isn't it? 28:55 I mean, it technically would have been for last year, but nobody visiting. 28:59 But that's all completed at Mariucci now, isn't it? 29:03 Yep, it's ready to go for the alums who get there. 29:05 And I know Bob has been very intentional about making alums feel welcome back with the program. 29:11 They kind of redid their golf tournament that they used to do with the Blue Line Club. 29:16 Now, the Blue Line Club has kind of gone away, and they just made it an alumni event. 29:20 And they were down at Legends. 29:21 They filled up the course with a bunch of old Gopher hockey players, and they all had a chance to connect and talk and feel like a part of the program. 29:30 And I know Bob really wants players to be able to come back together. 29:33 And some of those players, as much as they want to see the games and all that, a lot of them just want to see each other. 29:40 And so that was the idea of the small alumni room for those former players to get together and relive the glory days and maybe take in a few moments of Gopher hockey. 29:52 Yeah, and that's important because, you know, we hadn't seen much alumni recently when they're able to come. 29:58 So it's good that Bob is embracing those guys. 30:02 So looking forward to seeing a few of them hanging around. 30:05 Maybe I'm going to try to peek in there, see what it looks like. 30:09 Yeah, you'll see it right on your way by the arena. 30:11 It's right in that corner by University there. 30:15 Okay, I'm looking forward to it. 30:18 Definitely looking forward to it. 30:20 You know, I'm looking over here. 30:22 I'm seeing that we've got some Twitter questions and we're going to get to those in a minute. 30:28 But first, we need to hear from our sponsor. 30:32 Hey fellow GPLers, Jerry Peters here from First Class Mortgage. 30:36 Have you refinanced your home in the last 12 months? 30:38 If you haven't, chances are you should. 30:41 Record low interest rates and skyrocketing home values make this the perfect time to remove monthly PMI while improving your interest rate at the same time. 30:49 You can also use the equity in your home to finance those home improvement projects. 30:53 Or you can consolidate high interest rate credit cards into one new low monthly payment. 30:58 To hear more, call or text me today at 612-940-3291. 31:04 You can email me at jerry at firstclasscorp.com or you could go to firstclassmortgage.com to fill out a free online application. 31:13 Mention the GPL Podcast and receive a $300 closing cost credit. 31:17 Some restrictions do apply. 31:19 First Class Mortgage's NMLS number is 322-842-480-200. 31:25 This is not an agreement to lock into an interest rate under Minnesota law. 31:29 First Class Mortgage is an equal housing lender. 31:34 All right. 31:35 Thank you, Jerry. 31:37 Yes, keeps sponsoring us. 31:39 We just love that. 31:41 I'm going to head up some questions that we have on Twitter. 31:45 We got Tim Hapkey from earlier today. 31:47 I'm going to throw this set to you, Veegs. 31:49 What are the expectations for the farm kid Jackson Nelson this year? 31:54 Do you see him as a 20-point guy? 31:57 Also, will he be on the number one penalty kill unit? 32:01 Again, along with Meyers. 32:03 And actually, from what I heard from the media, it sounds like he's actually on the power play, you know, maybe a little tree out in front. 32:10 Yeah, he's on one of the three power play groups right now. 32:13 You know, he's such a big body, and he's going to be playing, you know, top nine minutes for the Gophers. 32:20 He'll be on power play. 32:21 I think I think he'll be on special teams. 32:23 I think they might split him up from Meyers on the penalty kill. 32:29 He's working with Kruikshank on the unit, so maybe trying to figure out a way to space some guys out, maybe get some more killers. 32:36 So we'll see what happens there. 32:37 But I'd be surprised if he doesn't get at least 20 points. 32:41 And I think he's got a chance to approach 30. 32:44 And he really started to hit his groove at the end of last year. 32:47 And I think the one thing he's got to learn is how to play in his big body. 32:51 You know, a big body like that, he likes to be physical. 32:54 Sometimes he goes over the line in college hockey. 32:57 He's almost got more of a pro game. 32:59 And I know that there are some NHL teams who are keeping their eye on him because he projects to be a pro player the way he's developed the last two years and the way he's coming into this year. 33:09 So I think there's going to be a lot of eyes and expectations on Jackson Nelson. 33:13 What do you think of Jackson Nelson there, Nate? 33:17 Yeah, I really agree with Veegs there where he's really coming to his own. 33:21 I saw it towards the end of last season. 33:23 And he's really become the player that you kind of thought that he could be when he committed to Minnesota many, many moons ago. 33:31 It's kind of funny thinking about this where Nelson was the first 2000 to commit to Minnesota, born player to commit to Minnesota. 33:39 And the second Minnesota 2000 board player to commit to his school is Kandre Miller. 33:44 So you kind of see their paths go in different directions. 33:49 But you're seeing it where Nelson, what Nelson's been doing the past last season, just during the off season and getting his opportunities entering this season. 33:58 You're reminded why he is thought so highly and why NHL teams are going to probably be thinking and trying to get him to sign after the season, especially if he's able to combine this and be just a high quality college player with a pro potential. 34:14 And it looks like he might get a chance to play with Lucius this year. 34:17 And I think anytime you're playing with a guy who's got hands like that, and you can deliver pucks to the net where there's going to be a lot of rebounds available, it could be a good season for Jackson Nelson. 34:29 Looking forward to it. 34:30 Looking forward to it. 34:34 Ryan Davis, with Moscow signing a contract extension last week, there's rumors this could be his last extension before retirement. 34:43 Is there any truth to these rumors or is it just baseless speculation? 34:48 Veegs, I don't know if it's baseless speculation, but Moscow says, I don't want to be doing this when I'm really old. 34:57 He did hint that, but at the same time, he is a hockey guy. 35:01 You can just tell he's loving being around the team right now. 35:05 He's even having a good time doing media. 35:08 I saw him at practice today during the penalty kill time. 35:11 He's getting his steps in by doing some whiffs of the ice, getting his calories burned and getting some air. 35:17 By the way, Vegoe sent me that video. 35:20 It was very entertaining. 35:21 He's just kind of skating back and forth doing his thing. 35:24 I think Bob's very comfortable with the way the penalty kill is working. 35:27 He's got Gordron Rabbs working at each end of the ice. 35:30 He can just go back and forth and burn some calories. 35:33 It's entertaining. 35:34 I think he's having fun. 35:36 I think that's a long way to make a decision on what's going to happen. 35:41 And the further that we get, Spoke 612, I'm going to throw this one at you, Nate. 35:45 You know, on the extension side, you know, in case he does decide to retire, is that something where Potomac can come in and take over the program? 35:53 I'm hoping not. 35:54 But what do you think? 35:57 I mean, so much, so much would change between now. 35:59 What's what he has. 36:00 Moscow has four years between now and when the extension ends. 36:04 Yeah. 36:05 Yeah. 36:06 So, like, so much, so much can change in four years. 36:08 Just even think about you were talking about Lucius there a bit ago. 36:12 Think about just the four years that have changed between when he committed at 14 to now actually being on here. 36:18 Like, honestly, the surprising part is that he still is one of the top players in his age group and one of the top goal scorers. 36:25 Everything else, I think, has pretty much gone crazy around him. 36:29 I'm pretty sure anyone who had Don Lucia will be the commissioner of the CCHA and will be like in month 20 of a global pandemic. 36:39 Anyone who knew that was going to happen when he finally comes on campus, it either be in like an insane asylum or like just won that $700 million powerball. 36:53 I didn't have him leading the CCHA either. 36:57 So I thought he was going to go to USA Hockey for a little bit. 37:01 You know, USA Hockey is looking for some leadership people. 37:04 I think Don wanted to be involved in the game. 37:07 Weren't you speculating a couple of years ago that he might want to get into television too? 37:12 Yeah, I think he'd be a good analyst. 37:15 He definitely can rub people a certain way, but he knows a lot about the game. 37:21 Okay, Steve Larson here. 37:22 We'll go throw this to you Veegs. 37:24 Do you think missing the Alaska series will hurt us against Mercyhurst? 37:29 I don't think so. 37:30 This team looks pretty dialed in. 37:32 I was just talking about the penalty kill. 37:34 This penalty kill unit looks way better than the one I saw Rabbs working with when he first got on campus and was trying to get his theory of penalty killing installed. 37:45 Guys are going to the wrong spots all the time, and he's having to stop drills and restart all the time. 37:50 Now they just run very, very smoothly. 37:53 They've got leaders at the front of the line who know all the drills. 37:56 This is the team that's trying to get going. 37:59 I almost think it helps them maybe, skipping the Alaska Series and getting right to Mercyhurst, because then they go from Mercyhurst to the 60-mile-an-hour speed limit. 38:08 I think maybe just playing the one weekend of this non-conference warm-up hockey will be better for them in the long run. 38:18 Mercyhurst, a nice warm-up for them, Nate. 38:22 It's a good warm-up. 38:24 It's probably the perfect team to have, be that second one where you have an Atlantic hockey school that brings back pretty much a good portion of who they were last year. 38:34 They weren't a great team last year. 38:37 They're still putting young players into big-time positions. 38:42 They have Danny Brear's kid, which is a crazy thing to think about. 38:49 But it's a good test. 38:53 Honestly, I would have liked to have them play Alaska last week and just kind of have a team that is playing their first game in over a year or so to kind of get the Kings out of there, kind of build up to Mercyhurst, and then build up into just playing, I think pretty much other than Ohio State is pretty much just all, it's a tough schedule through the 2021 portion. 39:14 But yeah, I guess, I mean, you can really, if you're going to start with the Mercyhurst, like it's better to start with the Mercyhurst than they do in the icebreaker or bringing in St. 39:24 Cloud State or something like right in right away. 39:31 Well, all I really matters to me is that buying something strange will be at Marriott Arena this weekend, Veegs. 39:38 I'm looking forward to that. 39:40 I haven't been in Marriott since, I just looked, it was March 8th of 2020. 39:47 So it's been a while and you've been there recently. 39:49 I'm just seeing practices and being media sessions, but you haven't been there for a game probably since about that time either. 39:57 I'm just excited. 40:00 I'm just excited to hear the sounds of hockey, the coldness of the arena, just a lot of things like that, Veegs. 40:06 I'm excited. 40:08 I'm excited too. 40:08 I'm going to be looking at these three power play units that Bob has been putting together and just try to test things out. 40:15 He says that he's going to reward production, and guys who produce on the power play are going to get to stay on the power play. 40:21 I will believe it when I see it. 40:23 I was just going to say that because you said last year he just kept throwing stuff out there, kept on the same thing, and you're like, you were pretty frustrated. 40:32 I think at some point you look at your roster and you say, these are the guys I think have the potential to be good power play players. 40:41 And I think maybe last year he looked at his roster and said, I've got maybe 11 of those guys that I think are power play type players. 40:48 So what really am I going to change by putting a plumber in front of the net? 40:55 He's just going to keep plumbing. 40:56 He's not going to turn into an artist. 40:59 He's not going to be a goal scorer. 41:00 He is what he is. 41:01 I think this year's roster, it almost looks like they have four scoring lines and they've all got experience. 41:08 They've played lots of junior hockey. 41:10 They've been on the world stage. 41:11 This is a deep roster. 41:13 And so I think truly there's a lot of artists on this team to pick from. 41:18 And you find the ones that are producing and you put them on the power play. 41:22 And I think that's kind of the difference this year as opposed to last year. 41:26 Last year, he's just like, let's find some continuity and figure it out. 41:29 This year, I think there's more competition. 41:32 I can't wait to see it. 41:34 I'm excited too. 41:35 Now, Nate, you're over on the East Coast. 41:39 Where are you going to try to be covering this year? 41:41 Do you know where your first game you'll be covering or be at? 41:47 Cornell, BU play Madison Square Garden in November. 41:50 So I'm going to try to do that. 41:52 Terrible place to see a game. 41:53 Terrible place. 41:57 I've seen quite a few there. 42:01 I don't know really. 42:02 I haven't figured out fully what games I'm going to try to see, what teams. 42:06 I have a few ideas for stories that I want to do. 42:12 I know I'm going to try to get out to Minnesota, Penn State. 42:14 I usually do that to yearly. 42:15 It ends up being pretty much. 42:16 It's been basically like the middle end of February for about four years in a row now. 42:23 I just love you sticking weekend with the Big Ten schedule. 42:27 So I'll probably get that out there. 42:30 I got a few. 42:31 I don't know if it's going to be this year or not, but I want to get up to Boston for a bean pot. 42:34 I need to do it at some point. 42:36 I just kind of knocked that off the college hockey bucket list. 42:40 Every year, I've just been, I tried to do it. 42:42 I was going to do it like maybe like three, four years ago, but it ended up being like a giant snowstorm. 42:47 So which I guess like historically happens about a bunch. 42:51 So I wasn't able to do it, but I'm still figuring things out a little bit. 42:56 I guess just a year behind, a little bit rusty on where I want to go. 42:59 But I mean, I was excited. 43:01 I went up to Connecticut two seasons ago. 43:05 Did the Connecticut Ice, their version of the Bean Pot. 43:09 I went up to RPI and wrote about the Big Red Freak Out, which was just a really unique, crazy experience. 43:16 And I know there's a few other ones that are just on my list that I wanted to be able to write about and cover for college hockey. 43:24 Well, that's awesome. 43:25 You're kind of our national guy now. 43:27 So we're gonna bring you in, but also our Gopher guy. 43:31 Veegs, obviously you had this attendance article this week. 43:37 Anything in the hopper for coming weeks that you're thinking about? 43:41 Or what kind of direction do you want to go this year with some of your coverage? 43:45 We'll probably be focused on some features. 43:48 I'm going to be talking a little bit about the off seasons that Barack Faber and Ben Myers had with Cal Deitz. 43:54 And I'm going to kind of pull back the onion on some research I've done with Cal over the years on training guys like Sammy Walker and Sam Poranta. 44:02 I've put a lot of work on it. 44:03 I haven't found the right home for it. 44:05 So you know what? 44:06 Gopher Puck Live is my home this year. 44:08 So we're going to share with you guys on there. 44:10 So I think that'll be something everyone can look forward to. 44:14 I'm going to be making some appearances on the Soda Pod this year. 44:19 Nice. 44:19 I got a guy out here, Stata Hoppe. 44:21 He's got some interests that align with mine, beer and hockey and Minnesota College hockey in particular. 44:26 So that'll be fun this year. 44:29 This weekend, I'll be publishing some of my thoughts on the Moscow family and some of the comments from the players that I picked up that I think have been the most poignant. 44:40 Okay. 44:40 Now, before we end the show, Nate, you know, we can preview and do whatever we want with Mercyhurst, but basically the bottom line is win this weekend. 44:52 But obviously not winning or tying would be devastating to the pairwise and everything else, because these games matter. 45:05 They do pairwise is back, baby. 45:07 Yeah. 45:09 Take that smoky back rooms. 45:13 We think, yeah, it's basically a bad loss is so much worse than the quality when when it comes to the pairwise and especially this, these games that this is the only serious that has against Atlantic hockey. 45:29 They need they need these two wins. 45:31 They might be just even more important at the end of the year than almost any other almost any other one because they're going to play a few games against the NCHC. 45:40 They'll have some CCHA games, which also again, we're just say that they'll have some CCHA games. 45:46 CCHA games, I can talk. 45:49 But they don't really have many out east and you need to win those comparisons. 45:54 If you lose a game or so against Mercyhurst and Atlantic hockey, a conference in Atlantic hockey that it's a conference that really struggles to get more than one bid in the NCAA tournament. 46:07 If you're losing a lot of those comparisons and a lot of those comparisons out east, it's going to crush you and the pair wise come March. 46:15 There's going to be a lot to have to go and make up. 46:19 A couple of tens of wins there, Veegs. 46:22 I'm thinking we'll see some culvers each night. 46:24 As much as Bob likes to say that he's only focused on Minnesota coming in this weekend, that's not what they're doing in practice. 46:32 They are prepping for an opponent like they normally would. 46:35 They take a very good look at special teams' history and they figure out what they want to have for a plan of attack, both with the kill and the power play. 46:43 I think when it comes to five-on-five play, Minnesota is going to want to dictate the pace. 46:48 I think all that feeds into their game plan going in about speed, about transition, about effort. 46:56 Bob is going to be able to roll four lines, and if a line's not performing, he's going to be able to roll the other three. 47:02 And I think you're going to see some short leashes this year, and he's going to be looking for productivity. 47:10 He definitely will be. 47:11 He definitely will be. 47:12 So let's do this. 47:14 Fall start last weekend. 47:15 Let's get it going this weekend. 47:17 Well, Nate, thanks for joining us again on the podcast. 47:20 We always love having you on. 47:23 Always. 47:23 Always make time for you guys. 47:25 And remember, you can follow Nate at Gopher State on Twitter, and you still have your Gopher blog, don't you? 47:33 I do for the time being. 47:35 Yeah. 47:35 And I'm going to put up some thoughts on the Gophers from when we're recording this. 47:40 It'll be up on Thursday. 47:43 Spoiler alert, I am high on this team. 47:45 I think that this is kind of the culmination of why you bring in Bob Motzko. 47:50 You have you have upperclassmen who are leaders and have kind of gained that experience through trials and tribulations. 47:58 You have young players who are all in the upswing for recruiting. 48:02 You are bringing in some couple older freshmen, the guy like Rep Pitlick, and you have an insane deaf on the blue line, which I think you might have to go back to those 13, 14 teams to say the last time that Minnesota has had a defense this good. 48:16 And I didn't even just talk about the Mike Richter award winner in Nets that comes back. 48:20 So we began this podcast talking about teams that are in a really good spot to begin the season and return a lot. 48:30 You put Minnesota in that group. 48:33 I think there might be teams that have a higher ceiling than the Gophers, but I don't know if you can say that anyone's floor is as high. 48:41 This should be a good year ago for hockey, and the expectations are there for it. 48:46 I'm so looking forward to it, especially after that false start. 48:50 Well, that's going to do it for this episode of The GPL Podcast. 48:54 I want to thank Nate Wells for joining us again. 48:57 Next week, we've got Pat Michaletti back on the podcast. 49:03 That should be a ton of fun. 49:05 For those of you currently watching live on YouTube, stay tuned for a bit of overtime. 49:10 For the rest of you, thanks for listening, and we'll catch you next week.