0:00 That was a hot mess inside a dumpster fire inside a train wreck. 0:14 This is The GPL Podcast from gopherpucklive.com. 0:24 You know, I think there's some shenanigans happening in the goalie community. 0:28 Are you gonna speak on that? 0:29 In the goalie community, oh, a former goalie? 0:32 I'm gonna ride this goalie mission, but... 0:39 Oh, boy. 0:43 And so, I had to train for this marathon. 0:51 But the Big Ten's a bad conference, that's a joke. 0:55 If this gets clipped, that's a joke. 0:56 Oh, no, no. 0:59 Now, here's Jupiter and Vegoe. 1:11 Good evening, and welcome to The GPL Podcast, episode number 240, and the season finale. 1:21 Well, Veegs, heartbreaking ending to the season for our Gophers. 1:27 Yeah, it was pretty painful. 1:31 In Tampa, I mean, it was so incredible to see all the support there all week. 1:38 The fandom had just populated the city. 1:41 Splitsville was a great spot to be and to take in all that Mernengold pride, and then to see it fall apart like it did on Saturday night, lose the two-nothing lead, and lose the championship was a real gut punch. 2:01 I actually had, I was, on the side the cameras were, I actually started my video at the beginning of overtime. 2:10 And let's just, we'll just watch it because it's a short clip. 2:16 What's up? 2:29 A very short clip, Veegs. 2:30 10 seconds, the season was over. 2:33 We could go back and analyze almost 10 seconds, all we want. 2:39 I'm not sure why Kester stepped up, causing Lacombe to move over and Nelson to cover, but some people were claiming maybe offsides. 2:48 There was no offsides. 2:49 There was a perfectly, is a great play by Quinnipiac, finding a weakness. 2:54 And boy, it was just over, just like that, Veegs. 2:59 I think what Minnesota was trying to do, and I tried to explain this on Twitter as best I could after the game, is when Quinnipiac gets the puck in the neutral zone and they regroup, they traditionally want to get up the ice as quick as they can. 3:15 So when they went it back to the D here and he's going back, he's usually looking to put it between the Minnesota and the Quinnipiac logo as quick as he can. 3:24 So what Minnesota is trying to do is they're trying to take away the options in the middle of the ice and they're trying to have their F2 and their F3 cover the strong side of the ice and they're trying to have a player cover the far side of the ice. 3:38 So that the D has to either go D to D or he forces a pass where Minnesota can jump and go on offense. 3:45 And what happens here is Minnesota just gets put in the wrong spot and Quinnipiac beats them up the ice. 3:54 And I think, you know, Jackson LeCombe could probably play this rush over again. 3:58 He's the D all by himself back there. 4:00 You can see that the Gophers have three players kind of on that red line, one attacking the puck, trying to take away that pass to the strong side. 4:08 You know, he wants that pass to go somewhere else. 4:11 And when they don't stop the rush here, they're in real trouble. 4:17 And I think this is something that Steve Miller saw. 4:19 He's like, you know, when Quinnipiac has the puck, let's be aggressive and try to create a turnover in the neutral zone so we can get offense. 4:26 But when they don't, if you keep going just a little bit here, all of a sudden now we've got a Gopher player chasing. 4:35 We've got Lacombe aggressively playing this rush. 4:38 I think because he thinks he could make a play on the puck and end the rush right here. 4:42 If he can do it over again, he should just be thinking about taking away the pass. 4:48 And a lot of them should play the shot. 4:49 Yeah, because it was a, it looks like a left, was that a left hand or right hand? 4:55 I can't really tell here, but. 4:56 It looks like a lefty. 4:57 So for him to get a shot off, he's gonna have to expose the puck. 5:01 And maybe that's what Lacombe is thinking is, is he's gonna expose the puck. 5:05 I've got my long reach, I can take it away. 5:07 But as you can see, I think the Quinnipiac player picks up his teammate coming wide open, going to the far post right away. 5:14 Jackson Nelson can't get back for that. 5:17 There's no one within 20 feet at that point when they enter the zone. 5:21 Right, so if you just go a couple of seconds longer. 5:23 Yep. 5:25 Only on man rush. 5:27 Yep, it's a backhand across, yep. 5:31 And then he catches the puck and he does a fine job. 5:34 Nelson almost gets there. 5:36 Obviously this isn't great for the people listening, but people watching or watching on YouTube, you can see a couple of guys, you know, Guester's probably shouldn't have pushed up there, but he was covering a guy. 5:49 He came up to cover a guy, but the puck went past him to another guy. 5:53 Yeah, and I think that's the issue is, is they're trying to take away all of the options at the red line and play the rush there, but they get beat up ice and there's just too many guys going the other way. 6:05 But this is not the story of the game, Beegs, at all. 6:12 As we know, many people, experts and non-experts and whatnot, saying after the Nelson Gold put them up to nothing, they sat back and tried to play a defensive game. 6:31 I would say that they're probably not wrong, but Quinnipiac also has a lot of something to do with that. 6:41 But the bottom line is two shots in the third period, and obviously we know that the snugger root one missed because the puck was kind of further as puck was rolling on. 6:54 He didn't have as much of a chance there. 6:57 But geez, what happened, Veegs? 7:05 Well, I think what happened was Quinnipiac got a little bit more aggressive with how they played Minnesota with about 12 minutes to go. 7:16 Earlier in the game, I felt like Quinnipiac was giving Minnesota a little bit of space to exit the zone in the neutral zone. 7:23 They were giving them up into the red line some space to make some plays. 7:28 But as the game went on and Quinnipiac got more and more desperate, they started getting real aggressive at the offensive blue line and coming down and making plays on Minnesota. 7:38 And it became difficult for Minnesota to win pucks and have any possession. 7:43 And the other thing that happened in the third period is Quinnipiac just started winning face off after face off after face off. 7:49 And that was really forcing Minnesota to always be on the defensive to start their shifts and be fatigued as the game went on. 7:58 You know, they had tired legs. 8:00 They were just flipping pucks out. 8:02 And then when they get that penalty called on them at the end with Cooley, that puts them on their heels even more. 8:10 And they just couldn't weather the storm all the way to the finish. 8:14 Do you, I mean, Matzko said he didn't change any strategy, blah, blah, blah. 8:18 Do you think it was Quinnipiac adjusting or maybe Minnesota not trying to go for the throat after the 2-0 lead? 8:25 Well, I think against Quinnipiac the whole time, it was going to be tough to generate offense. 8:30 You know, you look at Quinnipiac, they gave up the fewest number of goals in college hockey. 8:37 They had the second highest save percentage in college hockey. 8:41 They were the least penalized team in college hockey. 8:44 They had the fourth best penalty kill in college hockey. 8:46 This is a team that was going to be tough to play against. 8:49 And so I think Minnesota was not going to be able to get into a track meet like they did against BU, where they were able to push the pace and where BU wanted to push the pace. 8:58 It was not going to be a game that they would play against Michigan where they'd be trading chances. 9:03 It was a tough physical game. 9:05 And I think this is the game they probably had to play. 9:07 If you look at the shot charts throughout the game, there are not a lot of quality scoring chances for Quinnipiac throughout the entire game. 9:15 If you look at shots between the dots underneath the circles, I think there's maybe two. 9:23 You know? 9:23 There's a shot chart for the game, Veegs. 9:26 I mean, for those of you watching on YouTube or live or they're recorded, Minnesota on the right, Quinnipiac on the left, right away, just what shows up to me is obviously the lack of shots by Minnesota. 9:40 We knew that. 9:42 But that first little kind of trapezoid in front of the goal, two of them are goals, one is a save, and you compare that to the other side. 9:50 Minnesota just didn't have chances in close either. 9:52 Even, you know, the kind of next 15 feet out, you know, from the dots up to the top of the circle, not many chances. 10:01 And all those chances for Quinnipiac that came in the house, those basically all came towards the end of the game. 10:08 Those, that was not the kind of pressure they were getting early in the game or in the second period. 10:14 It all kind of came at the end as Minnesota really just buttoned down and said, okay, let's just weather this period and win a championship. 10:23 And it didn't happen for them. 10:28 They did get the 2-0 lead. 10:29 Things were looking good. 10:32 Quinnipiac gets actually a nice backdoor play really fast right across the crease. 10:37 Some people are trying to blame Close for this loss. 10:41 I don't know if he could maybe got a stick out for some of these things because both kind of went across the crease, didn't they, Veegs? 10:46 On both goals in the game. 10:49 And I understand that last goal or the second goal, you know, it looked like there was a player driving the net to maybe tip it. 10:56 And I think Closer was cheating a little bit towards that. 11:00 And he didn't close up the five hole for the shooter because he expected it to get tipped, I think. 11:05 Just it didn't happen and it slipped through him. 11:08 But Closer played pretty well. 11:10 I mean, look at all those shots earlier. 11:12 And, you know, the goals were in tight. 11:16 Yeah, let's take a look here. 11:18 This is your first period shot chart, like you were saying. 11:20 That's kind of most Minnesota's chances right there, Veegs. 11:26 And like you said, not as much for Quinnipiac. 11:28 One shot in that kind of really sweet spot area saved. 11:33 You know, we go through down to... 11:35 Let's go to the second here. 11:39 Quinnipiac a little more busy, getting a little closer. 11:42 Minnesota getting less and less busy. 11:44 And then let's look at the third period, like you talked about here. 11:48 Look at all that. 11:50 All those chances from the, you know, the dots on down. 11:56 And there's your game right there. 11:57 Minnesota, nothing down close. 12:00 I mean nothing. 12:03 There you go. 12:04 Let me see if we've got shots. 12:11 You know, you were talking about face offs too. 12:13 They were not good. 12:15 58.9 to 41.1. 12:22 And they were pretty even early in the game. 12:26 And during the third period, Quinnipiac just started to dominate. 12:30 I think after like that last TV timeout, like 1054, you know, I look, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 draws were won by Quinnipiac before they got the game time goal, just won by Minnesota. 12:46 And it's hard to win a game like that when you can't win those draws. 12:50 And Quinnipiac was one of the best face off teams in the country coming in. 12:55 They win like 57% of their draws, and I think that was a real strength for them throughout the third period. 13:01 Okay, devil's advocate here, Veegs. 13:04 Fans are going to say Minnesota had the offense to be able to counteract Quinnipiac and be able to get past them, dump the puck, go get some puck control. 13:12 We saw none of that in the second half of the game. 13:15 Well, I think it was difficult. 13:17 I don't know if you want to show one of those two clips that I uploaded into our file here, but all of a sudden, when Minnesota did get the puck and had possession of the exit zone, Quinnipiac got real aggressive and Minnesota still was able to get some chances. 13:33 We saw Matthew Nyes fend off two checks from the defense, still gain the exit, still get a rush chance, still have some possession down the ice. 13:43 Well, let's take a look at that. 13:45 You've got the nice pinching video here. 13:47 That will take over the whole screen, so let's watch that and we'll come back here. 13:50 The party can't find it. 13:51 A little out of his reach. 13:54 You'll need a good bounce the rest of the way. 13:57 Likely won't be a pretty goal. 13:58 Huck will be bouncing around and will end up on your stick so you can fire a quick one. 14:06 Minnesota looking for insurance. 14:08 Bobcat's a tie. 14:12 So you can see just that's what Minnesota needed to do to get possession. 14:16 They needed their big bodies to make plays like that, absorb hits and still get it out of the zone. 14:22 And I think the only line that was really able to do that was the top one. 14:26 The other lines, when they took those hits along the wall, they were losing possession and they were having to chip it out. 14:32 And that's just going to be what happens in some of these championship games. 14:36 You know, Quinnipiac's pretty good. 14:37 They were second overall in the country in the pairwise and they took care of business against Michigan and Ohio State. 14:44 And that was just, that was the game that they were going to go up against. 14:47 I don't think it was a game where they were going to be able to fly out of the zone consistently. 14:51 And then another chance that they had, this is the Stuckeroot play. 14:55 A lot of rubber, but they've both been very, very solid. 14:58 There's a faceoff win by the Gophers. 15:00 They needed it. 15:01 Now they need to get it out. 15:02 And they do. 15:09 Yeah, it definitely, Cooley missed the passer when you see it. 15:12 It was too far in front of him. 15:14 And you know, Cappy was even telling me after the game that it was kind of rolling as well, so it just took off. 15:19 But Stuckeroot had a little bit more time there than maybe he thought. 15:23 You know, because the goalie went down. 15:25 Because the goalie went down. 15:26 If he just settles it, waits for the goalie to slide out of the way, it might be an easy goal. 15:31 And the Gophers are up 3-1 with like eight minutes to go. 15:35 And it's over. 15:35 There's a chance to end the game. 15:37 There's another clip that we don't have, but Brudzinski had a rush, a two on one situation where he passed early. 15:44 Probably would want a guy like Brudzinski holding on to that and shooting because the player was trying to take away the pass. 15:51 So, you know, Minnesota had opportunities there to close out the game. 15:56 And we saw that one draw by Cooley there on the snugger rush. 16:00 That was, I think, the one draw they won during that seven minute stretch before Quinnipiac got their game tying goal. 16:07 So that was an opportunity for Minnesota. 16:09 When Quinnipiac pulled their goalie, the Bobcats had possession the entire end of the opportunity. 16:16 So it was a tough stretch for Minnesota. 16:22 And, you know, the Devons just got tired at the end. 16:25 I mean, they just got tired of defending. 16:26 I mean, you know, the Cooley penalty, you know, it wasn't, I don't believe it was a power play goal, technically, but I believe Cooley had just stepped on the ice. 16:35 What was? 16:36 Yeah, he was just crossed the blue line trying to get back into the play. 16:39 Essentially, a two-man advantage goal there. 16:46 And it was a lot of ice time at the end for Kester and Lacombe and Faber and Johnson. 16:52 Chesley got a few shifts, but they had kind of shortened the bench a little bit, too. 16:56 What could have Minnesota done differently? 17:01 Convert one of those three scoring chances. 17:04 There were shifts by the other lines where I thought they were getting a little too cute with some of their passes. 17:10 And you just like to see them maintain possession a little bit better. 17:16 They were trying to make a long pass that sometimes was behind players and things like that. 17:22 So I think for those lines, you got to go to your B game and not do something too fancy. 17:29 The Cooley-Kneis-Stager line, they were able to still get some chances, but for the most part, the other lines probably just need to be a little more conservative with their puck movement through the neutral zone and get it deep and have some pressure. 17:42 But instead, they were making long passes and giving the Bobcats the puck right back. 17:47 And one thing I noticed, Veegs, it wasn't just Minnesota, but a lot of players were just kind of flubbed, missed. 17:54 I mean, you look at Minnesota's first goal, Quinnipiac just served right up to them just because of a flub. 17:59 I don't know if the ice was bad. 18:00 I didn't hear any teams complain about the ice. 18:03 Obviously, Minnesota benefited in that first goal, Veegs. 18:08 You just whiffed it, but I just noticed a lot of Minnesota passes coming up the ice. 18:13 All of a sudden, just either they whiffed, missed, or whatever. 18:18 Well, it was 90 degrees in Florida. 18:22 It's a southern rink. 18:23 It's probably not going to be perfect ice. 18:26 There's a lot of activity going on in the building. 18:29 Great crowds. 18:29 I think it was third highest attended, frozen four of all time. 18:33 Probably impacted it a little bit. 18:35 Yeah, it was the second highest championship game of all time at 19-4-4-4. 18:40 I think both teams were struggling with the conditions a little bit. 18:44 There weren't a lot of super pretty passing plays other than the one for Hubel and Pitlick on Thursday night. 18:53 Yeah, that was pretty sweet. 18:55 First game, though, turned out that way. 18:59 We did cover that first game in our post game on Thursday evening. 19:06 But it was a really good game for Minnesota Vigues. 19:10 They won 6-2 over Boston University, obviously. 19:13 A long-time foe of Minnesota. 19:18 It was 2-2 game, and then Minnesota pulled away with two Middlestead goals and two empty net goals by Cooley. 19:25 Things were looking good in that area. 19:27 Then, of course, we had that play by Petlik to Hugeland, or Hugeland to Petlik between the legs that just got everyone going. 19:40 Things really kind of felt good after that game, don't you think? 19:44 Yeah, I think there were a lot of happy fans on Friday and Saturday in Tampa for Minnesota with how they played. 19:51 That was a fun game to watch. 19:54 It was high pace, some skill being made out there, and just a great college hockey game. 20:02 Michigan did not play very well that night against Quinnipiac. 20:05 No, neither did Portillo. 20:06 It kind of gave everybody a little bit of a fear of playing the Bobcats because they could slow down the game. 20:14 I didn't expect Minnesota to play as poorly as Michigan did against Quinnipiac. 20:20 I felt like throughout the game, Minnesota did a better job of not turning pucks over. 20:26 And for that part of the game plan, they executed really well. 20:32 They just couldn't, you know, at the end, there was just a lot of pressure by Quinnipiac since we couldn't, you know, how many times did they have to clear and ice the puck in that third period to relieve pressure? 20:41 It was a lot. 20:43 Yeah. 20:44 And I think it was actually less than I thought watching it. 20:49 You know, when you're watching it live, it just seemed so frustrating to watch it happen. 20:55 But when I go back and I rewatched the game last night and I rewatched the last 10 minutes again today, Minnesota made pretty good decision with the puck in the third period. 21:06 When there was an ability for them to take a check and protect the puck and move it to a teammate, they did. 21:13 When there was a risk of turning over the puck, for the most part, they chipped it out and it got into the neutral zone. 21:21 They didn't always chip it out and not ice it. 21:25 They didn't always chip it out and get a good line change, but they were able to relieve pressure. 21:29 It's just those passes a couple times turned into flubs and chips because they just couldn't complete them. 21:38 And now Minnesota is 0-3 against the ECAC in National Championship Games, 89, Harvard 2014 with Union, and now 2023 with Quinnipiac. 21:52 They just have Minnesota's number. 21:55 Yeah, the styles just haven't matched up for Minnesota. 21:58 I don't know what to say about it. 22:01 Maybe Minnesota just gets into these games and they get too nervy. 22:06 I think there were a lot of nerves for the Gophers on Saturday night. 22:09 You can see they weren't quite as clean and composed as they maybe have been in the past. 22:15 But they were weathering the storm pretty well. 22:20 It's just the storm broke the dam. 22:22 Looking back, first minute of the game, should that have been a five minute major, the hit on Kester. 22:29 Now looking back, when you showed that little clip today, I realized the guy left his feet as well. 22:34 Yeah, it looks like he explodes up. 22:36 We don't have a good view of him actually clearing the ice, but it looks like it. 22:40 You can tell he kind of landed. 22:41 He's tight when he goes down. 22:43 He definitely gets up on his toes. 22:45 I don't think it was a five minute major because I think he starts the contact body to body. 22:52 It's just the way he finishes the check with his elbow and arm coming up. 22:56 Players going to stop doing that. 22:57 And you see Kester's mask move. 23:00 That's pretty obvious to me. 23:02 I know that we've got some North Dakota fans trolling us on Twitter and trolling Gopher fans on Twitter. 23:07 Don't fall for that. 23:09 They're just trying to get you riled up. 23:11 They know you're upset with the result. 23:13 But I just don't understand why a player like that just doesn't take center mass and just blow them up that way. 23:20 I mean, Skyler Bryndamore is a big player. 23:23 He's a physical guy. 23:24 Mike Kester's not. 23:25 There's no need for him to come by and clip him like that. 23:30 He just goes center mass. 23:31 He's going to blow up Kester anyway. 23:34 When I initially saw the play, I thought maybe he got Kester's shoulder because he's a player that's had some shoulder issues in the past. 23:41 And I thought that might be it. 23:43 Clearly, it wasn't. 23:44 And Kester was out for the power play soon after. 23:48 But I thought the call was right. 23:50 I think it's definitely a minor. 23:52 Bobby Gollman was saying, I was at the game and since it wouldn't show replays on the video board, I was pulling up on my ESPN app to watch replays. 23:59 That's kind of an NCAA thing, Veegs. 24:01 They don't show any replays of anything controversial until almost, they either don't or if it's a goal, they might show it after the decision's made. 24:10 Yeah, which is too bad. 24:12 You've got all the people in the arena who've paid, you know, 200 plus bucks or whatever to go to the game. 24:17 They should get to see what's happening out there. 24:19 The New Yorker ushered those next to me for the championship game. 24:22 He was like, where's the replay? 24:24 What's going on here? 24:25 Literally just like that. 24:27 And I go, NCAA, they do things differently and we're not going to see that replay or we're not going to see that, you know, like the BU almost go when he, you know, cover it with his glove and can't see it. 24:41 I'm like, we're not going to see that because NCAA kind of has ESPN on a lockdown with those types of things inside the arena. 24:50 Right. 24:52 So, the team loses, Veegs, devastating. 24:58 We know, you know, poor favor. 25:02 He was so distraught after the game. 25:06 You, me and Chris Ekas did go down to the locker room after the game. 25:11 I just went in to say thank you to Scott Slarks because I could, I just didn't feel like I wanted to be in that room with those kids. 25:21 I did, obviously, if you guys go to GPL on the home page, you'll see Mason Nevers embracing Kester because he was pretty inconsolable after that game. 25:33 Yeah, I tried to talk to Brock for a little bit and, you know, the words were hard to come out, you know. 25:40 It was just so emotional in that locker room. 25:42 You know, I talked to about eight different guys just trying to get some explanation for what happened and almost remind them, you know, it's just one game. 25:52 They still had a pretty successful year. 25:54 I felt like I probably need to have that conversation with any Gopher fan I ran into after the game too. 26:00 You know, this team had the expectations to win it, just pinned on them. 26:05 You know, the players, they wanted to get back to that game and they wanted to win it. 26:09 For them to fall short of their goal was heartbreaking for them. 26:13 And if you think they didn't want it, that locker room after the game told you they did. 26:19 Exactly. 26:20 And that was me ripping on Sammy last year. 26:23 I think that was just kind of me just ripping on Sammy because I was pissed at his performance for the entire season. 26:29 Typically, you don't put leaders, you don't put seniors up in front of the cameras after the games. 26:40 Not the game that ends their season. 26:42 Yeah, I mean, it did happen in Tampa 2012. 26:46 I remember a Buddhist being up there. 26:51 But maybe it's something he wanted to be up there. 26:53 I'm not sure. 26:54 So you're not going to see the leaders. 26:57 That's why people like you, Veegs, go to the locker room because the locker room is open. 27:02 And that's different from during the season. 27:07 Yep, I mean, that's the last chance the media will probably get to talk to these guys until next year. 27:13 And so for the people that have been following and covering the team all year, that's the opportunity to get some last words to reflect on what's happening. 27:25 And I think the fans deserve to hear some of that. 27:30 Obviously, there's some tact with the reporters going around the room. 27:37 People can feel how they want to feel about that. 27:39 It's tough, but guys like Jackson LeCombe, Bryce Brzezinski, Ryan Johnson, they were all thoughtful about the season and about the game and about what happened. 27:50 And they all felt like the game plan was the one to execute. 27:55 And they all felt like they were close and they had it. 27:59 And that's a perspective you don't get if you don't go talk to them, because the press conference after the game, when a team loses, is brief. 28:07 It's hard to ask follow up questions. 28:09 And the players and coaches, both of them don't want to talk very much. 28:13 Yeah, I see Nevin Peterson saying, no one should have been in that room. 28:16 It's an NCAA thing. 28:18 I'm thinking they might want to tweak it because nobody does that during the regular season. 28:23 And then all of a sudden they do it in the playoffs when it's the most emotional time of year. 28:29 I'm guessing the coaches don't like it, but it's really kind of an NCAA thing, isn't it? 28:33 It is, and that's how it is in the NHL. 28:36 And maybe if these teams don't love it, maybe they should prep their players for it throughout the year a couple of times. 28:43 Possibly, yes. 28:44 Either do that or have the NCAA remove that type of access. 28:50 Not really sure. 28:52 Big mistake. 28:53 I really think having a smaller ice will help with games like this where it becomes physical and clogged up. 29:00 Obviously, they're making the change. 29:01 We've been seeing Craig Floor posting a lot of photos on Twitter himself and on the, you know, the Mariucci Facebook page as well. 29:12 Things are happening. 29:12 Craig is still on Floor with his family vacationing, so he's had a couple of photos sent down. 29:16 But it looks like there he started doing some of the forums of some of the new base of the arena. 29:21 So things are moving along nicely there. 29:25 Chris Ecke is interesting to see that Ryan Johnson hasn't signed yet. 29:30 Veegs, I don't think we should really be surprised with any non-playoff team. 29:37 Excited to sign anybody yet? 29:39 Yes, Ryan Johnson is four years. 29:41 He could opt out. 29:43 But they're not, there's, they're not, like you some talk about Cooley. 29:47 Well, is Cooley gonna sign? 29:48 Is Cooley gonna sign? 29:49 They're not gonna sign. 29:50 They're not gonna waste a year for that one game left in the season. 29:52 It just doesn't make sense. 29:54 Well, here's the situation. 29:56 If you have a player that may or may not sign with you, the carrots you have for players, sign them now and burn a year of their contract. 30:05 For them. 30:06 To get their restricted free agency sooner. 30:09 You know, that's the carrot that they gave to Lacombe and Nyes in favor. 30:15 You know, they really want those players in their organization. 30:19 Now, the players you're seeing sign these amateur tryout or professional tryout agreements. 30:25 That is basically the players going, I want to move on to pro hockey. 30:28 Let's make it happen. 30:29 I'll do whatever. 30:30 And so their entry level deal slides to next year. 30:35 And so I think for some of these players, they want that year burned. 30:41 They'll make more money as a restricted free agent than as an entry level contract player. 30:46 So I think the longer that these players wait means there's always the possibility that they don't sign because there's no incentive for them to sign once the year ends. 31:00 And I think the odds go up for a guy like Logan Cooley to come back next year. 31:05 I think there's a chance Ryan Johnson isn't being offered that year to be burned on his contract. 31:11 So maybe he doesn't want to do that. 31:12 And maybe he doesn't want to go to Buffalo if he waits till the end of July, I believe it is. 31:17 Right. 31:18 I mean, then he can kind of free agent and sign wherever he wants to sign. 31:24 Or wherever he felt that he's needed. 31:26 And then when you're looking at a guy like Jackson Nelson, if a team is willing to burn a year to sign him as a free agent, that's going to happen the next couple of days. 31:35 If they don't, maybe that opens the door for him to be a COVID year senior, a fifth year. 31:45 Or maybe he'll just wait to find the right fit later, because there's no incentive to sign right now. 31:50 Well, let's talk about all of what happened. 31:53 So the team comes back Saturday night. 31:55 They were coming back no matter what, even if they won, folks. 31:57 So that's not a big deal. 31:59 Faber, Nyes and Lacombe the next day, I believe it was, signed their contracts. 32:06 Faber with the Wild, he's played a game already. 32:09 Nyes with Toronto, he's played two games and was back in Tampa last night. 32:14 And then Lacombe played his first game for Anaheim last night as well. 32:20 One thing that's interesting with the Rink Live with Jess Meyers saying that Nyes felt, yeah, he could have stayed in Florida, but he wanted to go back with his team because they meant a lot to him. 32:30 So he was only home for a very short time and then went down to Miami to play against Florida. 32:39 But those three guys have all signed. 32:42 Lacombe was a senior, so he was going to be gone together to our underclassmen, but all three were expected to sign fairly quickly because those teams that they're on are going to keep playing. 32:55 Well, actually, Lacombe's not. 32:58 But they really wanted him. 32:59 They didn't want to lose him. 33:01 They didn't want to lose him, exactly. 33:03 So they gave him that incentive and say, we want to sign you. 33:07 We're willing to burn a year of your contract. 33:12 And so the players who haven't signed, I think that means that their teams are not willing to burn a year of their contract. 33:18 And so that's less of an incentive for these players to sign. 33:22 Now, will they ultimately sign? 33:24 Maybe. 33:25 But there's not much else for these teams to offer. 33:27 You know, they can give a different kind of bonus package to players. 33:32 You know, there's like an A level bonuses, B level bonuses, C level, you know, to really, you know, incentivize players if they play well in the NHL and they can get more money. 33:41 But for most of these contracts, they're pretty standard. 33:44 So they're getting their... 33:45 So somebody like Lacombe, he burned a year, but it's a big, huge pro-rated type of contract that he was getting paid. 33:57 So he's not, unless he got a huge bonus, really, he's playing one or two games. 34:01 I'm not sure if he's got another game or not, but that's it. 34:03 Yeah, he'll get like a $100,000 bonus or something like that, and then he'll get one 82nd of a salary. 34:11 But the issue is he'll only need two more years before he hits his first restricted free agency deal when he'll be getting a possible multi-million dollar contract at that point, which could include signing bonuses to pay him upfront, depending on how things go. 34:27 Now, Faber and Knives will get two 82nds or whatever of their contract, and then they will get... 34:35 I'm not sure, how does playoff pay work? 34:38 I feel like it's by round. 34:40 There's a player payout by round. 34:42 So they'd be able to get that. 34:46 So those three have signed already. 34:47 No other signing so far. 34:51 Stoddicker has hit the portal, Veegs. 34:53 That happened yesterday morning. 34:55 Are you surprised by that? 34:57 Maybe he was feeling the temperature of the room and decided probably not going to play as much next year. 35:03 What do you think his motivations are there? 35:07 I personally was going to be surprised if he was back to play the next two years with Minnesota. 35:12 When Bob started saying things like that around January, once it was confirmed he was redshirting, my antenna went up and I said, hopes he comes back? 35:24 I didn't think it was going to happen. 35:26 He wanted to finish his degree, graduate from Minnesota and be with the guys he came in with and finish that part out. 35:32 But he wanted to preserve those two years to go somewhere else, get an advanced degree. 35:38 And I respect the guy for doing that. 35:43 A lot of players don't really care about the academic side of it, but you've got a guy like Stoddicker, you've got a guy like Johnny Sorensen. 35:50 Those are two players who were put in their education first. 35:53 And well, North Dakota is looking for players, because they got plenty of spots to fill. 35:57 Maybe he could fill theirs, because they lost all eight of their defensemen. 36:01 Maybe they could use them. 36:04 And I think Stoddicker could play. 36:06 It's just last year, he got scratched a couple of times because he's not the greatest puck-moving player in the decor, but he adds a physical element and a good shot blocking element, defensive zone element. 36:20 But I think he's going to have to go somewhere where he can get supported by guys who can be a little bit more offensive. 36:25 In Minnesota, their blue line is going to be tough. 36:28 I think Carl Fish has probably passed him in terms of ability. 36:32 Fish, I think, is a much better skater, a little bit longer reach, and has shown himself to be pretty reliable. 36:38 I'm a big fan of Fish. 36:40 I wouldn't mind him having maybe an A next year, because he just kind of has that leadership vibe to him. 36:48 And when they did the player karaoke in Tampa, he was probably the best gopher. 36:53 Okay, we'll get to Tampa in a bit. 36:57 So do you see anyone else jumping into the portal? 37:02 Maybe some freshmen that didn't think they played enough. 37:05 I mean, this is pure speculation, folks. 37:08 We don't have any previous knowledge of anyone. 37:13 The only player I would worry about from a flight risk because of that would be Bartoszkiewicz. 37:19 Just because there's a pretty good chance Justin close is back next year as the number one goalie for Minnesota. 37:28 And Bartoszkiewicz has not gotten many games the last two years. 37:32 And games are critical for a goaltender. 37:35 The only issue there is goaltenders galore in the portal. 37:40 There are lots of experienced options for any team that needs goaltending to dip in the portal. 37:45 And Bartoszkiewicz is not going to be at the top of that list. 37:48 And we've got two recruited as verbal commits right now as well. 37:54 And still technically Andrew, Gino Pichora I think his name is. 37:58 Yeah, I don't know if Pichora is going to make it to campus. 38:01 You know, he had that one year where he was having a hard time finding a place to play goalie. 38:06 He ended up at Danbury. 38:08 This year it took him a while to find a spot at Aberdeen and the NHL and he's not their number one goalie. 38:15 So if you're Minnesota, you aren't usually bringing number two goalies from the NHL to your roster. 38:21 And the kid hasn't taken his commitment off any of his socials. 38:26 It's still listed that way in the line charts and whatnot for Aberdeen. 38:32 So we're not going to make any assumptions there. 38:34 But when they get a commitment from Nathan Airy, who's played a ton of games in Canadian Hockey, that's looking like a safer bet to be an ex-goalie who's going to come in and play. 38:45 That's the Justin Close model right there. 38:48 Okay, so we'll just have to keep an eye on the portal, folks, to see if anyone else decides to jump. 38:54 And then some good news, Veegs. 38:56 Mr. 38:57 Snuggeroot has said he is coming back, not going to St. 39:01 Louis. 39:02 And I'm glad he did because, honestly, the end of his season wasn't as good as it was earlier, Veegs. 39:13 Yeah, it felt like that whole line had a little bit of struggles down the stretch, almost like they were pressing. 39:18 Except for Cooley. 39:18 Cooley did pretty much. 39:20 Yeah, but they're pressing a lot, and Cooley got some of those empty netters that maybe kind of boost his scoring just a little bit. 39:26 And, you know, I think that there's room for growth in his game. 39:30 You know, he tries to play a little bit physical. 39:32 I think his skating has gotten better. 39:36 But there's just more done lock there. 39:38 I think he could be a little bit more productive at handling the puck, possessing the puck, and not just being a scoring threat. 39:45 So we'll see. 39:47 And really the big question right now is, does Cooley come back? 39:55 It's good so far. 39:56 He hasn't signed. 39:57 You don't see him down in Arizona yet. 39:59 I mean, we've seen videos of him saying, I don't like school. 40:02 I don't, I guess a lot of guys don't like school. 40:04 A lot of people don't like school. 40:05 I don't mean school. 40:09 But he really seemed to be, he, I don't know, he just gave me that feeling that he, you know, as the season went on, that he wasn't, he didn't give us that vibe of a one and done weeks. 40:21 It's like he really cared about the team, which a lot of times you do not see in some of those type of players. 40:32 And the one thing that kept coming up from everyone I talked to at the end of the game was how much love there was for everybody on the team and how, you know, anyone you see on the team when you see them, you're happy to be in the room with them. 40:46 And that was just common for all those guys. 40:49 And that has not been a normal thing at Minnesota for at least the last decade. 40:54 A lot of these teams are, you know, 20 players, four Ubers. 41:00 It's not because they all couldn't fit in one. 41:02 It's because they want to go different directions. 41:03 You know, we've talked about that with Ramsey and Shearhorn a little bit, where, you know, the teams aren't just one together group. 41:11 And that was really important for this group to be together. 41:14 You know, I talked to Jackson Nelson about that after the game, and he said it was very intentional. 41:19 When he got here, the team was not united. 41:22 And that was one thing he wanted to do as a leader for this group, is make sure everyone was included, and everyone wanted to be around each other. 41:30 And so, however they did that, they've created this environment where I think a guy like Luton Cooley feels like a part of the team and feels invested in being a Minnesota Gopher. 41:41 Fingers crossed, folks. 41:43 Fingers crossed that he comes back. 41:45 If he doesn't, I don't blame him, but boy, I don't know if I'd want to go to Arizona right now. 41:50 I'm playing in a tiny rink. 41:54 I mean, he can perform at an NHL level offensively. 41:58 And I think he's competent defensively with winning pucks, but it's never going to hurt you to stay that extra year. 42:05 It could set you back a little bit if you go too early. 42:09 And we saw that with Casey Middlestadt. 42:11 It's taken him a while to get to the point where this year where he's a productive NHL player. 42:16 And that path maybe could have been shortened a little bit had he spent that extra year in college. 42:23 Well, the one huge positive again, Veegs. 42:25 Tampa did a great job hosting the Frozen Four their third time. 42:30 As everyone sees probably when you get into that Tampa Airport, I don't know if, you know, maybe, I don't know, probably not the Orlando one, but there's signs everywhere talking about the Frozen Four. 42:38 Banners going across, walkways, downtown. 42:44 I heard them talk about it on the different news stations. 42:46 I was, they were doing a traffic and weather report when I was at a restaurant having lunch on Friday. 42:53 And they're talking about, oh, it's going to be, it's crowded down there and blah, blah, blah. 42:56 I'm like going, don't forget that they're talking about the championship. 42:59 And boy, I was running into Minnesota people all over the place. 43:06 Boy, they put on a great show again. 43:09 Yeah, it was great. 43:10 I think one of the nice things about Tampa and being around Omali, there's so many places you can walk to there that make it really inviting for the hockey fan. 43:20 We were staying right down there at the Marriott having a good time. 43:24 And you just saw so many fans getting out, walking, enjoying the sun after the terrible winter we've had in Minnesota. 43:31 I really, I really enjoyed it. 43:33 And it was probably a good thing my wife and kids stayed in the Twin Cities because I ran into so many people who were big fans of the podcast. 43:41 And I can't name them all here because there are so many. 43:44 And, you know, my wife would probably be telling me, Vig's, your head's getting a little big. 43:51 Tap that down a little bit. 43:52 Let's Marriott. 43:53 Well, it was really fun to see everybody there. 43:56 And then we went to the us trail party Friday night, which was always a big success. 44:00 Tim does a great job putting on that party. 44:03 The only thing is our venue had to close a little early when we wanted to keep drinking. 44:07 So we had headed down to Hat Tricks just down the street. 44:10 And funny thing is our guy, Craig Flohr, who's been on overtime here, he knows everyone, folks. 44:20 And as we came in, I was with his wife, and she's like, hold on. 44:24 She gets out her phone. 44:25 Okay, I'm going to time it and see how long it takes until Craig runs into somebody he knows. 44:30 And who was that first person? 44:32 Steve from our chat. 44:34 14 seconds into the building. 44:37 Steve came up to say hello to Craig Flohr. 44:40 And there you go. 44:44 So you were running into people, I was running into people, and obviously Craig runs into people. 44:48 But Steve's laughing now. 44:50 But yeah, Steve, 14 seconds. 44:52 You couldn't just wait a little longer. 44:54 You were just proving his point, her point, I should say. 44:59 So that was a fun night, Veegs. 45:00 That was my first Hustle Party. 45:04 I hear you went to the Hobie Award, a little hot at the Hobie Award, but you also ran into Ellie Ray as well sometime that weekend, didn't you? 45:12 Yep, she was down there in Splitsville hanging out quite a bit. 45:16 It was nice to meet her husband, who's a big Gopher fan. 45:19 I think he is probably the bigger fan than she was. 45:22 It was fun to meet her. 45:24 She drew a lot of publicity to Gopher fandom during the weekend. 45:29 I know she was on the SodaPod last week kind of talking about her journey to being who she is these days. 45:37 I was intrigued that she's into beer. 45:40 Beer is kind of my heart too. 45:42 Oh boy, that puts up years even more. 45:44 Yeah, because she does this beer podcast as a thing where she likes craft beer. 45:50 And she also likes the little independent craft brewers. 45:54 Anything owned by the big companies, she kind of shies away from. 45:57 So that was a good thing for her. 46:00 But all kinds of fans down there were fun to run into. 46:03 And it makes doing this special and rewarding, and we really enjoy it. 46:10 And as part of that whole thing, we did pull off quite a few live broadcasts down there. 46:15 We did the podcast last week, you know, me and Todd Valesky was great to have him, great to have him down there. 46:21 And Mike Grimm just happened to be in the press box doing some stuff. 46:25 So I'm like, let's have Grimmer join. 46:27 You know, our microphones aren't the greatest, not the highest quality audio like we've got going right now, but it worked pretty well. 46:33 Kind of showed we could pull it off. 46:35 And then we did those two post-game videos. 46:37 Obviously Saturdays wasn't as exciting as Thursdays, but kind of shows. 46:42 Hopefully we could pull off a podcast up in Grand Forks next fall when the Gophers head there in October. 46:49 So that will be fun. 46:50 But boy, you know, obviously the team losing was tough. 46:55 I had a great vacation. 46:57 I had a great week off. 46:58 I got to spend some time with some family. 47:00 I don't get to see very much. 47:01 My sister did a GPL short from the pool, which was fun as well. 47:12 I had a great time. 47:13 Yeah, you even got to play a little golf, didn't you? 47:16 Yeah, my Friday after my 24-hour day of traveling from Minneapolis to Orlando to Tampa to covering two games to staying out too late with a lot of GPL Nation, started with a round of golf with John King on that Friday. 47:33 And we went to this course called Westchase. 47:38 It was like 15, 20 minutes away from Tampa. 47:41 And we tee it up. 47:42 It was my first round of the year and first since probably October. 47:47 And so, you know, the swing was a little rusty. 47:49 I put up a Kaprasov out on the course, lost a few golf balls, go figure. 47:54 In Florida, there's a lot of water on the course and a lot of native areas. 47:59 At one point, I put a ball where I could have got to it, but as I was getting closer, I sensed there was some sort of animal that did not want me to get that golf ball. 48:10 And so I said, you know what? 48:12 I'm going to respect you. 48:14 I'm going to give you your space. 48:15 This is your home. 48:16 My home should be on the fairway, but I was having a hard time finding it. 48:21 So I deposited a few Pro V1s on the course, but it was a great day, great weather. 48:26 We survived. 48:28 Kinger leaving his phone in the Uber on the way to the course, and we actually got it back. 48:35 Wow. 48:37 We'll get in more detail about that in overtime. 48:41 I wasn't going to tell the tale about him losing his phone in the Uber, but he already talked about it on his podcast. 48:48 So the anxiety-driven John King talked about his podcast, so I guess it's fair game now. 48:54 His wife knows that he lost his phone on his way to the course. 48:58 And then I left the phone in the post-game news conference from Minnesota. 49:03 It was an exciting week. 49:04 And then I had to go back in and hopefully it was still sitting there and watch the whole Quinnipiac press conference because that was just, that was great to watch. 49:14 It was long too. 49:15 When you win, that press conference is longer. 49:18 Yeah, yeah, it does. 49:20 It does. 49:22 Vance, one little thing I want to talk about here before we run off, Tampa did a great job, blah, blah, blah, but just a couple hours ago, Binghamton University says they're going to go D1 in men's hockey and women's field hockey to make it balanced, and they want to start playing 24, 25 season, hopefully. 49:46 It literally came out of nowhere late this afternoon. 49:50 Well, one of the things that's kind of fun at the Frozen 4 is there's a college hockey kind of state of the game press conference where you have a couple people like Scott Sandalow is up there, and they're talking about expansion, name image likeness, transfer portal, funding scholarships, extra coaching positions, all this stuff. 50:14 And one of the things that the College Hockey Inc. 50:16 folks disclose, they've had about 14 or 15 schools do feasibility studies on whether or not they can add hockey and what they have to do to do Title IX. 50:28 And I got a feeling we're going through another period of change here in college hockey at some point. 50:34 Especially with spirit and spirit conference thinking they're going to do it too. 50:39 Sorry, sorry, sorry, I misspoke there, yes. 50:42 And so if you're not familiar with the summit, that's North Dakota, that's Denver, that's Omaha, they might form their own hockey conference. 50:51 And they only have four schools right now, but they could get four affiliated members and have eight. 50:56 And that might mean a shake up to the NCHC. 50:59 And the big thing Summit has going forward is they have Josh Fenton. 51:03 And he is the one that I think made the NCHC what it is today. 51:09 He was a big voice in that. 51:11 And if they split their ways, I think that would be a very strong conference. 51:16 Yeah, it would be a strong conference. 51:18 But boy, it would just mix things up even more. 51:21 Well, we've got teams without homes right now. 51:25 Augustana slid their way into the CCHA. 51:29 But, you know, Lindenwood is going to need a home. 51:31 Long Island. 51:32 You know, the Alaska School still needs a home. 51:35 Arizona State. 51:36 You know, Binghamton now. 51:39 And you know, maybe Atlantic Hockey could have Air Force play in the Summit League or something like that. 51:45 And maybe they have some more regional teams that way. 51:48 You know, ABCC goes in that league, too. 51:51 And that creates room for somebody else in the Midwest to join, you know, a different league. 51:56 So we'll see what happens. 51:59 Nevin's Mr. 52:00 Negative tonight. 52:00 He says, CSU Hockey will be dead in 15 years. 52:04 I don't think, I don't know, well, they'll hang on as much as possible. 52:07 I think it's more the university is in trouble up there, Veegs, more than just athletics. 52:11 Athletics is being affected by all this. 52:14 And they're limited a little bit. 52:15 Pardon? 52:16 This SESU is limited in what they can do with their program. 52:20 True. 52:21 They're not going to be able to invest big money. 52:22 But their enrollment is way down, and it's not looking good just on the academic side, much less to say the athletic side. 52:36 Great season, Veegs, for the Gophers. 52:40 Didn't end the way we wanted it to. 52:42 Two years in a row. 52:43 Some heartbreak. 52:45 This year was the worst because we were there. 52:50 We were there, Veegs. 52:51 Pat McAleady said we were going to blow them out Saturday night when I talked to him before the game. 52:57 Well, I was predicting a 2-1 game with some empty net goals, and Minnesota almost got there. 53:05 They were so close because you knew Quinnipiac was going to pull their goalie early. 53:10 And I think if the Gophers aren't on the penalty kill when Quinnipiac pulls their goalie, the Gophers have a good chance to end the game right there. 53:18 It's just when they were down and they were at that point in the game. 53:21 You know, Minnesota's had four extra attacker goals this season. 53:25 Their opponents had zero until the championship game. 53:32 And Minnesota, I think, had eight empty net goals. 53:36 Yeah. 53:36 On the year when other teams pulled their goalie, which happened a lot this year, the Gophers were able to get that extra goal to spread out the score. 53:45 And I still think that penalty changed the outcome of the game a little bit. 53:52 Even though they didn't score on the power play, they scored just after. 53:56 And it just gave them a lot of momentum. 53:58 It was a tough way for the game to end. 53:59 You know, that's a call I can see in October and November. 54:02 I can't see it being called at the end of the game. 54:05 It's not why they lost. 54:07 Minnesota had other chances, but it made the margin smaller. 54:10 And honestly, you look at somebody like Mr. 54:15 Nyes, zero points those last four games, Veegs. 54:22 He was still doing things to create the... 54:24 He was still doing things. 54:26 But how many times did he come up big with game winning goals during the season, overtime goals during the season? 54:31 We didn't see that Nyes in the playoffs. 54:35 We don't know if he was injured. 54:36 I don't know. 54:37 It was funny. 54:38 He got a point last night. 54:39 Almost had his first goal. 54:40 I'm like, we could have used one of those on Saturday night. 54:45 Oh, for sure. 54:45 Any final thoughts here, Veegs? 54:48 Great successful season for the podcast, for the website, for the team. 54:53 It was all a lot of positivity. 54:55 We're looking forward to next season. 54:57 Yeah, as mentioned to us today, we should do a podcast in the middle of summer. 55:01 Maybe we will. 55:02 We'll see. 55:02 We'll play by year. 55:04 But I kind of like the downtime. 55:05 I'm guessing you do too. 55:06 You don't have to kind of schedule the... 55:08 Oh, I can't because I've got the podcast. 55:10 But yeah, it was a great year though. 55:13 Great year. 55:13 It was a great year. 55:15 Hopefully, they get back to the Frozen Four in St. 55:17 Paul next year and maybe get one more step on the ladder. 55:22 Yes. 55:24 That's it, folks. 55:25 That's the end of season number 12 for the GPL Podcast. 55:29 Of course, we want to thank all of you. 55:31 Thank Veegs right over here. 55:34 Thank all of you that either listened, watched, as we've done these videos these last couple years. 55:39 We appreciate all of you and all of your support and are looking forward to next season already. 55:44 I had myself back in here. 55:51 I know I keep hitting the wrong button. 55:52 For those of you watching live, there I am. 55:55 Stay tuned for some overtime. 55:57 For the rest of you, we'll catch you back in September when we're ready to kick off the next season. 56:03 Thanks for listening, folks.