0:08 This is The GPL Podcast, part of the Pulltab Sports family. 0:17 Oh boy. 0:57 Here's Jupiter and Vegoe. 1:05 Good evening, and welcome to The GPL Podcast, episode number 257. 1:12 And Veegs, you predicted a sweep last week. 1:16 You said, if they didn't sweep, I have to go back to the Dominican. 1:19 Unfortunately, I can't go back to the Dominican right now. 1:21 They won't let you back in? 1:22 Your passport's no good? 1:24 I don't want to, I don't think I want to travel on an emergency passport. 1:26 Some countries don't accept it. 1:29 Okay, well better safe than sorry. 1:31 I, you know, have been called Mr. 1:33 Negative sometimes for my reality checks on the Gophers. 1:37 And I just felt like they're trending the right way. 1:39 It was time to give them six points. 1:40 And then they have that third period stinker on Friday night that really just costs them one game. 1:47 And overall five good periods, not good enough for six points. 1:51 There's been a lot of that this year, but it's Badger Week. 1:55 And what happens when it's Badger Week, Veegs? 1:58 We bring in one of the godfathers of college hockey. 2:02 The man who knows a lot. 2:04 Well, let's bring him in. 2:05 Todd Milewski. 2:07 Todd, how are you doing, man? 2:09 I'm doing great. 2:10 How are you guys? 2:11 You have a really good team covering this year. 2:14 It's a bit a bit different than the last few years. 2:17 Yeah. 2:17 It has been. 2:19 It feels a little bit more grounded in reality than that 2021 season. 2:28 That was the Cole Caulfield year, a lot of built around that. 2:33 And you knew when he left that it left. 2:38 Yeah, with Holloway and the whole crew there, once it moved on, it was like, OK, what's coming next? 2:47 And we saw what came next. 2:48 It was a couple of pretty down years. 2:51 But this seems more like a building of a structure instead of just kind of like a quick fix. 3:01 I mean, I could be wrong. 3:02 It could turn south again next season, but I don't think it's going that way. 3:09 And so we'll see. 3:11 I feel like there's more stability coming to Wisconsin. 3:17 And we're starting to see that this season. 3:21 But we won't know that for a while now. 3:24 So going back to Minnesota's weekend, Veegs started out pretty good. 3:29 A couple of two periods played wonderful. 3:33 And then a very much Detroit Lion-esque collapse in the third period on Friday night. 3:43 I know that there's a lot of Gopher fans out there who equate this loss to something that happened in Tampa back in April where a team changes their style or they change their approach and they choke a game away. 3:56 I think this is just a situation where you have a team that has lapses in judgment and they chase offense in a situation where they didn't have to. 4:07 I asked Bob today about situational awareness. 4:12 He's like, yep, this team is still trying to figure that out. 4:16 It was a big problem in the first half of the season where they give away goals in key situations or not be buttoned up defensively on the back check in key situations and it costs you games in college hockey. 4:29 That's part of the learning experience this team goes through. 4:31 Will they figure it out by the end of the movie? 4:34 We don't know. 4:37 Oh boy, it's tricky. 4:39 So, it was a bad go for loss. 4:43 It's something close to what Bob said Friday night. 4:46 And then we heard Frank Mazzocco saying on the radio that the bus ride would never been that quiet, either going to or from or even the next game. 4:54 Next game, they showed up. 4:57 Very impressive and pretty much handled Michigan State the entire game. 5:02 Well, the thing that most impressed me with their performance on Saturday was they were under pressure for long periods of time. 5:10 And typically this year's team, when they've been under pressure for long periods of times, they make mistakes or they get in trouble and they give away goals. 5:20 Saturday, the Gophers were in the right spots. 5:24 They didn't chase the puck into the corners and give away offense to Michigan State. 5:29 They stayed in their structure and they fought through it and got out of it. 5:33 And they extended the lead when they had opportunities and they weren't chasing offense. 5:37 It was very much winning percentage hockey, which is a switch that has to turn for a team, I think, especially in college with young guys. 5:45 You have to go, alright, I know I could probably get away with this, but it's not the right time for that. 5:52 And I'm going to play smart. 5:53 I'm going to play winning hockey. 5:54 And they closed out the game. 5:56 They got solid goaltending. 5:58 They didn't take any bad penalties. 6:00 And they closed it off for three points. 6:03 So split weekend for Minnesota and Michigan today. 6:07 And for the Badgers, Todd, I would say a split in Michigan is kind of always a good thing, isn't it? 6:15 I mean, they have not played well there for years. 6:18 So anything you get out of Michigan points wise is a bonus for them. 6:24 You know, maybe it's a little bit different of framing this season with where the teams were. 6:32 But we've seen where Wisconsin, whatever framework they have on the ice doesn't match up very well with what Michigan throws at them. 6:46 And that did show through a couple of times throughout the weekend at Yost where the high danger chances were coming way too fast. 7:01 And there were too many of them. 7:03 And that was a little bit of a flashback to previous seasons for the Badgers. 7:08 And I think that was a concern both days. 7:13 They bought their way out of it on Saturday by having, just by being resilient and not letting a one goal deficit get to two goals. 7:22 Every time they chipped away, they got back the tide. 7:25 They went behind, got back the tide. 7:28 If you fall too far behind Michigan, you're in trouble, especially a team that doesn't have the kind of dynamic scoring that Michigan and Minnesota have and can do. 7:42 They have players that can score, but it's not necessarily going to be an automatic thing. 7:47 You have guys you know you're going to get something out of every night. 7:51 They're going to have to play a much more strict defensive style this week to get their way out of that. 8:00 They don't want to get back into that kind of style of game again this week, because that's going to turn out poorly for them. 8:10 Yeah, it could, but we'll get into that later. 8:13 I'm just, I'm still waiting for, I'm waiting for Bob and one of Bob's teams to solve Mike Hastings' teams. 8:25 It's been a while. 8:26 And that's kind of where I'm still not so sure about this weekend, or where I'm even thinking this weekend is going to happen. 8:35 So I would still say VHL, I predicted a split last weekend. 8:39 I was disappointed that they didn't get more from Michigan State, especially with how well they played most of Friday night. 8:47 I would still call it a successful weekend, going into a team higher than you that's been playing a lot better this season and getting a split. 8:58 Unfortunately, I think that's the way the Gophers have to look at it, is that it was a successful weekend, getting the split on the road. 9:04 You always talk about winning at home and splitting on the road. 9:09 It's still tough, I think, to stomach, just the way they gave away the game on Friday, because it didn't feel like they really were beaten. 9:16 And so that's the hard part, I think, is that... 9:19 Four seconds left. 9:21 It takes a team like this to go through that moment, to reinforce that lesson, is really hard. 9:27 And we really won't know if that lesson takes hold, unless they start taking care of business on weekends like this one coming up. 9:34 Because we know what the recipe is to be to Mike Hastings' team. 9:39 And it's discipline, it's situational awareness, and it's not chasing the game. 9:43 And it's discipline. 9:45 You just have to take advantage of situations when they present themselves. 9:49 Because that will happen during a hockey game. 9:51 It's just, do you capitalize in those moments? 9:54 And that will be key. 9:55 Because Minnesota was able to do that Saturday against Michigan State, and it wasn't even close. 10:00 You know, I don't know if Michigan State is really a top five team based on the way I've seen them play Minnesota. 10:07 But when I saw Wisconsin play Minnesota, that looked like a top five team. 10:15 I don't think you're wrong there, Veegs. 10:18 Well, before we get, I've got a couple topics I want to cover tonight. 10:21 But first, we need to talk about our sponsors, Veegs. 10:24 And of course, Cub Foods is one of our sponsors now. 10:31 They're always great for us. 10:31 ous eal talk about a lot. 10:35 Tell us about them. 10:36 Yeah, we love Cub, you know. 10:37 They're a part of Minnesota Sports right now. 10:40 They're on PJ哈哈哈 Mandla Headset. 10:42 They're sponsoring our podcast. 10:44 They sponsor Pulltab Sports, Diamond 7, all that stuff. 10:47 It's great. 10:49 And you know, when you go to a grocery store, you want something local, Cubs Local, they're one of us. 10:54 They get support, give back to the community, and they've got great stuff. 10:58 If you want to order for pickup, you can do that. 11:00 If you want to stop and get your groceries and get some liquor, beer, wine, THC products, they got it as well. 11:08 So there's lots of Cubs around the metro. 11:10 Find one you like and stop in there. 11:12 Definitely, we definitely appreciate Cub being one of our sponsors, but also one of our sponsors is Duke Cannon. 11:19 And this is one of my favorites right here. 11:24 Jake Middleton here, Director of Hair and Hygiene for the Minnesota Wild. 11:28 How did I get this important role with the team, you ask? 11:30 I'd like to think it was because of hard work, but the truth is, I run hot. 11:34 Yep, I'm a sweater. 11:38 In my role as Director of Hair and Hygiene, I'm sort of like a player coach. 11:42 Let me pull out the grease board here. 11:44 Well, it's not actually a grease board because there is nothing dirty about Duke Cannon. 11:50 How do I help the guys stay squeaky clean? 11:52 Helpful reminders. 11:53 It's simple, tarp saw, Duke Cannon up. 11:57 Say it with me, tarp saw, Duke Cannon up. 12:03 Pick the scent that suits you. 12:06 Sawtooth. 12:08 Thick body wash, extra thick. 12:12 And my favorite, midnight swim. 12:16 Tarp saw, Duke Cannon up. 12:18 Duke Cannon, work harder, smell better. 12:22 Of course, we thank Duke Cannon and Cubs for being sponsors of The GPL Podcast. 12:27 Back with Todd here. 12:30 Oh boy, we're hearing a lot of complaints this week, Todd. 12:33 What is the deal with TV and the badgers and all that stuff? 12:38 Why can't Fox 9 here in the city pick up a simulcast or something? 12:45 Let's strip away the layers here, right? 12:47 Because this is a multi-layered issue. 12:51 Bingo. 12:53 To the heart of it, if a game's not picked for BTN, if it's not going to ESPN, which it wouldn't be right now, or FS1, one of the other linear TV stations that covers a national platform, it goes to BTN Plus. 13:10 However, the teams themselves can choose to make deals with local stations, a la Fox Nine has, Minnesota has with Fox Nine. 13:22 Those games are produced by a company that's actually based here near Madison, Rush Media. 13:29 They do the production of them, but they get paid by the University of Minnesota to do the production of them. 13:37 This all comes at a cost. 13:38 This is not cheap to put on a hockey broadcast. 13:43 It won't be done cheaply, but you know it when it is, a la some of the Big Ten Plus broadcasts we've seen in Ohio State, if you want multi cameras, if you want a lot of cameras around the building, you have to pay for the cameras, you have to pay for the operators, you have to pay for the production, you have to pay for the wiring, you have to pay for all of these things. 14:12 It all adds up and if you're not able to sell sponsorship for it, who's paying for it? 14:20 It's the school and so here at Wisconsin, they had a deal with Ballet Sports, first Fox Sports Wisconsin, Ballet Sports Wisconsin after that point when the name changed, that deal ran out after last season and because Diamond Sports Group, which owns the Ballet's networks, is in bankruptcy, they cannot sign new deals. 14:49 So even if Wisconsin wanted to make an arrangement with Ballet's to put their games on TV, they couldn't. 14:57 So that cut that off right away. 15:00 Then you go into the, is there an opportunity like Fox 9 has in the Twin Cities with a local station here in Madison? 15:08 Nothing really developed. 15:09 From what I heard, there was no interest in that, no interest in absorbing that cost to put on those games. 15:16 And so you're left with having a BTN Plus, BigTen Plus, wherever we call it now broadcast using student announcers. 15:26 And I believe mostly a student crew. 15:28 There is some crossover between the production crew that runs cameras for the video board in the Cole Center. 15:38 Some of it gets used by both. 15:39 I believe it can be used by both. 15:41 I don't know how often that happens. 15:44 But it's not a great situation, obviously, for, you know. 15:51 Growing the game. 15:53 Exactly. 15:54 We understand that the future is streaming, that this is not something we can just ignore and think it'll change and it'll be different a year from now. 16:03 No, this is the way it's going. 16:06 It has however many BigTen men's basketball games and football games and that's the way it's going to go to be able to pay for all of these costs is that they need to sell, they need you to pay more than the $1 a month they're getting out of your cable bill or satellite bill. 16:26 So this is the way it's going. 16:29 I can hope and I think we can all hope that at some point there'll be a better product across the board in the BigTen but we're not there yet. 16:41 Thank goodness we have opportunities or, you know, arrangements like Minnesota has with Fox 9 to have real high quality broadcasts. 16:49 And the Notre Dame broadcasts on Peacock are really high quality too. 16:52 That's a TV quality broadcast just happens to be on Peacock. 16:59 And so there's a big gap there between the high end and the low end of what you get on Big Ten Plus. 17:10 And that's a little bit of where we're at. 17:14 And I did some research today. 17:16 The last time a Minnesota Wisconsin game was not on linear TV in the Twin Cities. 17:23 You want to guess a year? 17:25 Oh, my goodness. 17:29 I should say not on live because it was on a two hour delay. 17:34 Okay, but that could have been more recent. 17:39 Late 90s. 17:40 Yeah, 96. 17:44 February of 96. 17:46 Here in Madison, there was the same thing for the series earlier that season in the Twin Cities too. 17:54 Gopher Basketball was on MSC at 7 and hockey got kicked at 9 o'clock. 18:00 So do we know last time it wasn't televised period? 18:05 Well, the ginger records still go back. 18:09 No, I can't go back because at least the games at Wisconsin always would have been on the tape delay broadcast through public television, home games. 18:19 Paul Braun, that whole crew. 18:22 Who, by the way, is back doing, he's starting this week as radio announcer for the women's hockey team. 18:30 Really? 18:30 So it's a great story. 18:33 Paul is a wonderful guy, was out of broadcasting for a long time and, out of hockey broadcast, played by play broadcasting for a long time, lost his wife to Alzheimer's. 18:45 And it was, he's, my counterpart at the state journal, Jim Polstein, is working on a story about him coming back and doing these games now. 18:54 And it's, he, I love that he's getting this opportunity because he's such a good man and a real quality broadcaster too. 19:04 Forget about that. 19:05 But it's cool that he's getting this chance to fill in for some hockey games. 19:12 Well, back in those fun days, Veegs, it used to be when we'd go to Madison and they'd, you know, they'd have Paul Braun. 19:18 And then when they were here in, you know, met, you know, Mariucci, it'd be, you know, Frank Mazzocco. 19:24 And then we'd get Wugger in there. 19:27 And, oh, who was the Wisconsin guy? 19:31 Who was doing the color? 19:33 Well, it would have been Tom Sagasore for a while. 19:35 That's the one they're putting. 19:38 He's memorable. 19:40 They put Sagasore and Wug together. 19:41 I'm like, oh my gosh. 19:43 Sagasore made it memorable the times that he was on, that's for sure. 19:48 Yes. 19:49 So, Veegs, those were fun days. 19:51 But we always saw the games on TV. 19:54 Those were fun days. 19:55 And I just think the concern about the production quality is what hockey fans are worried about right now. 20:02 You see certain schools like Notre Dame and Minnesota really investing in it. 20:07 And then the flip side is the Ohio State, the Michigan State, Michigan. 20:12 Not so much. 20:13 I feel like the Penn State games have been OK that I've seen. 20:17 And then Wisconsin's been all over the board. 20:20 Like some have been great. 20:21 Some have been pretty on the low end. 20:23 So I would think a conference like the Big Ten could set some expectations for standards for how to move forward here. 20:31 But it's definitely a concern for the fans. 20:34 And we're going to hear about it all weekend. 20:36 I'm sure. 20:40 Well, it is a student thing. 20:42 Maybe more broadcasts will bring more, like you said, more attention to it. 20:47 Maybe more money gets put into those schools. 20:50 I mean, you look at St. 20:51 Cloud Veegs. 20:52 They've been doing a wonderful job for years. 20:56 Putting out great producers, directors, audio people, I mean, just all over the place through their broadcast program. 21:05 There's no reason why some of these BigTen schools can't do the same. 21:09 You'd think so. 21:10 You know, St. 21:10 Cloud, a lot of people there want to get into broadcasting and they get really passionate about their product and they take care with what they put out there. 21:18 I did hear a note from one of our listeners that the Michigan State crew felt like a SNL skit of like a student broadcast. 21:26 It was almost unintentionally funny at times. 21:29 But it's good feedback for those students to learn and like really pay attention to what they're doing and take a little pride and get better the next time. 21:38 And that's just it. 21:39 The more you do it, the better you get. 21:41 Yeah, I hope just like our first podcast. 21:45 I hope that's what's happening behind the scenes. 21:47 Yes. 21:49 Yeah, yeah, we can only hope. 21:52 And but like you said, Todd, it's the future. 21:55 It's more of it's more of it's coming. 21:56 Yeah, what I'd like to see. 21:58 And this is again, one of these like wishlist things that will probably never happen is the opportunity to choose which audio you're hearing with the video, you know, because I hear last week what I didn't go to Michigan. 22:15 So I was watching the the BTN plus stream and I had on the radio broadcasts of Brian Posick and trying to sync that up. 22:26 And so I wasn't hearing things a minute apart from the live radio. 22:30 I got rid of the actual over the air radio and went to the stream of the auto because that was a little closer. 22:36 And then you pause on the video until I could kind of match it up. 22:39 And it's it's 2024. 22:42 We shouldn't have to do those kind of things that let's get the radio broadcasts. 22:47 Because around the Big Ten, those are the highest quality broadcasters we have. 22:53 The ones that know those teams the best are the home radio announcers. 22:57 Let's get them to be part of it. 22:58 And I'm sure there's got to be a compensation part of the, you know, the Asian there for them. 23:04 But, you know, I don't know that we have to overdo the broadcasting, you know, in terms of the number of actual broadcasts we have out of a game. 23:17 When if there are two already happening that are going to radio, let's have those be options. 23:24 And I've actually seen in previous years, even last year, like the Michigan BTN Plus games at home was their radio crew, a much more experienced crew and did a great job. 23:37 But students don't have to get paid to do a lot of this stuff. 23:44 If you take a radio crew all of a sudden, hey, we're on radio and TV, we need to get paid more. 23:51 That's it's a difference from being maybe a professional than an amateur or student things. 24:00 Yeah, I'm not going to be the expert on this. 24:02 I don't know how the budgets are going to work out. 24:05 I want the students to have the opportunity to get that experience and get that exposure. 24:10 It's just you want to have a professor that's helping them along and really being firm with them about what the product they're putting out. 24:20 Well, it's just one of those interesting things that's just it's kind of coming to a head this weekend since no regular TV, so it'll be interesting. 24:28 It doesn't bother me. 24:31 Vegoe, you told me to embrace the streaming a couple of years ago, and I totally have, so I enjoy it. 24:38 Another thing I wanted to get into here, Todd, are your thoughts on the NCAA regional sites. 24:45 And, you know, you've got Brad Schlossman has a point of view, you got Adam Wodon, who's got another point of view. 24:53 I'm guessing some people have views in between, we're going to have both of them on the show at the end of February. 25:00 What are your thoughts on how we solve this regional issue? 25:06 No one's ever going to be happy. 25:08 True. 25:09 Accept that as one of the basic positions here. 25:17 I am, I find myself kind of torn between the, I think it would be a better product having it in the campus buildings and having that be the direction things go. 25:34 But I don't know if, I don't know, I should say the overall product would be better, but the, what we'd have to give up as a college hockey body to get there. 25:48 And I say that in a couple of things, in scheduling, because I think we're talking about a three week, or adding an extra week to the NCAA tournament, or taking away the week off in between the regionals, you know, what is now the regionals and the Frozen Four. 26:06 And also, we're talking about TV, we're talking about streaming, just a few minutes ago, we're looking at having to get then eight different sites covered on one weekend. 26:20 If it goes to the way that I think it would be going to where you're having the top eight seeds host the first round and moving into then the four top remaining seeds after that hosting the next round. 26:34 That becomes difficult, not impossible, but difficult, especially at that time of year to get production done at eight different sites. 26:44 When you also have NCAA basketball, men's basketball, women's basketball, NIT, women's NIT, all these other tournaments that are all kind of trying to get productions done. 26:59 I feel like it should be able to happen. 27:01 I just don't have enough knowledge to know that it can happen at a high enough level that we wouldn't then be complaining about. 27:10 Well, this TV broadcast is so terrible. 27:15 It used to be better than this. 27:16 Now we're under that complaint. 27:18 So going into it knowing that we're never going to make anyone happy, everyone happy is, I think, the best way of looking at this. 27:28 But we can definitely make some improvements, I feel like, if it does go to campus sites. 27:36 And I just, I don't know that there's, I know there's demand for that around College Hockey. 27:44 I don't know if there's enough demand to push it through. 27:48 Really, it's about if there's enough demand on the East Coast speaks. 27:51 Yeah, it is going to come down to that. 27:54 And I do think there's some disingenuous arguments being made about neutrality and that the system works now and why go back being made out there. 28:05 And I always go, what's the most important thing to the tournament? 28:12 And I think it's a great experience for the fans, for the players, for everybody who's watching it. 28:20 I think that's the number one key. 28:21 And I think maintaining a neutral site doesn't really help make it a great experience for everyone. 28:29 You hear all kinds of college hockey players. 28:31 Would they rather play in an empty building or in a building filled of the opposing team's fans? 28:36 They would pick a full building of people booing them every time. 28:40 You know, that's an atmosphere that people can get into and get up for. 28:45 And I just think for the biggest games of the year, you want that atmosphere. 28:49 And then when you compare it with making money by selling more tickets, like my cross from Penn State documented, that's a win. 28:59 You look at every other tournament run by the NCAA at a high level and making money and putting together a great atmosphere definitely seems to be higher priority than neutral sites. 29:13 I mean, you look at what's going to happen with the college football playoff. 29:16 Where are those first round games being played? 29:18 Campus sites. 29:19 And that's big time college football where you have football coaches making $100 million contracts based on getting into those games. 29:27 They're trying to create a big atmosphere. 29:30 Why does basketball do all these regionals? 29:33 It's because CBS pays billions of dollars for the broadcast rights and they want the easiest, best TV product. 29:40 That's why that tournament is run that way. 29:43 You look at volleyball, there's campus sites. 29:46 Women's basketball, campus sites. 29:48 All the smaller sports, campus sites. 29:51 Because it gets you a better atmosphere and it works. 29:53 So why we hold our feet to the fire that we have to do this neutral site thing? 29:58 When we bend over backwards to figure out how to get people to bid, to host it. 30:03 What do we do with the hosts when they make the tournament and they're not a one or two seed? 30:07 We don't have enough buildings out west, so they're going to play in a 2,500 seat arena. 30:13 What are we doing? 30:15 Yeah. 30:16 What are we doing? 30:22 Yeah. 30:23 That kind of got around. 30:25 We didn't really know that Maryland Heights, Missouri is 2,500 seats. 30:30 I believe it's closer to 3,000, but your point stands. 30:34 Oh, wow. 30:35 Standing room seats. 30:36 Standing room seats get us to three. 30:40 I think it is because they have one of those party areas. 30:45 Oh, wow. 30:45 Yeah, that'll make great. 30:48 Kind of the same way that Fargo has, I believe, behind one of the goals, if I'm remembering it right. 30:56 Yeah, but that's still a much bigger arena. 30:57 It is a bigger arena. 30:58 More like five. 31:00 And it's this, it came to my attention a couple of years ago when that building opened. 31:07 And I think the Wisconsin women's team was one of the first teams to play in there the first weekend. 31:13 And so I wasn't there, but I was watching the stream and it was like, wait, this is a regional site in a couple of years, huh? 31:24 I need someone to please count the seats for me because they were advertising at one point that it was going to be 3,500, 4,000 seats. 31:32 And that did not line up with what I saw on the video those couple of days. 31:38 And so I don't know exactly what the number is or what the final number is, but what I was told at some point was that they were thinking it was 3,000 seats. 31:49 It's not going to be 5,000 like the regulations say is the minimum number of seats required. 31:56 Which the way you get under that is if no one else is bidding. 32:00 Exactly. 32:00 And which is a and the minimum is has been going out of regulations and some different things. 32:10 Like for the women's frozen for they took out a minimum number just in this cycle to see if some other sites would really would bid on that that are underneath the 5,000 or I forget 3500. 32:26 I don't remember. 32:27 It must be at least 3500. 32:30 Yeah, right. 32:32 And so that made people wonder whether LeBron at Wisconsin would be interested in hosting. 32:40 It's just that's it. 32:42 They would love to. 32:43 But it's that time of the year to squeeze things in when you have the state basketball tournament and the wrestling tournament, all these other events that are going on right around there. 32:53 It only lines up like once every six years that they would even have an opportunity to have something in that building because you need to use the locker rooms that are in the cold center as well to have four teams in there. 33:07 So Veegs, something like this, maybe they do go down the home team road. 33:11 How would you like to see the schedule? 33:13 Would you like to see still that extra week? 33:17 You know, two weeks basically between the regional final and a frozen four. 33:22 I think the best point I've heard so far is you don't want to go up against the final four for men's basketball. 33:29 So you want to have that extra week in there and that that makes sense to me. 33:34 On the flip side, I'm like, why do we take this long winter break? 33:37 Why can't we just pack some of the season into that time? 33:40 Yes. 33:41 And just use it. 33:42 Just one more week. 33:43 You just need one more week. 33:45 So, you know, all the other sports don't take these long breaks. 33:49 Why is hockey? 33:51 So that would be a way to fit your schedule in if you just didn't take that long break. 33:57 Well, it's an interesting topic that we, you know, we'll be talking about more in a couple, you know, the end of February when both, you know, Brad was on with with Wodan. 34:06 I did listen to that podcast. 34:09 I was a little disheartened that, you know, Wodan said, well, I didn't really read your article yet. 34:14 He said this in the podcast. 34:15 I'm like, but I got the gist of it. 34:18 And then and then Wodan's rebuttal hadn't come out yet. 34:21 I'm like, well, it'll be interesting because it seems like Wodan is not very happy with you, Veegs. 34:30 And I I'm like, what? 34:31 I mean, really, come on. 34:34 We're just trying to get great ratings for that show when he comes on. 34:39 We're just going to build it up. 34:40 I'm not going to comment on social media about it. 34:43 I want to see you face to face. 34:45 And maybe he'll listen to this one and he'll get some more of my talking points. 34:49 We'll see. 34:49 I know that he had Rand Pecknold on this week on his podcast and they talked about it. 34:55 And Rand, you know, is like, well, campus sites probably would have benefited us. 34:59 But I don't mind it the way it is right now. 35:02 Another coach who doesn't sound passionate about it one way or the other. 35:06 And I think he probably gets a lot of pressure from his conference to stick with neutral sites, because that seems to be what they care about, because it might help somebody other than Quinnipiac if they make it. 35:18 They're probably just getting one bit this year, though. 35:22 Yeah, you know, it's not about growing the game. 35:25 It's not what's better for the game is what's better for our team, our conference. 35:31 And I don't like that argument. 35:32 I don't think that's a good place to start your stance from. 35:37 But isn't that the way college hockey has gone in the last 15 years? 35:41 I mean, just in general, not to like get all high horse here or anything, but pulling apart of leagues and going different directions. 35:52 And that was a little bit of the leading edge of of some of this discussion, I think, when it comes down to it. 36:02 This is not the college hockey of, you know, Ron Mason and Jeff Sauer and a lot of the guys we miss. 36:16 Of course, it was gonna happen. 36:17 I mean, I don't think there's any question about that. 36:20 But it is pretty stark, different from those days. 36:28 It'll definitely be interesting. 36:30 I have a feeling we're gonna go with at least one more round of added regionals and it'll just keep getting worse and it'll eventually change, but I don't think the next section session is gonna happen. 36:44 So what can you do? 36:47 Well, Veegs, we do have more sponsors here that we wouldn't want to talk about today. 36:52 We'll get some new ones for us that we'd love to share with people. 37:01 Yeah, first one, Yokem Real Estate Group. 37:03 If you're in the market to buy or sell a house, tis the season. 37:07 It's a little known fact that Super Bowl Sunday here in the Midwest is the official trigger point to list your home or start looking. 37:14 And if you're going into the market, whether you're buying or selling, don't roll the dice on your biggest asset. 37:20 Think twice and work with the twins from Yokem Real Estate Group. 37:24 Sarah and Jody are five foot tall, identical twin sisters who somehow can move an entire home of heavy furniture all by themselves. 37:32 And you know, when you got two body doubles, just keep in 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They saving you money? 38:30 Will they answer the phone when you call? 38:32 Do you even know their number? 38:33 Better yet, reach out to our sponsor, Will Anderson Insurance. 38:38 And check him out. 38:38 We can't promise he'll save you money. 38:40 Let's just say you should sure get a quote. 38:43 Call 612-361-7283 or visit willandersonagency.com. 38:51 And we thank Will Anderson and Yokem Realty for being new sponsors of The GPL Podcast. 38:59 So that's great. 39:00 Let's bring Todd back in. 39:06 Big weekend, guys. 39:09 To say the least, we didn't see it coming back in October. 39:17 Was it October? 39:17 I think it was. 39:18 And the team certainly didn't see it coming. 39:21 But these badgers are for real. 39:24 Yeah, we weren't being foolishly optimistic, were we? 39:27 I was trying to think if that was that the phrase I used to say it was gonna be a split? 39:33 Yep, turns out we were the ones who were way off. 39:40 But to be honest, Todd, we didn't see this kind of turn around that quickly. 39:46 Nobody did. 39:47 No, at that point, Wisconsin looked okay. 39:52 I mean, they lost at North Dakota, but they're in that game was a two nothing game with a shorthand goal and they probably deserved to be closer, if not tied at some point in that game. 40:04 And so you think, well, they can hang around with really good teams. 40:11 And that's kind of where I was at going into the series at Mariucci. 40:16 And then just the way that they played defensively in that entire weekend was kind of the first I'd really seen of that up close, where not making the mistakes that had cost them for the last few years, picking up assignments, being on the right assignments, handling the rush better. 40:42 Those are the things we've seen that have been the big changes for the team this season to be at 20 wins in the top five and in the hunt for number one seed in the NCAAs. 41:01 I don't know where last week is going to fit into the picture of, well, was that an. 41:15 Anomaly or was what we saw before a little bit of fool's gold in terms of how well they're playing defensively because like I said, if they give up as many of these, you know, chances in dangerous areas, they're going to pay for it. 41:29 Even if Kyle McClellan is playing well, he can't play that well to cover up that much as much, you know, kind of just loose play that we saw from the Badgers in their D-Zone last week. 41:43 And that would be something I think you got to, you have to pay attention to if you're Wisconsin for this week. 41:50 And Veegs, we've said it for years. 41:55 Yeah, the fans might not like it, but the league is better when the Badgers are good. 42:03 And, and if anything, it's really ramped up the excitement for this weekend of Minnesota coming in to the Badgers after what they did to them in the fall. 42:14 Well, I heard a couple of Gophers really looking forward to going to Madison and seeing what that building looks like full, because they've never really seen it that way with a big, into it Badger fan base. 42:30 And I'm expecting we're going to see that this weekend. 42:32 I think there's a whiteout going on. 42:34 And there's a lot of excitement should be a pretty full building for this one. 42:39 Yeah, what I had heard was 12,000 sold for Friday and 14 for Saturday. 42:47 And that was earlier this week. 42:48 So I checked the seat map on the tickets site earlier tonight. 42:57 And they're basically selling the upper row ends on Saturday. 43:07 So that should be the biggest crowd they've had in almost five years at the Cole Center, which tells you a lot because in the last sellout they had... 43:16 Cole Caulfield was part of that. 43:18 He wasn't even... 43:20 it was before that. 43:22 Well, that's what I mean. 43:22 Cole Caulfield went through and it hasn't... 43:26 Well, it didn't do much. 43:27 Unfortunately for them, the year that he was really good was the year that no one was in the building, except for parents and cardboard tiles. 43:34 Oh, that's right. 43:36 Which is, I mean, is a thread to all of this that we could go down, but... 43:40 Yeah. 43:41 Or your viewers don't care. 43:44 But the last sellout at the Cole Center was in, I believe it was February of 2019. 43:53 It was Mark Johnson's Jersey Retirement Night. 43:56 And that's the only crowd that they've had over 14,000 in the last five years. 44:02 So it's, this is a story I'm actually working on this week. 44:09 It's starting to come, I don't know if it's, the attendance is really coming back or forward, just seeing kind of a bump here for what should be a really good weekend. 44:18 There was a really good crowd both nights against Michigan earlier in the season, and they got rewarded with some really good games. 44:31 But it still doesn't need to be more than just a one year thing to get this program back going attendance wise. 44:38 I think it's kind of where I'm ending up with things here. 44:41 And yeah, I remember last year, Veegs, I hadn't been to the Cole Center in 15 plus years. 44:48 I found it very easy to get lower level tickets last year for both games in the same spot, great seats. 44:55 I'm guessing that's just not happening this year. 44:59 Probably not. 45:00 No. 45:00 And I think the Gophers are ready for a big series. 45:03 You just tell from the attitude the players are giving in media this week that, you know, they're trying to build on their team right now. 45:12 They were disappointed with how they finished Friday. 45:14 They took care of business on Saturday. 45:17 While the players said that their preparation and just their attitude, getting ready for the game was something they really paid attention to. 45:25 And the leaders are trying to do that this week, headed into Madison. 45:30 You know, not just get in the free flow of riding the bus, getting the hotel, getting the ring, go back to the hotel, show up for the game, play the game. 45:38 They want to be focused and dialed in. 45:40 And I think for Minnesota to be successful, that's something they're gonna have to do because Mike Hastings really puts in a tough structure to play against. 45:49 And I think it's really benefiting McClellan this year in goal. 45:53 He's putting together some really good numbers. 45:55 I do wonder if that's the Hastings system protecting him as opposed to him playing really, really well. 46:02 Because I've heard some college hockey people talk about all the great numbers. 46:05 He must be playing great. 46:07 I watched a lot of Minnesota State games over the years where Dryden McKay was in that and he was getting hyped up. 46:13 And I'm just like, I don't see it. 46:15 He gets easy saves. 46:17 And no one's dangerous against him. 46:20 No one's moving the puck across the slot and getting dangerous shots off. 46:23 He can just face every shooter, challenge him top of the crease and make the save. 46:29 I don't know if McClellan can do that this year. 46:31 He hasn't done it in the past. 46:33 Definitely not last year, but it's up to Minnesota to put that pressure on him and figure it out. 46:38 Is there something still in the Gopher's heads though about a Mike Hastings team? 46:42 Because they've all experienced it and haven't been able to beat him. 46:47 Well, I think from the Minnesota perspective, it's just frustration and lack of patience. 46:53 And it's almost like the Moxie that you can outskill a Hastings team. 47:00 And that's not really what's gonna work. 47:02 And I feel like Bob has a different attitude in his lineup that that's not gonna happen. 47:08 The way Minnesota is getting in trouble this year is chasing offense. 47:13 It's not necessarily making bad decisions at the blue lines or making bad decisions on exits. 47:21 It's putting four players below the dots, trying to chase a rebound or a rush, or trying to chase pucks on the power play where you just leave one player back and all of a sudden you have a shorthand rush going the other way. 47:33 Those are the mistakes they're making. 47:34 It's not the maverick mistakes that are costing odd man rushes and stuff in transition. 47:41 So it's a little bit different, I think. 47:43 Got our guy Taylor Kearns, who we like to call Motay, wants to know, Todd, I was writing stories this year versus the last few years. 47:52 I guess last year you even got pulled off the beat. 47:54 Well, I was gonna say that they're about hockey this year, which is something I feel like I know, as opposed to basketball, which I was covering at this point last year. 48:02 So that's a big bonus for me that back covering hockey. 48:07 And I try not to take that for granted. 48:12 So it's a little bit different because this coaching staff is a lot more tightly controlled on who gets to see what. 48:23 Tony Granato's staff was basically doors open, come on in. 48:26 He didn't go in the locker or anything like that, but he wanted to come and see practice, come on in. 48:32 Whereas now where we don't get to see practice, we have one day of media availability a week, kind of like the Gophers have. 48:41 It's a little more difficult to get to know people well that way. 48:50 So, fortunately I have some relationships built up from the last few years, but getting to know the assistant coaches has been a little bit of a challenge because they don't see them very often. 49:01 They're not coming in to talk to us in the media room and it's kind of like I stopped and try and chat with them for a couple of minutes in the hallway. 49:10 But yeah, it's a little bit different that way. 49:14 So, it's a little bit more of a challenge to get in some of the details of things that we don't get to see as much of. 49:25 But I should say that, you know, Mike Hastings is really good to work with. 49:29 I mean, they lost five to one Friday night and he was on the phone with me, you know, 15 minutes after the game. 49:37 And, you know, just being honest and being, you know, not, he could have, you know, just said, forget it, I'm not calling tonight. 49:45 But he did that. 49:47 And so I appreciate that. 49:49 And I think he's, you know, he's in a different situation, you know, than he was in Mankato, obviously, in terms of just visibility. 49:57 There's, you know, the availability. 49:59 There's, you know, three TV stations that show up. 50:01 There's two newspapers, a radio station. 50:04 It's, you know, there's a, there's a lot more faces around than, I guess, on a consistent basis than there probably was in Mankato. 50:18 And, you know, he's dealing with trying to figure out who everyone is still around Madison. 50:24 So who are the people he has to make sure to pay attention to in terms of, you know, donors and sponsors and people in NIL and all this kind of stuff that's evolving. 50:36 And so he's... 50:38 It seems like he's doing a pretty good job of kind of managing all of those other areas you need to be in as a college coach. 50:48 All right, let's get into some predictions here, Veegs. 50:51 You've been preaching discipline. 50:57 That's going to be key this weekend. 50:59 How does it turn out at the end of the game on Saturday? 51:04 Where are we sitting? 51:08 This is going to be a tough series, I think, for Minnesota, just because the way Wisconsin played against Michigan last weekend, I think, allows Mike Hastings to get their attention. 51:19 And I think the way Minnesota played against Michigan State gives Bob Monsko the ability to get the Gophers' attention. 51:25 So you're going to have two teams. 51:27 They're going to be real dialed in on what they're supposed to execute in a hockey game. 51:34 And I'm worried that Minnesota is going to go through one of those stretches where they're almost too patient and they're too on their heels. 51:43 And Wisconsin, if they get the Mike Hastings coaching that I know he can deliver, they're going to take advantage of that. 51:51 And they're going to press and they're going to get out to a lead and then Minnesota is going to be chasing. 51:56 And I think that's how Friday night is going to go. 51:59 And Wisconsin is going to get three points. 52:01 And I think it's going to be flipped a little bit on Saturday because that's just what happens in college athletics is young kids. 52:08 When they win, they don't pay as much attention to the details. 52:12 And the team that loses has a little bit more and Minnesota has definitely got the talent to score goals. 52:17 I think we'll see a split. 52:20 All right, Todd, what are you thinking? 52:22 Well, Vegoe kind of took my, stole my thunder there because that's pretty much exactly what I was going to say is that I feel like we've been doing this for a while, Todd. 52:33 The Friday night to me feels like a night that we're going to see a lot of what's been drilled in the Wisconsin this week in terms of D-zone coverages and being aware a little bit better than they were last week and having more structure and all these things that at the start of the year, we're being hammered in over and over again, we're probably being hammered in over and over again all of this week. 53:02 So I feel like that's going to make it a probably a lower scoring game on Friday that I feel like the batters have a better chance of winning. 53:12 But then Saturday, you're at a point in the season now where we're in the last five weeks and you get to see some desperation in teams where when you're talking about, okay, Minnesota is in a decent pairwise position, but not great. 53:31 Exactly. 53:34 If you start lingering towards that 12, 13 spot, that's... 53:39 Danger, Will Robinson. 53:42 And so, that's where I think you get to see some desperation and I feel like that's where we'll see desperation if Friday goes away, we're talking about where we'll see that from Minnesota and I would feel like we'd see them a little bit like we saw last week from the Gophers, a much better effort overall on the second night to get out of... 54:05 I mean, what would really be if you think about it, back to back road series at Michigan State in Wisconsin didn't used to be all that dangerous, right? 54:15 But now you're talking about as the number one and number two teams in the conference back to back. 54:20 If you get out of that with... 54:24 You're probably doing all right, even if it might not help catch up anywhere getting closer to first place, but it does you okay in the big picture. 54:37 And I think it just solidifies yourself in the pairwise. 54:40 If you can split against teams like Michigan State and Wisconsin, the way the numbers are looking, that's going to help your team down the road, especially, you know, with Minnesota playing on the road this weekend, that always helps in the pairwise rankings, so important. 54:56 I'm going to be a little more positive than you, Veegs. 54:58 I'm going to say four points for Minnesota. 55:00 Wisconsin wins in overtime Friday night and Gophers win regulation on Saturday. 55:10 Can I throw something else in here? 55:14 First, you guys, I don't know if you saw this, but last time these two teams were both ranked in the top 10 for a border battle series in the regular season. 55:25 All the road teams won, didn't it? 55:27 Correct. 55:29 I thought I saw you tweet that. 55:32 A certain number, 26, wait, no, wait, was that Vanny? 55:38 No, no, it was 26. 55:40 It was 26. 55:41 Yeah. 55:42 Take that, you stink of badgers. 55:45 On the second game of that series here at the Cole Center. 55:50 Yeah, that was, yeah, I was at that game. 55:53 That was, that was enjoyable. 55:56 Don was not real happy with him afterward. 56:00 At least what he said to us, he may have been saying something different to him, but yeah. 56:07 He knew what he had to say, right? 56:08 Yeah, I think so. 56:09 And oh, then they when they brought Phil out. 56:12 Oh my god, he was like the deer in the headlights. 56:20 Not someone who enjoys the media. 56:22 No, no, definitely not. 56:23 But in that situation, too, yeah. 56:28 Hometown. 56:29 Yeah. 56:30 Hometown kid doing this, scoring a goal. 56:35 Making memories for everybody. 56:36 That's what these series are about. 56:38 I wonder if we're gonna have any big moments this weekend. 56:43 I don't know. 56:44 We'll see. 56:45 People have been blowing kisses in games, throwing sticks. 56:50 Who knows what's gonna happen this time? 56:51 We need a good Jersey Pop, though. 56:53 We need some good Jersey Pops going on this weekend. 56:57 Let's get some of the anger that we used to see in these series. 57:01 Like I said, Jersey Pop's a good old taunt. 57:03 And trash talk between the benches. 57:06 Let's have some fun. 57:07 These guys are gonna rile up. 57:11 One thing I'm gonna be watching this weekend is the shift lengths for Rhett Pitlick. 57:18 I know that's something that got him into trouble with his coach. 57:23 Is that why he wasn't playing for a bit? 57:25 It's a good bet. 57:26 It's a good bet. 57:27 There were a couple of times I think Rhett looked at the bench and said, nah, I'm gonna stay out for another 30 seconds. 57:32 And the coaches were not too happy with that. 57:34 I was listening to Rick Bowness, bonus, the Winnipeg Jets coach, he was on the 32 Thoughts Podcast, and they were asking him like, what's the most selfish thing you can do in hockey? 57:45 Shift length. 57:45 That was a really good segment. 57:47 If you're taking a long shift, you are cheating your teammates, you are taking away their ice time, you're embarrassing your coaches, and you're being a bad teammate. 57:57 And he said that is Messing things up too. 57:59 Yep, the lines get off, the rhythm falls out of whack. 58:03 So I think it's important for Rhett to learn from that. 58:07 And I'm sure Bob doesn't seem to have any qualms about sitting him. 58:12 There's other players that seem to have, you know, the manila envelope or something to stay out of the doghouse. 58:19 Take his place on the first line? 58:21 Yeah, who knows? 58:22 But Bob and Rhett seem to have their issues. 58:26 So we'll see what happens there this weekend. 58:28 I'm sure he'll be prompt on his line changes because that line has been very explosive this year. 58:33 Oliver Moore has really stepped up his game last couple weeks. 58:37 I think you'll see some articles on him from other journalists in the Twin Cities. 58:42 And of course, Jimmy Snugger continues to do what he does, which is shoot the puck and he'll probably get 25 shots this weekend. 58:50 All right. 58:52 So what are you working on right now, Todd, for this weekend? 58:58 For this weekend, like I mentioned, I talked to some people about attendance and talked to the athletic director who hired my casings and could probably be taking a victory lap right around now. 59:12 He didn't do that that much of it, but just about where things are at, that's happened a lot faster than anyone thought. 59:23 But then again, that attendance still does need to, has a way to go because this is all in context too, because Wisconsin is still going to end up as the number three team in college hockey in terms of attendance. 59:40 Because it has that big of a building. 59:43 It's not like a lot of the schools out east where you have a 3000 seat building and you get 2500 and you're happy with it. 59:51 That would be a little bit different here. 59:55 But when you're talking about that 15 years ago the average was 14,000 and now that you're talking about 8800 being the average, it's a lot off from that. 1:00:08 I don't think we'll ever get back to that era. 1:00:12 That was a different era in a lot of ways for a lot of different things. 1:00:16 But you know, if they can get consistently over 10,000, that would be, I think, a good thing for them. 1:00:27 Well thanks for joining us, Todd. 1:00:28 Your 15th appearance. 1:00:30 Of course, you know, any time I am, I am happy to be here whenever you guys need me. 1:00:45 It would have been a little more if you wouldn't have gotten post-over to B-ball. 1:00:49 I got done writing and I looked at the clock like, can I weasel my way into an appearance? 1:00:56 It was a late game. 1:01:00 I think it started at 9 Eastern, so at that point it was like 11.30. 1:01:05 I'm like, they're probably done by now. 1:01:07 I can't get down. 1:01:10 Well, we appreciate it. 1:01:11 You're our number one guy now. 1:01:13 I mean, you're a couple ahead of Cappy and a couple and a little more ahead of Frank Mazocco. 1:01:18 So let's keep it going, kid. 1:01:21 Let's keep it going. 1:01:22 I take that as an honor. 1:01:24 Oh, that's great. 1:01:25 So that's going to do it for this episode of The GPL Podcast. 1:01:28 You know, we'll be back next week to recap, you know, this, this Badger series, but we're also going to have a new person on the podcast, Brian Tripp, the voice of Penn State Hockey is going to join us. 1:01:39 So it's always fun to have a new guest on the show. 1:01:42 For those of you watching live, stay tuned for some overtime. 1:01:46 For the rest of you, we'll catch you next week on The GPL Podcast.