0:03 This is The Gopher Puck Live Podcast, episode number 43, recorded October 15th, 2013. 0:22 Welcome to The GPL Podcast. 0:24 I am your host, Jupiter, and of course, joining me once again is Vigo and Hammy. 0:30 Boys, how are you doing this week? 0:34 Pretty good. 0:35 Happy with this week? 0:37 Quite well. 0:37 Now, Vigo, you're in your car still, aren't you? 0:42 Yep, still looking for Alice. 0:43 Best podcasting location ever. 0:46 Well, so far, I should say. 0:47 It's very quiet for me. 0:51 Hey, what works, what works. 0:52 Just let's find that house for you. 0:55 Get that family into a nice abode. 1:01 Did we lose them? 1:03 No, I'm still looking for that house. 1:05 I'm looking out my window. 1:09 Is there a binder I can build on? 1:11 Vigo is actually driving right now and looking for that house, so we're good to go. 1:16 All right, boys, opening weekend of the year. 1:19 I'm guessing you guys are fairly happy with the results. 1:23 You know, a 6-0 win over Mercyhurst and a 3-2 win over New Hampshire. 1:29 Vigo, give me your initial thoughts on the first weekend of the year. 1:34 Well, I think the team really had good performances from all of its freshmen. 1:40 Most of them got on the board. 1:41 It was just a great weekend. 1:43 I was really surprised by how solid Hudson Fashing looked right on that first line. 1:49 Looks like he's going to be there all year the way he played the first weekend. 1:52 Just two great games. 1:54 He looked good, battles in the corners, winning pucks, looked strong going the net. 1:59 His skating looked really good for a big guy. 2:03 And the team's got a lot of depth from the young players. 2:07 They're all just stepping in and performing right away. 2:10 I think Mike Riley had a great weekend, showed that he's gotten even better with his skating. 2:16 So it's going to be fun to watch him. 2:18 Hammy, your initial thoughts on the weekend? 2:22 Well, yeah, I mean, really, I mean, of course, you always have to have the asterisk that it's one weekend and it's the first weekend, so you can't read too much into it. 2:30 But I think that, you know, obviously the freshmen were probably the most exciting aspect of the weekend because of the fact that they all looked like they belonged and they all produced for the most part. 2:42 And, you know, the exciting thing for me is that I have, for recruiting class, you know, for a first year class, this is the most excited I've been about a class in a long time. 2:53 And, you know, because they're, for the most part, guys that are likely to be around for, you know, three or four seasons. 3:01 And I just think that that just bodes well for the future. 3:03 So I'm excited about that. 3:04 I certainly liked what I saw from, you know, Sam Warning played great. 3:09 You know, it was really good to see him playing well. 3:11 I expect a lot out of him this year. 3:14 You know, and some of the lower line guys that, you know, looked like they're, you know, pretty inspired. 3:19 And as far as, you know, like Hudson Fashing, I kind of mentioned it last week, but I really thought that that kid would probably play well. 3:27 I mean, he surprised me. 3:28 I'm not going to lie. 3:29 He surprised me because I didn't expect him to be as offensive as he was. 3:34 I didn't expect him to be, you know, skating as well as he did. 3:38 I just think that maybe playing home, being around the family again, I think that's probably inspiring to him. 3:44 So I'm glad to see that he started off so well. 3:46 Well, one thing I noticed about Fashing is, obviously, he's a fairly good sized kid, but you talk about his skating, he skates well, but he is pretty darn fast for a bigger fella. 4:00 I noticed he had some spurts of some great speed, and I really didn't expect that. 4:05 You know, you're used to a bigger guy being a little slower, and he might have good hands, but I was impressed with his speed. 4:12 Well, exactly, and to me, that was, it was funny to me, because I was thinking, just yesterday, I think it was, I was like, to me, he already looks like he's better than the last 24. 4:22 You know what I mean? 4:23 I know it's hard to say that, but it's like, I mean, literally, I mean, he looked more, he just looked more in control of his game, and the way he just went out there and played hard, and went to the net. 4:37 Yeah, I mean, to me, it was like, I was, I mean, no offense to the Buddhist fans of the world, but to me, it was like, wow, you know, I had no qualms thinking that fashion should at least produce what we lost with the last 24, so. 4:54 I think Buddhist kind of missed out on some opportunities by not being that guy in front of the net. 5:00 He would kind of camp there a little bit, but I don't think he was as much of a factor that fashion could be, and it's already starting to be. 5:10 There's a big difference between placing yourself in front of the net and drawing traffic and doing that and trying to find the puck. 5:17 And it looks like fashion after one weekend, you know, it's a really small sample size. 5:21 He was able to find the puck in that traffic, and that's an impressive thing. 5:26 And going up against two pretty veteran teams in Mercyhurst and UNH, he showed great ability to go into corners, win battles and come out with the puck. 5:35 It's one thing to go in and win the physical battle, but to have the puck skill to be able to win the puck out of those battles is pretty impressive. 5:43 So what do you think about the Mercyhurst? 5:46 We thought they would be a little better than they were. 5:50 An older team, it seems like Gophers have struggled with teams like that in the recent years and they just didn't put up much, did they Hammy? 6:02 I mean, I think it's a combination of, it's the first real game of the season. 6:06 You have young guys in a lineup for the Gophers that are obviously going to feel maybe kind of a combination of nervousness but also that excitement and that energy. 6:16 So sometimes in the past when we play teams like this, you might have that let down because you're just not inspired by the opponent. 6:24 But I think in this case, it's because of the so many young guys in the lineup and it's their first time to play in college hockey that maybe it kind of overcomes some of that potential let down factor. 6:33 So I think that's some of it. 6:34 And I also think that I don't care who you play. 6:39 It's beating a team six to nothing, almost outshooting them two to one. 6:45 That's impressive. 6:46 You know what I mean? 6:47 Even if you don't think Mercyhurst is the greatest team in the world, still to beat them like that in the first game of the season with so many freshmen in the line up. 6:55 That's pretty impressive. 6:56 So I don't look at it necessarily as they're not as good as we thought. 7:00 I just think that maybe we're a little bit better than maybe we expected early on. 7:05 Not as veteran of a team as we thought in Mercyhurst there, Vegoe? 7:10 You know, I don't really think it was that. 7:12 I think it was Minnesota just jelled really quickly in the first game. 7:15 And on top of it, they got great goaltending from Wilcox all weekend. 7:19 You know, he played two real solid games and showed that he hasn't dropped off his game at all in the off season. 7:26 That save against UNH at the end, I mean, that was a point saver for sure. 7:32 Well, speaking of UNH, that was definitely a closer game with all this, you know, nothing going on in the first, all the scoring in the second and nothing in the third. 7:42 What do you think, Vegoe? 7:43 I think UNH is definitely a better test. 7:47 Where will UNH be at the end of the season? 7:51 I mean, I got to think UNH is going to be in the battle for Hockey East. 7:56 You know, they've got a pretty veteran crew and they've got a lot of strength on the blue line. 8:00 You know, they've got two really impressive guys back there with, I think it's Kenodal and Van Riemsdijk and they looked solid and they're all big. 8:09 They're all over six feet plus and, you know, they were able to stretch the ice early in the first period against the Gophers. 8:16 I think that gave them a little bit of trouble in that Minnesota turned the tables on them and started catching them with some stretch passes and got in transition and you know, and the other thing that you could look at with UNH is their penalty kill was so strong. 8:29 Yes. 8:30 Minnesota had a lot of trouble getting established in the offensive zone and I don't think that's so much a poor power play performance by the Gophers because they were able to gain the zone. 8:42 It's just the UNH penalty kill is a veteran group and they showed it. 8:46 And I also think they were more aggressive on the kill than Mercyhurst was too. 8:51 I mean, the Gophers could move the puck very well against Mercyhurst on the power play, but UNH was right in their faces. 9:02 They needed to make quicker decisions. 9:04 Yep, exactly. 9:05 Hammy, what do you think about the old New Hampshire game there? 9:10 Well, I mean, I thought it was a pretty well-played game. 9:12 I mean, the only thing that was somewhat of a negative was, you know, the fact they got two power play goals, but you kind of have to expect early in the year that, you know, the specialty teams, especially when you have a bunch of new faces in the lineup, that tends to be the thing that takes a little extra time. 9:29 And, you know, they haven't had that many practices, you know, as far as full-fledged practices with the coaches and all that. 9:35 So it's going to take a little time to have the specialty teams to kind of be clicking. 9:40 But I think that overall, you know, Wilcox played great this weekend. 9:44 I liked what I saw from pretty much all the lines. 9:49 I liked what I saw of the fourth line. 9:51 I was really happy with, you know, what I saw from Michelson and Ambrose, Saratari, those guys. 9:56 I think they're actually going to create a little bit of offense from that fourth line, which is nice to see. 10:02 Certainly, I think, honestly, the line that I was less sure about is that third line. 10:09 Latterri looked great, but I didn't really feel that comfortable with maybe some of the other guys. 10:14 And so I think that maybe out of the lines that I saw, that third line to me still has a little bit of the question marks there. 10:21 But the top two lines, I thought, looked really good. 10:24 And then the last, the fourth line, looked pretty strong. 10:27 Defensively, I thought we played pretty solid all week. 10:29 I mean, we really, what, about 24, 25 shots on average for the both games. 10:35 So I mean, I think that that's pretty good. 10:36 And you have a good goalie playing well. 10:38 I think that that's a good sign for the future. 10:41 What do you think about Hall's return to defense, Hammy? 10:46 Well, I mean, you can't argue that the results that we saw, I mean, especially on Saturday, you get two assists here plus two. 10:53 You know, there's not a heck of a lot you can complain about. 10:56 I think that he probably, like I said earlier, it's one weekend, but I think that he's probably going to feel a little bit more confident with what he did last year, even though he was up front. 11:06 I think that maybe he gained some confidence from that. 11:08 And certainly being a senior, you know, he's been through the battles. 11:13 So I'm hoping that for him, it's going to be one of those kind of like the Nellie type of seasons, you know, where he doesn't do a lot his first three years, but then kind of comes on strong that last year. 11:23 So we'll see. 11:25 But he certainly started off the season well. 11:28 We have a question via Twitter from Andrew Soderquist. 11:31 He's wondering, do you guys feel that the Gopher's lack of size, especially on defense, will come back to haunt them later in the year? 11:40 Vegoe. 11:42 Well, I think it was hard to tell from this weekend whether or not it's going to hurt them. 11:47 I mean, even you look at guys like Brodean on the wild, and he's not a big guy, but he can get to Pucks, retrieve them before the forecheck gets in on them. 11:56 And, you know, he does just fine. 11:59 But the Gopher team, you know, they've got a lot of skill back there and a lot of speed. 12:03 So if they can get back and win Pucks before there's even a physical battle, you know, you're not going to notice that size difference quite as much. 12:11 But I think it's going to be a while before we know whether or not they're that talented, where they can get away with it, or if it's going to be an issue. 12:20 Hammy, lack of size, is it a problem? 12:23 You know, I mean, it's kind of to be determined. 12:26 I really am not concerned about the size aspect from the forward standpoint. 12:31 I think that they do have some good size and some good mix there. 12:35 I think that the speed factor was really apparent this weekend. 12:40 I think that this is going to be a very fast team. 12:42 So I think that being able to kind of close down the passing lanes and, you know, it's kind of having a quick stick and poking pucks away and all that, I think that that's going to be of value. 12:53 As far as the grinded out factor, I mean, you're not really going to get grinded out games in many cases, especially at least on an olympic size rank. 13:01 You might get that a little bit, but you're not going to have quite as much, maybe a little bit more in terms of the NHL size ranks. 13:07 And so we'll have to see how that plays out. 13:11 I think that, you know, Shea is not a big physical guy, but he's got good size. 13:16 You know, Parenteau, I think, is a little underrated as far as his physicality goes. 13:20 So I think that he'll be pretty solid there. 13:23 But, yeah, they don't really have the big, you know, six foot four guy that's going to really just be throwing his weight around, defensive, defenseman type. 13:31 And we'll have to see if that hurts them or not. 13:34 But it's a little too early to tell. 13:36 Just a reminder, if you're listening live, you can always just tweet one of us your questions and we'll try to get to them, you know, either at Gopher Puck Live or at Hammy Hockey or at EVegoe. 13:49 We'll try to answer your questions as we go through the show. 13:52 Actually, Andrew has another reply on his question. 13:57 He's kind of wondering, is the size a recruiting trend for Lucia? 14:02 You know, does he want these smaller players so they stay longer? 14:08 Well, I think there's no doubt that from at least from a forward standpoint that that's been a little bit more of an emphasis. 14:13 I mean, if you look at what they have, you know, lined up and what they have coming in this year, I mean, obviously, most of these guys are kind of in, you know, five, 10 to shorter range. 14:24 And let's face it, we got bit pretty hard for a few years because we had that kind of prototypical NHL size guy that would get drafted in the first couple of rounds and then would be gone after, you know, a couple of seasons. 14:36 And, you know, I think that that was a big piece of why we had that little slump for a few years, not the only reason, but it was certainly a piece of that. 14:45 And I think that, you know, when you see how well BC has done over the last 10 years, and a lot of that has been, you know, on the backs of some really talented offensive players that were smaller, I think that it's kind of, you know, a copycat situation. 14:59 I think that it's like the NFL. 15:01 It's a copycat league. 15:02 I think you're going to see some teams kind of employing that, you know, strategy a little bit more in the future. 15:07 From a defensive standpoint, I don't know. 15:09 I think it's, you know, it'll be a mix. 15:12 I don't think that they're going to emphasize small guys necessarily. 15:15 It's more what their puck skills are. 15:17 I would agree with that. 15:18 It definitely you need a mix on the D, but just because every once in a while, you need somebody back there to thump some skulls. 15:25 Yeah, Branszynski and Bischoff aren't exactly small guys. 15:28 True. 15:29 They're pretty solid defensemen. 15:32 Yeah, and if you look at the guys they have next year, Collins and Glover are both, you know, 6'2 plus. 15:37 I mean, Collins is, you know, 6'5. 15:40 I mean, so they're not bringing in small, you know, real small, small guys. 15:44 And then Steven Johnson, the latest commit, you know, he's I think like 6'1 or so. 15:49 And so it's they're bringing some guys in with some decent size on the back end, you know, in the future. 15:54 But I just think that from a forward standpoint, especially I think that they're probably not going to shy away from the smaller guys quite as much as maybe they did in the past. 16:03 And I think one other thing about the prospects that have been developing in Minnesota, there haven't been very many Bugstad type guys the last couple of years. 16:13 The elite players haven't been big, powerful skaters. 16:17 It's been a lot of smaller guys who are probably better in college, not so much for the NHL. 16:24 All right, boys. 16:25 Well, I guess we'd agree it was a good weekend for the Gophers. 16:29 They moved up a spot or two, whatever, in the rankings. 16:33 But listen, fans, don't pay attention to the polls for at least a month or more. 16:40 It's just more of a popularity contest right now. 16:43 So let's play some games, and then we'll start looking at the polls midseason, because then they're a little more accurate around then. 16:52 Well, if you look at it, polls are just all about... 16:55 It's just a discussion point. 16:57 It is. 16:58 It doesn't mean anything. 16:58 It's kind of just a fan thing. 17:00 And if anything, it's kind of a marketing thing for the pollsters who are involved, you know, the USCHOs and all that. 17:07 So it's just a, you know, it's a discussion point. 17:11 It definitely is. 17:13 Well, Gopher's good weekend. 17:16 And it looks like a couple other Big Ten teams did pretty well in the weekend as well. 17:20 Michigan defeats Boston College and then defeats RIT. 17:26 I thought they would have a little more of a struggle. 17:29 But, Hammy, Michigan might be a pretty darn good team. 17:35 Well, you know, I think it's one of those things. 17:36 I mean, people saw that exhibition loss that they had. 17:40 And, you know, they start wondering, you know, and for me, it's just a matter of, it's early in the year. 17:46 We talked about it last week. 17:48 You just don't know what you're going to get, you know, with certain teams and, and, you know, they're getting their feet wet and their lines settled. 17:55 And just everybody get developing that chemistry. 17:57 So you just don't know it. 17:59 I don't tend to read too much into anything one way or the other early in the year, because certainly you want to win those games for pair wise reasons. 18:06 But, you know, it was great to see them, you know, beat BC and, and, you know, I saw what the, on that poll that, you know, Wisconsin, the Gophers and Michigan are what, like three, four or five in the latest poll. 18:18 And, you know, people were talking about that on GPL and I'm like, Hey, look, you know, it gets back to the poll thing. 18:25 It's more of a discussion and not a true measure of where the teams are right now. 18:30 Well, that, and they're also talking about, you know, that kind of natural competition with other conferences and, you know, how we stack up and I'm like, you know, let's let it play out for a few years before we get in that hole. 18:42 What conference is better discussion? 18:43 Because the reality is, is that it's going to ebb and flow and it's not going to stay the same. 18:49 And sometimes it's going to be the Big Ten. 18:51 Sometimes it's probably going to be another conference, so don't read too much on any of that stuff. 18:56 Any thoughts on Michigan there, Vegoe? 18:59 Just that it's early and they did get two power play goals and I think the special teams can be a little hit and miss this early in the year because it's not like college football. 19:08 They haven't been working on this for over a month. 19:11 It's pretty early in this whole deal. 19:13 Well, usually in the podcast, we go over the conference, the games previously and then we preview. 19:20 But since it's a new conference we talked about last week, we don't know a lot about these teams. 19:24 So we'll just gloss over it until we get a good feeling of these teams. 19:30 We saw Penn State win this weekend over Army, opened up their new arena. 19:34 Apparently, it was blah, blah, blah, yippie, skippie. 19:37 Wisconsin swept Northern Michigan. 19:40 Anything about that guys you want to talk about? 19:42 Not really, maybe? 19:45 You know, it's kind of surprising that they took them late into that second game. 19:52 I'm a little surprised at the result in terms of needing basically to win in a last handful of minutes. 20:00 But I mean, it's nice because certainly when you're playing that non-conference schedule from our perspective, you want our conference mates to be winning those games. 20:10 And so it's only helps, you know, with regard to strength the schedule and all that other kind of stuff. 20:15 Ohio State got swept in a home at home by Miami. 20:19 That's pretty much all that in this past weekend. 20:22 Yeah, well, that's not a big surprise. 20:24 Miami is a good team this year. 20:25 And it'll be an interesting series to see them, you know, against North Dakota this coming weekend. 20:31 Won't shock me if Miami takes a tomb a couple of times. 20:35 Well, what was it preseason number one? 20:37 Was it Mass Lowell was upset by? 20:39 Oh, was it Sacred Heart? 20:41 Was it? 20:43 Who did they lose to? 20:45 Yes, they lost to Sacred Heart. 20:49 Yikes. 20:49 How about how about UNO? 20:52 Who did they they lost to? 20:55 Bentley. 20:57 They lost to Bentley six to four, and then they won the second night. 20:59 But I'm just like, wow, is Dean Blais in trouble? 21:03 Ah, well, I mean, I don't know that he'll ever be in trouble. 21:07 Really? 21:08 I mean, you got it. 21:08 You're going to have to win there. 21:11 I agree. 21:11 But at the same time, he's sort of what are they going to get to replace a guy with that track record? 21:17 I mean, it's not like it's not like, no, I don't think you would go. 21:24 But anyway, the reality is that maybe they could steal Hastings away from Mankato because he's got such strong ties to Omaha, but I just can't see them bailing. 21:37 I just, Blaze's problem has always been the crappy goaltending. 21:41 I mean, he's had good offensive players, but. 21:44 And he chased away an elite prospect last year, too. 21:48 So I just don't, I don't really understand what the problem is. 21:51 But it's always goalies with that guy. 21:55 I don't know Vegoe. 21:56 I think he could be in trouble if he has another terrible season. 22:00 Well, I think he's got a little bit longer leash. 22:02 I mean, they had more draft picks at UNO last year than in any year in the program's history. 22:07 So even though he chased away the big goalie that he had, Stolarts, you know, he'll get a couple more years to see if he can put something together for them. 22:18 Anything else going on this past weekend that piqued your interest, guys? 22:25 I can't say anything really popped out, you know, significantly. 22:28 I was a little surprised at how, I mean, our upcoming opponent in Bemidji kind of gave St. 22:34 Cloud a lot of trouble, it looked like. 22:35 Although, you know, certainly, that was probably more from the standpoint of how they play in terms of the games being close as opposed to anything else. 22:44 But that was a little surprising for me. 22:48 All right. 22:49 Well, I have a Twitter question from earlier today that I wrote down just in case I would forget. 22:56 That GPL or ZWOC wanted to know, has something changed with our relationship with Shattuck? 23:04 Seems like we're getting more commitments recently. 23:07 Hammy, you know, we talked before we went on the air that, you know, quite a few more Shattuck commitments recently. 23:17 And this just hasn't quite been the case over the last few years. 23:21 So what's up with that relationship? 23:23 Is it getting better? 23:26 Well, I don't know that it was ever necessarily bad. 23:28 I think if you look at the players that the Gophers have landed from that program, you know, that are on the horizon. 23:36 I mean, Edquist, Pitlick, Lindgren, I mean, they're all local kids, you know, and we're always going to have a pretty good, you know, stranglehold on the top local kids, you know. 23:49 So that's going to play a role in it. 23:51 Norman was a little bit of a surprise since he had ties to, you know, another program, so I mean, as far as family goes. 23:58 But, you know, I think that it's just a matter of, sometimes you just get a string of guys from a specific program that have ties to you, or you have, you know, they're friends, or whatever it might be, and it just kind of leads to a handful of them, you know, going in a certain direction. 24:15 And I think that happened with Wisconsin, with some kids from Chicago. 24:19 And so I think it just sometimes depends upon the circumstances. 24:23 I don't know that we ever had a bad relationship with, you know, Shaddock with Tom Ward being there and all that. 24:30 But I just think that, you know, sometimes you just have those connections. 24:35 Looking at the list of recruits, according to Heisenberg, and I was wondering if you could just tell us anything about these guys, Hammy. 24:43 Let's start with, was it a Tarek Baker? 24:47 Who's that? 24:48 The kid that, well, he's a Wisconsin kid, actually. 24:52 So people hopefully won't hold that against him, but he's a really talented forward. 24:56 He's been playing a little bit for Des Moines on USHL, but he's also been in Omaha. 25:02 I think that, you know, he had a handful of teams that were really interested in him, some really good programs were interested in him. 25:09 I don't know a ton about him because I haven't seen him much, but he's supposed to be a talented kid with a lot of offensive upside. 25:16 So, you know, he's an exciting recruit down the road. 25:19 We got a bunch of Shaddock boys. 25:20 He's like the Edquist, Ryan Edquist, the goalie, know much about him. 25:25 You know, he's supposed to be probably arguably the top, one of the top goalies in his age group in the US. 25:32 But, you know, the thing is, I'm a little sketchy with recruiting goalies that young. 25:38 I think that, you know, the goalies tend to develop a little bit later. 25:42 You tend to like to see them facing, you know, junior hockey competition before you really jump on board with that. 25:48 And so when I first heard this commitment, I was a little bit sketchy about whether or not that was the best decision. 25:55 But I'm not the coach. 25:56 And if they're confident that that's the right move to make, then so be it. 25:59 Yeah. 26:00 According to Heisenberg, he's not coming around to about 2016. 26:04 So that way to go is quite a waste of what's is a Rem Pitlick? 26:13 Is that his name? 26:14 Rem? 26:15 That's his name. 26:16 Yeah. 26:16 Is that a son of Lance? 26:20 You'd be correct on that. 26:21 Oh, I got Lance. 26:25 Pitlick didn't play that long ago, did he? 26:27 Or am I just getting old fast? 26:29 Yeah, I think we're getting old. 26:31 Boy, what's his story? 26:33 I very, you know, he's very small. 26:38 He's only 100. 26:39 Oh, 5'4, 130 right now. 26:41 Oh, jeez. 26:41 Well, I don't know how accurate that is, but I mean, he's a very small player. 26:46 He's very quick and elusive. 26:49 Okay. 26:50 He's a forward who is just kind of one of those water bug types that, you know, create a lot of offense and, you know, can turn on a dime. 26:57 Kind of, who was the kid, Steve Seigen? 26:58 Was that the one from UAA from several years ago? 27:02 You know, that, he's kind of like that type of a player. 27:06 I, one of our GPLers actually, I think helps train him. 27:11 I remember getting a private message from one of a fellow GPLer. 27:15 I won't mention his name, but who trains very closely with Pitlick and he raved about the kid and how quickly the kid picks up complex drills and just how skilled he is. 27:26 And so, you know, that he's going to be an exciting player. 27:30 I think I certainly, there's hope that he's going to have a late growth spurt because I guess, you know, his, I think his dad was what, six foot or so. 27:38 And I think I heard his mom had kind of like a late growth spurt when she was younger. 27:42 So hopefully something will come along and he'll kind of grow to be, you know, five, eight or whatever, you know, five, nine range, but we'll see. 27:49 Ryan Norman. 27:53 Very good two way type of a player, you know, skilled. 27:57 Certainly he's, he played on Shaddock's team as a 10th grader last year, which is always very impressive. 28:04 He, actually, I think his dad played, I don't know how much, but played for North Dakota. 28:09 So there was a little bit of a surprise there, but he's a, he's a talented kid and certainly very happy to have him coming on board in the future. 28:19 Yet another Ryan, Ryan Lindgren. 28:23 Yeah, that is probably, probably one of the biggest recruits that we've landed in a while. 28:29 This kid is, yeah, I mean, he's super talented. 28:32 He's already very good size. 28:34 He's probably the best defenseman in his age group in the country. 28:38 I mean, he's that good. 28:39 He's already got good size. 28:40 He's physical. 28:41 Where's he from? 28:43 Lakeville. 28:44 His brother, I think it's Lakeville. 28:46 I can't remember. 28:47 I'm pretty sure it is, but his brother is actually the goalie at St. 28:51 Cloud, so his older brother. 28:52 Okay. 28:54 Then we got it. 28:55 So yeah, he's very talented, very excited. 28:58 Tom Novak. 29:01 Yeah, people know him. 29:02 I don't know why on Heisenberg it says Burnsville when he's been playing for St. 29:06 Thomas, but he's very skilled. 29:08 Maybe that's where he's from, I'm guessing. 29:11 Yeah, it could be. 29:12 I don't know. 29:13 But in any case, last I saw he was the leading scorer in the Elite League. 29:19 I haven't looked recently, but he's very skilled, lefty, kind of a goal scorer. 29:26 They say he's out of Wisconsin, but I think that he's spent a lot of time in Minnesota. 29:31 So I'm not sure that I necessarily consider him a Wisconsinite, but I don't really split hairs on that stuff either. 29:40 We don't worry about that stuff anymore anyway. 29:41 Yeah, I know, but you know how some people are out there. 29:44 Yeah, they need to let it go. 29:48 Jack Ramsey. 29:51 You know, he's a kid out of Minnetonka playing in Penticton, a physical, everybody knows his dad, of course, is the former Gopher, former Wild assistant coach. 30:00 And you know, he's not, I don't think, going to be a real offensive player to me. 30:07 He's sort of a kid that's probably going to be more of that tougher, grinded out, maybe, you know, third, fourth line type of kid who is, you know, maybe has some offensive upside. 30:17 I know that I saw, I think it's Craig Button for TSN. 30:21 They had his top 30 for the next draft and he actually had Ramsey surprisingly to me, you know, ranked in his top 30 early on. 30:29 I don't know that he'll stay there, but, but you know, he's got some upside. 30:32 He's a very good athlete. 30:34 And so I think that there's some, there's some good potential there. 30:37 Ryan Collins, six foot five. 30:41 Yeah, but you might as well talk about Collins and Glover together. 30:43 They're both playing for the US team. 30:45 They came out of BSM. 30:49 They're different players. 30:50 You know, Collins a little bit more raw and tall. 30:53 He's more of a defensive minded type of kid. 30:56 You know, so he's going to bring certain aspects of the game. 31:00 Of course, I don't know what he's bumped up to now, but I think that he'll probably be more of a defensive style that we talked about earlier that maybe we don't necessarily have, you know, the big defensive guy right now. 31:10 And Glover is more of a, you know, he's kind of an offensive type of a player. 31:15 He plays good on both ends, but he's more of an offensive minded player. 31:19 He's probably going to be, I've seen where he's ranked kind of like in that first, second round draft territory. 31:26 I think Collins will be a little bit lower than that. 31:28 You know, maybe second, third round type of a range, but they're both really good players that we should be very optimistic about. 31:35 And it looks like both of those guys coming in next year? 31:38 Yep. 31:39 All right. 31:40 Twitter question from Bob Sucumano. 31:44 I don't know how to say your name, dude. 31:46 Sorry. 31:47 He wants to know, was Patoni on a recruiting trip last weekend? 31:51 Any idea if Kyle Kawamura is on the radar? 31:55 I don't know if that's how you pronounce his name, but Kyle Kawamura. 32:01 I can't say I've heard anything specific about him. 32:04 I don't recall if... 32:05 I thought I saw Patoni on the bench. 32:07 No, he was gone all weekend. 32:09 I never saw him. 32:10 Okay. 32:12 I don't ever really look too carefully at who's behind the bench. 32:16 But it's quite possible. 32:18 I mean, it's certainly early in the year, especially. 32:21 There's a lot going on with a lot of games, a lot of prospects that you want to keep your eye on throughout the year. 32:28 So it wouldn't shock me. 32:29 But I'd have to ask. 32:31 But I didn't really ask at all about what's been going on with that part of them. 32:36 Well, now that Vegoe's finally found a house while we've been excluding him for a little while. 32:40 Sorry, Bigs. 32:42 Hammy's kind of the recruiting guy. 32:43 Because I'm going to watch all these kids at some point this year, so. 32:48 Well, let's move right into this week, Vegoe. 32:50 Are you making the trip to Mabinji? 32:53 I am not making that trip to Mabinji. 32:55 I'm actually looking at houses, believe it or not. 32:58 Shocking. 32:59 Shocking. 33:00 I've never made the trip myself. 33:02 I'm hoping to get there someday. 33:04 Well, let's kick it off. 33:05 Bimiji Gophers. 33:06 Let's get your initial thoughts. 33:10 Well, I think Bimiji's got a veteran team, but not a lot of scoring. 33:14 They've returned a lot of their blue line core and their goalie, but they lost a lot of their scoring and they didn't have much to begin with. 33:21 So I think we're going to see some tighter games on the smaller rank. 33:26 Bimiji will probably be able to trap things down a little bit. 33:28 I know last year in Minnesota played on, they struggled a bit with how defensively Bimiji played, and Bimiji's going to be looking for turnovers. 33:37 And so especially with some of the younger blue liners working in the lineup, they're going to be a little bit more careful with the puck, maybe be a little more careful with their decision making. 33:47 I think you saw on Friday and Saturday, very active defensemen coming in from the blue line, making plays on the half wall. 33:55 So you'll probably see a little less of that this weekend. 33:59 Hammy, what do you think? 34:02 Well, I think we're probably going to see a style of play that I would be surprised if Bemidji doesn't try to kind of pack it in, play a little more conservatively. 34:13 They're not going to try to skate up and down the ice with the Gophers. 34:15 That's just not their game. 34:17 They're not going to try to outscore it. 34:19 You know, it's going to be kind of, you know, pick your spots, try to score a few goals. 34:24 And then if you get up a lead, you know, sort of play that conservative style and just try to keep, you know, three, four guys back and not allow much for offensive space for the Gophers. 34:36 And especially with a young team, you know, there might be a case where I think the guys are just going to need to be a little bit more patient. 34:43 I was looking at some of the statistics from Bemidji's games against St. 34:48 Cloud and, you know, St. 34:50 Cloud got a lot of point. 34:51 There are a lot of shots on goal. 34:54 And certainly they had some power play opportunities. 34:57 So if we get that, you know, kind of same situation, we're going to have to capitalize on the power play. 35:04 And, you know, Bemidji didn't get many shots. 35:06 I think the Gophers are a better team than St. 35:08 Cloud this year. 35:09 Even if they were younger, I think that more deeper, especially in forward. 35:12 So I think that, you know, I expect kind of similar games to that. 35:18 And hopefully, we'll see the Gophers come out with two wins. 35:22 Vegoe, do you follow the US. 35:23 Soccer team? 35:26 I do a little bit. 35:27 I've been known to see a game every once in a while in person when they come to Chicago. 35:31 And I did just see the score line. 35:34 I don't want to ruin it for people who, you know, maybe are DVR-ing. 35:37 Oh, we can ruin it. 35:38 That's too bad. 35:39 I couldn't believe what just happened. 35:40 I'm just kind of following here. 35:42 And it's just that this doesn't happen in soccer. 35:45 I knew you were probably following it, too. 35:48 Yeah, the US just scored two goals. 35:50 It was actually, they were down 1-0, and they've scored three goals here now. 35:54 And Mexico is back in the qualifying picture for World Cup. 35:58 If the US would have had a draw tonight, Mexico would have been out. 36:02 Oh, what a shame. 36:03 What a shame. 36:04 You guys are screwing over all my DVR. 36:08 I know. 36:09 What are you going to work out to tomorrow? 36:11 I don't know. 36:12 I only follow the US. 36:13 National Team when it comes to soccer. 36:14 I cannot do the European MLS, whatever. 36:18 I just... 36:19 It's a USA thing, kind of like with US. 36:21 Hockey and whatever. 36:22 So I just happened to see that and I figured Vegoe was following along with it too. 36:28 All right. 36:29 So you thinking, guys, what's going to be a sweep this weekend? 36:34 Sweep? 36:35 Maybe sweep in a tie? 36:37 It seems like in the past that the Gophers have struggled with teams that try to lock down and just play solid D, but, you know, geez, with their speed, they might be able to break this kind of defense. 36:51 Well, the Gophers have been pretty successful in Bemidji. 36:54 I know they've been there a ton, but... 36:55 Yeah, they have been. 36:59 I think that, like I said, I think it's going to be Bemidji trying to play a little more conservatively, and I'd be surprised if they tried to skate up and down the rink with the Gophers, because I just don't see that being their strategy to win games, especially against a pretty deep offensive team. 37:17 So, I mean, I'd be a little surprised if it's not kind of lower scoring. 37:22 I think that the young guys, especially are going to have to be a little more patient. 37:25 I don't know that's going to necessarily be kind of what we saw with the Mercyhursts. 37:29 It's probably going to be closer to what we saw in New Hampshire, despite the fact that New Hampshire is a much better team than Bemidji. 37:34 But I just think that that's probably the style of scores we're going to kind of see. 37:40 I think Minnesota has really got to be cautious about turning the puck over, because when you're playing a team like Bemidji, as long as you don't make silly mistakes and get caught below the dots, you're going to be in OK shape because you're going to be able to get some back pressure on every rush that they get because you're going to be able to catch up and make up for any of those mistakes. 38:00 But if you turn the puck over high in the offense zone, it's going to make it hard for you to get back and cover. 38:07 All right, guys. 38:08 Do you have any other thoughts? 38:09 I thought we'd keep it a little shorter this week. 38:13 What? 38:13 You don't like talking? 38:14 Oh, jeez. 38:15 You start at 9.45 at night. 38:18 OK. 38:18 Well, next week it will be at 9 as usual. 38:21 Sure. 38:21 Well, I thought it was going to be that way this week. 38:24 Right. 38:24 Wow. 38:25 It will be. 38:26 You had a hot date. 38:27 Just say it. 38:29 I didn't, but I had some other stuff going on. 38:35 Good Big Ten games this weekend, though. 38:37 Wisconsin and BC. 38:38 Yeah, I was just about to mention that. 38:39 Michigan, UNH. 38:40 I mean, those are going to be some good games. 38:42 Michigan State is going to get UMass. 38:44 I mean, some pretty good games out there. 38:45 Yeah, definitely. 38:46 Wisconsin is doing the old Boston two-step there, you know, with BU and BC. 38:53 Yeah, UMass. 38:56 How about all the talk on Penn State early on? 38:59 I mean, I've seen a number of articles talking about how, you know, their impact. 39:03 And it's like, well, well, I mean, I think that I understand the arguments that if they start off and do pretty well, especially in the next few years, that it might entice other bigger schools to kind of join the realm of college hockey, but... 39:19 It's all about the money. 39:21 You gotta have a big donor. 39:22 Without that donor, there is no Penn State D1 program. 39:27 Right. 39:27 Well, and I think some of these other places, they don't necessarily like Lincoln, for instance. 39:33 They have, they already have an arena that can hold hockey, so they don't really need some of that. 39:38 But, you know, it'll be interesting. 39:41 I'm certainly, I want Penn State to do well because I think it's going to just be a good addition to the Big Ten as far as the strength of the conference goes. 39:50 But, you know, we'll see. 39:52 To me, the team that needs to step it up is going to be Ohio State. 39:56 You know, they need to step it up. 39:57 You know, it seems like every five years they have a fairly decent team, and they did make the Frozen Four within the last ten years, right? 40:08 I want to say they made one Frozen Four, didn't they? 40:13 Honestly, I do not recall. 40:15 So CCH, guys, it's hard to tell. 40:19 Yeah. 40:20 One other thing to look for here in the next couple of weeks is the officiating. 40:24 I know we haven't touched on it, but the games Friday and Saturday were called much closer and tighter than I think most people at Mary G would have liked. 40:33 And I think that's going to be something we're going to see as a trend throughout the year. 40:37 It will be something interesting to watch. 40:40 I thought the funny thing that I saw kind of perusing various message boards was the fact that, you know, and I said this last year when they talked about having these new things, like in the National College Hockey Conference, and oh, they're going to have these reviews and they're going to do this and do that so they have better refereeing. 40:59 And I'm like, the fans are still going to cry and whine about bad calls and this and that and whatever, and that's exactly what you saw. 41:06 You know, they can try to legislate and review and do whatever they're going to do. 41:12 In the end, the fans are still going to whine about missed calls and whatever. 41:16 So I don't expect all that stuff to do a hell of a lot. 41:19 You know what? 41:20 I don't have a problem if they call it close, as long as they're consistent. 41:24 And they're that way the entire season. 41:29 I've always, I never liked the WCHA refs because a lot of times, first couple of weeks, they were real tight on things. 41:34 Then they let a lot of stuff go. 41:37 And by the time, you know, the Gophers or another WCHA team would get to the NCAA playoffs, they'd have different refs and they would call it much tighter. 41:46 And it was a different game when you got to the NCAA playoffs. 41:51 Well, I think technically, you should kind of expect, you know, the Gophers should be a team that probably isn't penalized as much. 41:57 I mean, a lot of times you see penalties because guys, you know, they get out of position or are lazy with their skating or whatever it might be. 42:04 And I think that with the speed that this team has, they should get a lot of those kinds of hookings and, you know, some of the lazier penalties. 42:13 So hopefully, if there is going to be called tighter, that's going to be the Gophers' advantage with their speed. 42:18 But, you know, we'll see. 42:20 Yeah, I had no idea who those refs were last weekend. 42:25 All the linesmen were the same, a lot of the same guys from the WCHA, but I had never heard of any of the four guys that refed the Gopher Games this past weekend. 42:33 Yeah, I know Saturday night the guys were CCHA guys last year. 42:37 Okay. 42:39 Because you looked it up, didn't you? 42:41 I don't look them up. 42:42 I was wondering who these guys were calling this tight game at Mariucci. 42:47 Yeah, I couldn't even barely pronounce their names. 42:52 But, you know what, that's kind of a good thing if you don't remember the refs that much. 42:57 That's usually a good thing. 42:58 I know in this case it's because we don't know them at all. 43:00 But, I didn't think that the weekend was poorly refed or anything like that. 43:06 I didn't really have any issues with what I saw either way. 43:09 And so, I think that all in all, that's all you can really ask from refs. 43:12 Definitely. 43:13 Yeah, I didn't think it was poor or anything. 43:14 I just thought it was tighter than your typical game from last season. 43:18 Yes, yes. 43:20 And another problem I have is that the refs were not wearing numbers either. 43:24 So, you couldn't identify who was who. 43:28 So, get used to it. 43:30 Go for fans. 43:31 Unless you see Marco Hunt out there or someone else, it's going to be tough to know who is who. 43:37 What do you think of some of the things that the Big Ten have done as far as promotions go? 43:41 I mean, I kind of like the fact that they're doing this three star thing, for instance. 43:45 Yeah, I did like that, actually. 43:47 I kind of like that, you know, because not only because, you know, it's better than just one guy getting recognition for Player of the Week or whatever, but it's also nice to, you know, start learning a little bit more about other teams and their players and whatever. 43:59 So, I kind of like the fact that they have that, you know, top three stars of the week or whatever it was. 44:05 Well, actually, the main PR guy for Big Ten Hockey was there Friday night, and he was getting guys, you know, he went to everybody in the media deck and said, hey, are you following us or go to this website to get on the Big Ten Hockey, you know, email list, blah, blah, blah. 44:23 He was being very proactive. 44:26 So it will be interesting to see how things progress from here on out with Big Ten. 44:31 Say, I didn't check this, but has it been solidified now how much of the TV is going to be on from that Notre Dame series? 44:39 Is it just one game or is it both or how? 44:41 Well, how it's going to be is one game will be on NBC Sports Network. 44:45 That will be the Friday night game. 44:48 Saturday will be the NBC Sports Network live live events or something like that. 44:57 It will be a streamed game, the Saturday night game. 45:03 And it looks like the Big Ten Network is also going to be streaming many FSN games as well as their Big Ten games. 45:12 This past weekend, if you had the, you could go to the BTN to Go website and see the Gopher games live on the internet. 45:21 Of course, you have to have a television provider that has the Big Ten because there's a login and everything that you like for Dish Network. 45:31 I can use that service, but maybe some other cable networks around the country might not let you use that service. 45:40 So that will be something to look at in the future too for, you know, they've scheduled all the way out through the end of December for Big Ten to go and most of the games are going to be on. 45:50 So if you're somewhere out in other part of the country, you may be able to go for hockey either through an app on your phone or iPad or whatever or just on your computer. 46:01 So technology is getting better. 46:05 Yeah, I really like how much, you know, airtime and everything else that the Big Ten is getting. 46:10 Yeah, the commercials and everything. 46:12 Well, I think it's twice as many games as the National College Hockey Conference. 46:19 You know, as far as a national TV perspective goes, I don't remember what it was, but I mean, it's very impressive. 46:24 And I think that it's certainly going to be a big thing for the conference because like it or not, you know, we're in a media age and TV is a big part of that. 46:33 And, you know, you look at the arms race and just college sports in general, that's what you're seeing. 46:38 I mean, you're seeing all these conference shifts and teams going here or there because of, you know, television essentially and the money that comes with it and people who, you know, aren't going to be on TV as much and whatever, they might be on the internet and whatever, but nonetheless, it's going to be an arms race in that regard too. 46:57 Well, one thing is also nice is that like with the BTN to go, you can go back and watch the New Hampshire game online if you want, the entire game. 47:05 So that's kind of nice. 47:07 You just want to go back and look at something, you're bored at work, not endorsing that. 47:13 And if you go to the men's schedule page on GPL, it tells you which games are going to be on FSM North, FSM Plus, Big Ten, whatever. 47:24 And if you click those icons, it will bring you to information on those networks and streams and whatever. 47:30 So, you get all the information there. 47:34 And you can get the ICAL link. 47:36 Yes. 47:36 And then you can put them on your calendar. 47:37 Yes, there's a little iOS and a.ICS link on the schedule page. 47:44 So, if you click on that, even if you have Google Calendars, Android, if you click... 47:47 Android, you want to click the.ICS, and you should be able to save it, and it will load the entire schedule into your calendar. 47:53 And the same thing with Apple. 47:55 It's got an iOS little button at the top. 47:57 You click that, it's going to add it to your calendar, and you're good to go for the year. 48:02 Thanks for the reminder there, Veegs. 48:04 Yeah, it's a great title. 48:06 I like it, because I like it, and I can make... 48:08 Well, at least with the iOS one, I can make a change right on my iOS calendar, and it's going to be reflected to everyone else who has an iOS device. 48:18 Just like this weekend, when the opponent changed, didn't know who was going to be in Saturday, I changed it to New Hampshire, and I'm guessing on your iPhone it says New Hampshire now. 48:27 So that's a nice little feature there. 48:30 All right. 48:30 Anything else, guys? 48:33 Tomorrow there's a presale for the Hockey City Classic. 48:36 Type in U of M staff for the promo code, and you can get tickets for that January 17th game. 48:43 Wow. 48:45 Those cheap tickets. 48:47 They help 15 bucks. 48:49 Yeah, for about 1,000 seats. 48:55 Veegs is getting a kickback for that. 48:59 I might be able to use it towards a down payment. 49:01 Who knows? 49:05 All right, then. 49:05 Well, I think that's going to wrap it up for this week. 49:08 We'll be back again next week. 49:10 We'll talk about Bemidji and we'll preview the big series with Boston College coming up. 49:16 That's one of the series I am looking forward to. 49:19 Until then, thanks for listening.