By now, I'm sure everyone has heard that the Big Ten will form a hockey conference for the 2013-14 season. I'm really mixed how I feel about this.
On the one hand, you've got added exposure for the sport, Michigan will play Wisconsin and Minnesota more often (which I love), State is going to get destroyed, I won't have to hear about how great the WCHA is all the time, and it opens the game up to further expansion.
On the other hand, it would be a tragedy if teams like Bowling Green, Lake State, Michigan Tech, etc. struggled to survive in a BTHC world, there's the thought that we'll lose out on some traditional rivalries, etc.
The Big Ten is a name, and a well-recognized one to boot. It adds a little extra credibility that maybe you don't get with the "Central Collegiate Hockey Association". The fact that these teams can now play for a "Big Ten Championship" is kind of cool. But the real exposure is going to come in the form of the Big Ten Network. Brian posted a ton of links, one of which mentioned that they were committing to "at least 40 games" per season. That's huge for the fans, because we'll get to see our team a lot more. It's also huge for recruiting to be able to tell a kid that he'll play on national TV 10-15 times per season minimum. Plus, as my buddy Kevin texted me when it was announced: "HD, yo!"
Additionally, the selfish part of me is really excited to get to play Wisconsin and Minnesota more often. Quite honestly, I hate Minnesota more than I hate any other team in the country. I'd absolutely take a win over Minnesota over a win against FYS any day. Living in Madison, I've grown to hate the Badgers as well. The BTHC won't start until after I'm likely living back in Michigan, but still, four games a year against these teams instead of one? Big fan. Especially if the Gophers keep sucking. (Yes, I know they killed us this year.) And it'll be a good opportunity to get back out to Madison and visit after I move back home eventually. Tie it in to the Michigan road weekend? That's good times.
State will keep getting destroyed. That's fun too. If you didn't hear, they hired the former commish of the CCHA, Tom Anastos as their new head coach. He's never been a head coach outside of U-M Dearborn's club team and hasn't coached period in 20-or-so years. MGoBlog is pointing and laughing. Spartan fans are "absolutely crushed". I kind of wonder how they're going to recruit, having been as bad as they've been for the last few years. Now they're bringing in a guy with no track record of developing players, putting guys into the NHL, or, you know, coaching. At least they'll have the Big Ten Network recruiting bump.
The other thing is that it opens the sport up to further expansion. As it is right now, Atlantic Hockey has 12 teams, the CCHA has 11, the WCHA has 12, Hockey East has 10, and the EZAC has 12. Where are you going to put anyone? The CCHA could take one, and Hockey East could take a couple if they really wanted to.
After B1G hockey comes about, the WCHA will be back down to 10, the CCHA will have 8, and the Big Ten will have 6. That's at least eight spots that are open for non-Big Ten teams (including Hockey East taking two) and that's a good thing.
I agree with Brian that there will probably be some realignment. This is a completely uneducated opinion, but back when we went through this with Omaha, Bemidji, and Huntsville, I thought that the two Alaska schools should end up in the same conference for a lot of reasons and I'm sticking to that now. You lose the Minnesota/Wisconsin/Michigan draw (I have a hard time believing that OSU or FYS are drawing crowds) but you could add some additional importance to a rivalry series, teams from the conference could just go up for 2 weeks at a time and knock out both of them, and you'd lower the number of teams that have to make the trek up to Alaska in the first place. (I did the math on that awhile back.)
Again, completely uneducated opinion, but I could see Tech in the CCHA or NMU back in the WCHA. There have been rumblings about Notre Dame flirting with Hockey East or Miami going to the WCHA. This is going to get interesting.
I agree with the points that MGoBlog made about the conferences being okay. Denver and NoDak are the teams to beat in the WCHA more often than not. CC and Omaha are both solid. Duluth is usually pretty good. St. Cloud is pretty good. They're still alright. The CCHA is alright as long as Miami and Notre Dame stay in the conference and stay good. The smaller schools lose the Michigan gate, but Michigan'll still end up playing them sometimes, given that a 20-game conference schedule means 16-or-so non-conference games.
My enthusiasm drops significantly if it results in some of the smaller schools dropping their program, but it doesn't seem that that's the plan for any of them--at least not yet. Also, despite what they're currently saying, I bet we see Iowa go D-1 in hockey at some point. There are so many USHL teams there....they could recruit. People in the state clearly are at least aware of hockey. I think it makes a lot of sense.
Right now, though, my immediate reaction was a positive one: More games on TV, more games in HD, more games against Minnesota and Wisconsin, at least some semblance of a recruiting bump, more exposure for this awesome sport. I know my team is one of the "haves" in this scenario, but I see a lot to like.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Selection Show Live Blog
Here we go!
10:35-Yale/Air Force and Union/Duluth in the East Regional in Bridgeport. In the breakdown, Melrose pretty much rips Ryan Rondeau, the Yale goalie, who happens to lead all goalies in goals against average (1.83) and is second in save percentage (.932). I think I would've just said what everyone was thinking, which is "The ECAC sucks. We have no idea how good they actually are."
10:41-North Dakota gets the 1 seed in the Midwest Regional in GB. They'll take on RPI. Denver and Western Michigan play in the other side of the bracket. Denver and NoDak just played a double-overtime game last night.
10:44-We saw a clip from the semifinal game and they show a clip of Evan Trupp picking the puck up on his stick in his own zone and skating the length of the ice. He didn't score, but that was pretty damn cool. That guy can fly. Mike Legg is still better.
10:50-Hehe! Another shot of BU beating Miami for the title. How many years do we get to see this? It never gets old. BC number one seed in the West regional. They'll play CC. Michigan/UNO on the other side. That's a tough draw, and it's a perfect example of why you HAVE to beat Western Michigan and keep your #1 seed. If we got the #4 overall seed, we'd be looking at a UNH --> Merrimack/ND/(maybe Miami?) --> Yale road to the Final. Now it's UNO --> BC --> North Dakota.
10:53-The rest of the bracket is Miami/UNH and Merrimack/Notre Dame.
10:58-God we crapped the bed by losing to Western. Is it possible to still pull this off? Sure. But if you win that game, you avoid BC, NoDak, and Miami until the Championship Game. Now we'd likely have to go through both of them just to make the Final. (Note: This is assuming the NCAA does the #1 bracket vs #4 bracket in the Frozen Four, which is how it usually works.)
I think our chances of making the Frozen Four went from 50% down to something like 15-20% by losing that game to Western Michigan and getting the draw we did. Ugh.
We'll play at 5:30 on Friday. According to my guide on Dish Network, ESPNU will air that game on tape delay at 11:30 pm. They'll be airing both games from the East Regional live, then showing the nightcap of the Midwest Regional. Then they'll show our game on tape delay. I hate that ESPN has the full rights now. It was so great being able to flip around and play choose your own adventure with which game you wanted to watch live. Hopefully the in-laws place in Florida gets ESPN3.com. That's where I'll be.
More later.
BEAT DUKE!
10:35-Yale/Air Force and Union/Duluth in the East Regional in Bridgeport. In the breakdown, Melrose pretty much rips Ryan Rondeau, the Yale goalie, who happens to lead all goalies in goals against average (1.83) and is second in save percentage (.932). I think I would've just said what everyone was thinking, which is "The ECAC sucks. We have no idea how good they actually are."
10:41-North Dakota gets the 1 seed in the Midwest Regional in GB. They'll take on RPI. Denver and Western Michigan play in the other side of the bracket. Denver and NoDak just played a double-overtime game last night.
10:44-We saw a clip from the semifinal game and they show a clip of Evan Trupp picking the puck up on his stick in his own zone and skating the length of the ice. He didn't score, but that was pretty damn cool. That guy can fly. Mike Legg is still better.
10:50-Hehe! Another shot of BU beating Miami for the title. How many years do we get to see this? It never gets old. BC number one seed in the West regional. They'll play CC. Michigan/UNO on the other side. That's a tough draw, and it's a perfect example of why you HAVE to beat Western Michigan and keep your #1 seed. If we got the #4 overall seed, we'd be looking at a UNH --> Merrimack/ND/(maybe Miami?) --> Yale road to the Final. Now it's UNO --> BC --> North Dakota.
10:53-The rest of the bracket is Miami/UNH and Merrimack/Notre Dame.
10:58-God we crapped the bed by losing to Western. Is it possible to still pull this off? Sure. But if you win that game, you avoid BC, NoDak, and Miami until the Championship Game. Now we'd likely have to go through both of them just to make the Final. (Note: This is assuming the NCAA does the #1 bracket vs #4 bracket in the Frozen Four, which is how it usually works.)
I think our chances of making the Frozen Four went from 50% down to something like 15-20% by losing that game to Western Michigan and getting the draw we did. Ugh.
We'll play at 5:30 on Friday. According to my guide on Dish Network, ESPNU will air that game on tape delay at 11:30 pm. They'll be airing both games from the East Regional live, then showing the nightcap of the Midwest Regional. Then they'll show our game on tape delay. I hate that ESPN has the full rights now. It was so great being able to flip around and play choose your own adventure with which game you wanted to watch live. Hopefully the in-laws place in Florida gets ESPN3.com. That's where I'll be.
More later.
BEAT DUKE!
A Small Consolation
After a very subpar performance against Western Michigan the night before, Michigan was at least able to get back a little bit of momentum heading into the NCAA Tournament by knocking off Notre Dame 4-2 in the CCHA Consolation Game.
Notre Dame took a 1-0 lead on a fluky goal. Shawn Hunwick cleared the puck around the boards, but it struck the official and bounced right back into the slot where Riley Sheahan was able to put it in.
Michigan then came back with a pair of goals 15 seconds apart. Caporusso came in on a two-on-one and opted to shoot, beating Summerhays to tie the game. Hagelin then put a shot through from around the faceoff dot to make it 2-1 Michigan.
The Wolverines extended their lead in the third period. Mac Bennett let a shot go from the point that deflected off a defenseman. Summerhays lunged to cover it, but Jeff Rohrkemper just beat him to it and got enough of the puck to knock it over the goal line.
Notre Dame crawled back within one with about 1:20 left in regulation as TJ Tynan was able to bang home a rebound.
The Wolverines appeared to seal the game when Scooter Vaughan had a breakaway on an empty net from center ice in. He ended up scoring but the whistle had gone several seconds earlier. The referee ruled a hand pass and blew the play dead. Upon review, there were a couple of things wrong with that call. First, Vaughan touched the puck while it was still in the Michigan zone and hand passes are legal in your own end. Second, Vaughan was the player who played the puck with his glove in the first place. It was as bad of a call as you'll ever see. It gave Notre Dame a chance to tie the game back up. Fortunately Luke Glendening was able to put one into the empty net that did count, and Michigan escaped with a 4-2 win.
The hero of the game was Shawn Hunwick, who made a regulation career-high 42 saves in the victory. Michigan was outshot by a 44-23 margin, including 16-6 in the final frame. Hunwick made a slew of top-notch saves, but none was better than a glove stop he made on Calle Ridderwall in the third period, which prompted me to make a "Call him Kevin Quick, because he just robbed a Swede" joke. The media continued with the trend of not making him the #1 star when he was at his best. Caporusso got the nod, which, okay. He did have a goal and an assist in the 15-second span that gave us the lead, but Hunwick was fantastic once again.
The seniors end their careers 16-4-0 at Joe Louis Arena. Caporusso had 13-7--20 in those games.
So now it's off to the NCAA Tournament. USCHO has Michigan projected to be the #2 seed in the St. Louis regional, facing Nebraska-Omaha in the first round. If we advance, we would play the winner of Boston College and Colorado College.
Adam Wodon from CHN has Michigan the #2 seed in the Manchester, NH regional. He also has us facing UNO in the first round, but he would have us playing the winner of Miami/UNH if we advance. UNH is hosting yet again.
As a reminder, we were 1-1-0 against UNO this season. Both games were at Yost. We lost the opening game of the series 4-2 before throttling them 6-1 Saturday night. The Mavericks have struggled down the stretch, going 3-5-0 in their last 8 and 1-4-0 in their last 5. They've been very inconsistent since early December, sweeping only 2 series the remainder of the year (St. Cloud and Wiscy, both at home).
The selection show airs at 11:30 EDT on ESPN2.
Notre Dame took a 1-0 lead on a fluky goal. Shawn Hunwick cleared the puck around the boards, but it struck the official and bounced right back into the slot where Riley Sheahan was able to put it in.
Michigan then came back with a pair of goals 15 seconds apart. Caporusso came in on a two-on-one and opted to shoot, beating Summerhays to tie the game. Hagelin then put a shot through from around the faceoff dot to make it 2-1 Michigan.
The Wolverines extended their lead in the third period. Mac Bennett let a shot go from the point that deflected off a defenseman. Summerhays lunged to cover it, but Jeff Rohrkemper just beat him to it and got enough of the puck to knock it over the goal line.
Notre Dame crawled back within one with about 1:20 left in regulation as TJ Tynan was able to bang home a rebound.
The Wolverines appeared to seal the game when Scooter Vaughan had a breakaway on an empty net from center ice in. He ended up scoring but the whistle had gone several seconds earlier. The referee ruled a hand pass and blew the play dead. Upon review, there were a couple of things wrong with that call. First, Vaughan touched the puck while it was still in the Michigan zone and hand passes are legal in your own end. Second, Vaughan was the player who played the puck with his glove in the first place. It was as bad of a call as you'll ever see. It gave Notre Dame a chance to tie the game back up. Fortunately Luke Glendening was able to put one into the empty net that did count, and Michigan escaped with a 4-2 win.
The hero of the game was Shawn Hunwick, who made a regulation career-high 42 saves in the victory. Michigan was outshot by a 44-23 margin, including 16-6 in the final frame. Hunwick made a slew of top-notch saves, but none was better than a glove stop he made on Calle Ridderwall in the third period, which prompted me to make a "Call him Kevin Quick, because he just robbed a Swede" joke. The media continued with the trend of not making him the #1 star when he was at his best. Caporusso got the nod, which, okay. He did have a goal and an assist in the 15-second span that gave us the lead, but Hunwick was fantastic once again.
The seniors end their careers 16-4-0 at Joe Louis Arena. Caporusso had 13-7--20 in those games.
So now it's off to the NCAA Tournament. USCHO has Michigan projected to be the #2 seed in the St. Louis regional, facing Nebraska-Omaha in the first round. If we advance, we would play the winner of Boston College and Colorado College.
Adam Wodon from CHN has Michigan the #2 seed in the Manchester, NH regional. He also has us facing UNO in the first round, but he would have us playing the winner of Miami/UNH if we advance. UNH is hosting yet again.
As a reminder, we were 1-1-0 against UNO this season. Both games were at Yost. We lost the opening game of the series 4-2 before throttling them 6-1 Saturday night. The Mavericks have struggled down the stretch, going 3-5-0 in their last 8 and 1-4-0 in their last 5. They've been very inconsistent since early December, sweeping only 2 series the remainder of the year (St. Cloud and Wiscy, both at home).
The selection show airs at 11:30 EDT on ESPN2.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Turrible.
Western looked like the hungrier team. Michigan was done in by silly penalties, poor penalty killing, and a largely uninspiring performance.
The Broncos scored 4 in the second period en route to a 5-2 win.
DeBlois got called from hitting from behind (or boarding, whatever they're calling it these days) in the first period. Looked like the guy turned after he had committed to the hit, but whatever. Then on the power play, Merrill plowed the net off it's moorings on the most obvious penalty to put us down on a 5-on-3 since Komisarek chucked the puck out of the zone against St. Cloud.
Of course WMU scored. Langlais wrapped it around the boards, didn't get it out. WMU got set up and put a shot past Hunwick. That was really the only thing that happened in the first, as Michigan outshot Western by a whopping 6-4 count.
My computer actually went to sleep from a lack of typing early in the second period. DeBlois went off for another hit from behind and WMU scored again. Wrister from the high slot that went in and out really quickly, but it was clearly a goal.
After a too many men call on Michigan, the Broncos made it 3-0. Are you noticing a trend? There were three blocked shots in a row (one might have gotten through) before the rebound came out to the side for an easy tap in. Two Broncos could have scored that one.
Michigan then made it 3-1 off a Moffie shot through a Lynch screen. But with a little life, Sparks overskated a puck by the blueline and turned it over. That led to a partial breakaway. The guy shot from about 3 feet out and it juuuuuuust snuck through Hunwick and got over the goal line.
Hunwick then made a save, kicked out the rebound, stopped the next one. The puck was trickling toward the goal line and Merrill knocked it out of there------right onto the stick of O'Kane who buried it to give WMU a 5-1 lead.
Merrill then took a shot from the point that hit Sparks on the way through and brought Michigan to within 3, but that's as close as we'd get. I was in full-on fast-forward mode by that point.
Western looked like they wanted it more, and good for them. They've got a chance to get in the tournament, they were getting a little revenge for the way we stole one on Senior Night, and they definitely outplayed Michigan tonight. Our penalty kill has been better of late, but they went the route of killing off penalties as quickly as possible tonight--by giving up goals. It was pretty brutal.
We've seen these alarmingly bad performances before, and it's no less frustrating when we've got a tournament bid sewn up. The funny thing is, if all the favorites win tomorrow except for WMU over Miami, we're still a #1 seed.
As it stands right now, we're sitting 7th in the PWR and probably looking at a 2 seed, which is probably closer to where this team is at. Hopefully we'll have a better effort tomorrow against a Notre Dame team that got similarly thrashed in their semifinal.
The Broncos scored 4 in the second period en route to a 5-2 win.
DeBlois got called from hitting from behind (or boarding, whatever they're calling it these days) in the first period. Looked like the guy turned after he had committed to the hit, but whatever. Then on the power play, Merrill plowed the net off it's moorings on the most obvious penalty to put us down on a 5-on-3 since Komisarek chucked the puck out of the zone against St. Cloud.
Of course WMU scored. Langlais wrapped it around the boards, didn't get it out. WMU got set up and put a shot past Hunwick. That was really the only thing that happened in the first, as Michigan outshot Western by a whopping 6-4 count.
My computer actually went to sleep from a lack of typing early in the second period. DeBlois went off for another hit from behind and WMU scored again. Wrister from the high slot that went in and out really quickly, but it was clearly a goal.
After a too many men call on Michigan, the Broncos made it 3-0. Are you noticing a trend? There were three blocked shots in a row (one might have gotten through) before the rebound came out to the side for an easy tap in. Two Broncos could have scored that one.
Michigan then made it 3-1 off a Moffie shot through a Lynch screen. But with a little life, Sparks overskated a puck by the blueline and turned it over. That led to a partial breakaway. The guy shot from about 3 feet out and it juuuuuuust snuck through Hunwick and got over the goal line.
Hunwick then made a save, kicked out the rebound, stopped the next one. The puck was trickling toward the goal line and Merrill knocked it out of there------right onto the stick of O'Kane who buried it to give WMU a 5-1 lead.
Merrill then took a shot from the point that hit Sparks on the way through and brought Michigan to within 3, but that's as close as we'd get. I was in full-on fast-forward mode by that point.
Western looked like they wanted it more, and good for them. They've got a chance to get in the tournament, they were getting a little revenge for the way we stole one on Senior Night, and they definitely outplayed Michigan tonight. Our penalty kill has been better of late, but they went the route of killing off penalties as quickly as possible tonight--by giving up goals. It was pretty brutal.
We've seen these alarmingly bad performances before, and it's no less frustrating when we've got a tournament bid sewn up. The funny thing is, if all the favorites win tomorrow except for WMU over Miami, we're still a #1 seed.
As it stands right now, we're sitting 7th in the PWR and probably looking at a 2 seed, which is probably closer to where this team is at. Hopefully we'll have a better effort tomorrow against a Notre Dame team that got similarly thrashed in their semifinal.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Having a Seat Over There: Evan Allen
Chris Heisenberg is reporting that Michigan has picked up a commitment from Detroit Honeybaked forward Evan Allen. (HT to @ChrisDilks) He's a February of 1995 birthday, so that probably puts him in the incoming class of 2013.
Allen is listed as 5'10", 180. He has 14-24--38 in 34 games, which is good for the team lead in points. Fellow Michigan commit Tyler Motte is second on the team with a 23-14--37 line. His total of 38 points is good for 11th in the league in scoring. Allen's 24 assists are good for 7th in the league.
Last year Allen had 14-35--49 in 31 games, which was good for first in the Bantam Major division. And actually, JT Compher was third in points, and Motte was 4th. (Allen and Compher were also 1-2 in Bantam Minor points two seasons ago.) 35 assists was ten better than anyone else in the league. The other good thing is that in 65 games over two years, Allen has taken just ten penalty minutes.
In the MAHA state tournament, Honeybaked went 6-0-0 to capture the title and Allen led the team and tournament with 5-5--10. Motte was second in both classifications with 3-5--8. They are now off to Nationals.
Allen was one of the players invited to the NTDP tryout camp.
The Scouting News (I know...) says that he has made a habit of "impressing the daylights" out of contributing sources. He is also "very agile on his skates, can turn on a dime and possesses pretty impressive acceleration."
This is old, but back in 09, he impressed USHR at the Select 14 Camp. They had him as the #3 forward, saying that he had "Great hands, good shot. All-around strong game." At Select 15s last year they didn't have him as highly ranked (13th) but said that he "does a little bit of everything. Battles. Makes plays."
Allen is listed as 5'10", 180. He has 14-24--38 in 34 games, which is good for the team lead in points. Fellow Michigan commit Tyler Motte is second on the team with a 23-14--37 line. His total of 38 points is good for 11th in the league in scoring. Allen's 24 assists are good for 7th in the league.
Last year Allen had 14-35--49 in 31 games, which was good for first in the Bantam Major division. And actually, JT Compher was third in points, and Motte was 4th. (Allen and Compher were also 1-2 in Bantam Minor points two seasons ago.) 35 assists was ten better than anyone else in the league. The other good thing is that in 65 games over two years, Allen has taken just ten penalty minutes.
In the MAHA state tournament, Honeybaked went 6-0-0 to capture the title and Allen led the team and tournament with 5-5--10. Motte was second in both classifications with 3-5--8. They are now off to Nationals.
Allen was one of the players invited to the NTDP tryout camp.
The Scouting News (I know...) says that he has made a habit of "impressing the daylights" out of contributing sources. He is also "very agile on his skates, can turn on a dime and possesses pretty impressive acceleration."
This is old, but back in 09, he impressed USHR at the Select 14 Camp. They had him as the #3 forward, saying that he had "Great hands, good shot. All-around strong game." At Select 15s last year they didn't have him as highly ranked (13th) but said that he "does a little bit of everything. Battles. Makes plays."
Thursday, March 10, 2011
CCHA Quarterfinals: BGSU Preview
Last weekend, Bowling Green went up to Northern Michigan and became the first lowest-seeded team ever to win a CCHA playoff series by upsetting the #6-seeded Wildcats. Their reward is a trip to Yost and a second-round series with the Michigan Wolverines.
NMU took a 1-0 lead in the series, but BGSU advanced after 2-0 and 2-1 (2ot) wins. In doing so, they won two games in a row for the first time since October 22nd and 23rd against Alabama-Huntsville. (They did win and then pick up a shootout win in late January.) For the regular season in the CCHA they were 3-21-4-2, so to pick up a pair of wins on the road was pretty impressive. They actually did pick up a win against Notre Dame. They also knocked off NMU and LSSU in conference.
The Falcons were far and away the last place team in the CCHA. They scored 15 points on the season. Michigan State was 10th with 35. They were also a distant last in goals scored. Their 41 in 28 games was a full 18 behind Ferris State. They were also tied for last in goals allowed with NMU.
The offense is really, really bad. They didn't score more than three goals against a team not named Alabama-Huntsville this season (though they did have 5, 4, and 5 against UAH). They scored exactly three goals on seven occasions, but it's worth pointing out that three of those were against ND and Miami. The first game of the series against NMU (a 6-3 loss) was the only time they've scored more than two goals in 2011. Since then, they've gone 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1, 0, 3, 2, 2. That's ugly. They currently rank dead-last in offense at just 1.85 goals per game.
That said, they've been playing pretty decent defense. For a team that was last in the CCHA in goals allowed, they've only given up 28 goals in their last 12 games. That's not too bad, especially considering 11 of those were over 2 games. In the other 10 games, they've only given up 17. They're 34th in team defense at 2.92 goals per game.
They're led up front by sophomore Jordan Samuels-Thomas, who has followed up his 25 point freshman campaign with 9-12--21 in 34 games this year. Freshman Brett Mohler has 7-10--17 on the year. Nobody else has more than 6 goals or 15 points.
They've gotten absolutely nothing offensively out of their defensemen. No defender has more than nine points and their blueline as a whole has 7-23--30 (along with 1 PPG).
In net they had a time-split for a good chunk of the season, but senior Nick Eno has given way to sophomore Andrew Hammond. Eno did get in during Game 1 of the NMU series after Hammond got the hook, but Hammond played games 2 and 3 and allowed just one goal on 74 shots in helping the Falcons to advance. Despite playing 8 of his last 9 on the road, Hammond has given up just 17 goals over that stretch (and just 19 goals in his last 11). For the year, he is 6-15-3 with a 2.50/.918. He's solid, though the Wolverines did touch him up for 4 goals on 20 shots earlier in the year. For his career against Michigan he's 0-2-0 with a 4.98/.833. Eno has been better, 1-5-0 with a 2.64/.914, but I don't expect to see him this weekend unless it's in a relief role.
They're middle of the pack in penalties at 14.0 minutes per game. Their penalty kill is 29th at 81.9%, and they've had to kill off 35 more penalties than Michigan has. Their PP, as you would expect, sucks. They're 56th at 10.9%. They're -19 on special teams this season.
Michigan has won 5 in a row in the series. Caporusso has 4-7--11 in 8 career games against BGSU. Chris Brown has 5 points in 6 games. Hagelin (10 games) and Wohlberg (8 games) have identical 2-6--8 lines, and Matt Rust has scored 4 times. Shawn Hunwick won his only appearance against BGSU. He has a 1.00 goals against and a .944 save percentage.
We should do pretty well on draws this weekend. BGSU has one guy who has taken almost 500 faceoffs and has won fewer than 40%. David Solway is their top regular faceoff man at 52.2%. Out of the three guys who have taken 400+ faceoffs, only one is higher than 45% and he's at 50.2%. We're going to have the puck a lot.
Samuels-Thomas has had a fair amount of success against Michigan. He has 2-3--5 in 6 games. Solway has 5 points as well. The team as a whole has a 6-11--17 line in 140 career man-games.
The bottom line: We're much better than this team. They've had a terrible time putting the puck in the net. They were able to win a couple of games last weekend by keeping NMU off the scoreboard. Hammond is a solid goalie, but Michigan has gotten to him when they've played him, granted he's been really good in the second half of the season. Unless Hammond absolutely stands on his head, this should be a sweep and a fairly easy one if Michigan plays their game.
Sickness:
Red Berenson (Coach), Jon Merrill (Freshman, Offensive Defenseman, Defensive Defenseman), and Carl Hagelin (Player of the Year, Best Defensive Forward) were named finalists for various CCHA awards. Gotta say, that's kind of gross that Merrill is a finalist for both awards for defensemen as a freshman. Please come back for one more year. Please?
The Hunwick Snub:
Carl Hagelin was named to the All-CCHA First Team and Merrill was named to the Second Team (in addition to being on the All Rookie team). Brandon Burlon was an honorable mention. I think there are a couple of snubs there. I know Krug was the leading scorer amongst defensemen, but if a kid is named one of the three best offensive defensemen and one of the three best defensive defensemen in the conference--and only took four penalties the entire season--how is he not one of the top two defensemen in the conference? Sorry, that's a snub.
The bigger one though, in my opinion, is no postseason hardware for Shawn Hunwick. Four goalies in the CCHA got more votes than him (Nagle, Greenham, Reichard, and Kapalka). I have no problem with Nagle. I'm pretty sure I mentioned either here or on The Wolverine that I thought he would be a great choice. He got Ferris State a bye despite getting just a tick over 2 goals per game in support. He ran away with first-team honors. To be fair, the difference between Hunwick in 5th and Greenham in 2nd was 3 points.
You want to vote for Nagle, I've got no problem with it. But Cody Reichard? Come the f*** on. Hunwick had him in wins (14 to 9), goals against (1.94/2.04) and killed him in save percentage (.931 to .914). Oh, and Miami scored 11 more goals during conference play. It's not like we were winning games 5-4. Give me some rationale for picking Reichard over Hunwick. Reichard outplayed him head to head. That's it. For the course of the conference season it wasn't even close. I suspect Shawn doesn't care that much, but it's ridiculous that a guy with a 1.94/.931 for the conference champions finished 5th in the voting. That's turrable.
Having a Seat Over There: Alex Talcott
Nice find by Jason at MHNet, who has been killing it lately. Alex Talcott, a 5'11", 180 lb forward for Detroit Honeybaked has committed to Michigan, likely for the incoming class of 2013. USHR had him as the #7 forward in the Select 15 Tournament last year. There's lots of good stuff over in the linked article if you want to read more about him.
This is a couple years old, but here's what his high school coach had to say about him:
"For lack of a better word, he's a freak of nature, and in a very good way. He's mature, strong, and naturally very athletic, complemented by the fact that he's a great kid with a good work ethic who does the things that he needs to do to get better."
He has 8-13--21 in 37 games this year.
Future NTDPers?
Tyler Motte and JT Compher were invited to the NTDP evaluation camp.
Cappy's Back?
According to an article in The Wolverine, Billy Powers said that "the impression he gets" is that we could have Caporusso back for the CCHA Semifinals, should we advance past BGSU. That's great news given that the initial prognosis was 3-6 weeks, which could have knocked him out for the year.
Keep Patch in Your Thoughts:
Former Wolverine Max Pacioretty was injured on a hit by Zdeno Chara the other night. Pacioretty suffered a concussion and a broken vertebrae. You be the judge. Chara was not suspended for the hit, but did receive a five minute major and a game misconduct.
NMU took a 1-0 lead in the series, but BGSU advanced after 2-0 and 2-1 (2ot) wins. In doing so, they won two games in a row for the first time since October 22nd and 23rd against Alabama-Huntsville. (They did win and then pick up a shootout win in late January.) For the regular season in the CCHA they were 3-21-4-2, so to pick up a pair of wins on the road was pretty impressive. They actually did pick up a win against Notre Dame. They also knocked off NMU and LSSU in conference.
The Falcons were far and away the last place team in the CCHA. They scored 15 points on the season. Michigan State was 10th with 35. They were also a distant last in goals scored. Their 41 in 28 games was a full 18 behind Ferris State. They were also tied for last in goals allowed with NMU.
The offense is really, really bad. They didn't score more than three goals against a team not named Alabama-Huntsville this season (though they did have 5, 4, and 5 against UAH). They scored exactly three goals on seven occasions, but it's worth pointing out that three of those were against ND and Miami. The first game of the series against NMU (a 6-3 loss) was the only time they've scored more than two goals in 2011. Since then, they've gone 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1, 0, 3, 2, 2. That's ugly. They currently rank dead-last in offense at just 1.85 goals per game.
That said, they've been playing pretty decent defense. For a team that was last in the CCHA in goals allowed, they've only given up 28 goals in their last 12 games. That's not too bad, especially considering 11 of those were over 2 games. In the other 10 games, they've only given up 17. They're 34th in team defense at 2.92 goals per game.
They're led up front by sophomore Jordan Samuels-Thomas, who has followed up his 25 point freshman campaign with 9-12--21 in 34 games this year. Freshman Brett Mohler has 7-10--17 on the year. Nobody else has more than 6 goals or 15 points.
They've gotten absolutely nothing offensively out of their defensemen. No defender has more than nine points and their blueline as a whole has 7-23--30 (along with 1 PPG).
In net they had a time-split for a good chunk of the season, but senior Nick Eno has given way to sophomore Andrew Hammond. Eno did get in during Game 1 of the NMU series after Hammond got the hook, but Hammond played games 2 and 3 and allowed just one goal on 74 shots in helping the Falcons to advance. Despite playing 8 of his last 9 on the road, Hammond has given up just 17 goals over that stretch (and just 19 goals in his last 11). For the year, he is 6-15-3 with a 2.50/.918. He's solid, though the Wolverines did touch him up for 4 goals on 20 shots earlier in the year. For his career against Michigan he's 0-2-0 with a 4.98/.833. Eno has been better, 1-5-0 with a 2.64/.914, but I don't expect to see him this weekend unless it's in a relief role.
They're middle of the pack in penalties at 14.0 minutes per game. Their penalty kill is 29th at 81.9%, and they've had to kill off 35 more penalties than Michigan has. Their PP, as you would expect, sucks. They're 56th at 10.9%. They're -19 on special teams this season.
Michigan has won 5 in a row in the series. Caporusso has 4-7--11 in 8 career games against BGSU. Chris Brown has 5 points in 6 games. Hagelin (10 games) and Wohlberg (8 games) have identical 2-6--8 lines, and Matt Rust has scored 4 times. Shawn Hunwick won his only appearance against BGSU. He has a 1.00 goals against and a .944 save percentage.
We should do pretty well on draws this weekend. BGSU has one guy who has taken almost 500 faceoffs and has won fewer than 40%. David Solway is their top regular faceoff man at 52.2%. Out of the three guys who have taken 400+ faceoffs, only one is higher than 45% and he's at 50.2%. We're going to have the puck a lot.
Samuels-Thomas has had a fair amount of success against Michigan. He has 2-3--5 in 6 games. Solway has 5 points as well. The team as a whole has a 6-11--17 line in 140 career man-games.
The bottom line: We're much better than this team. They've had a terrible time putting the puck in the net. They were able to win a couple of games last weekend by keeping NMU off the scoreboard. Hammond is a solid goalie, but Michigan has gotten to him when they've played him, granted he's been really good in the second half of the season. Unless Hammond absolutely stands on his head, this should be a sweep and a fairly easy one if Michigan plays their game.
Sickness:
Red Berenson (Coach), Jon Merrill (Freshman, Offensive Defenseman, Defensive Defenseman), and Carl Hagelin (Player of the Year, Best Defensive Forward) were named finalists for various CCHA awards. Gotta say, that's kind of gross that Merrill is a finalist for both awards for defensemen as a freshman. Please come back for one more year. Please?
The Hunwick Snub:
Carl Hagelin was named to the All-CCHA First Team and Merrill was named to the Second Team (in addition to being on the All Rookie team). Brandon Burlon was an honorable mention. I think there are a couple of snubs there. I know Krug was the leading scorer amongst defensemen, but if a kid is named one of the three best offensive defensemen and one of the three best defensive defensemen in the conference--and only took four penalties the entire season--how is he not one of the top two defensemen in the conference? Sorry, that's a snub.
The bigger one though, in my opinion, is no postseason hardware for Shawn Hunwick. Four goalies in the CCHA got more votes than him (Nagle, Greenham, Reichard, and Kapalka). I have no problem with Nagle. I'm pretty sure I mentioned either here or on The Wolverine that I thought he would be a great choice. He got Ferris State a bye despite getting just a tick over 2 goals per game in support. He ran away with first-team honors. To be fair, the difference between Hunwick in 5th and Greenham in 2nd was 3 points.
You want to vote for Nagle, I've got no problem with it. But Cody Reichard? Come the f*** on. Hunwick had him in wins (14 to 9), goals against (1.94/2.04) and killed him in save percentage (.931 to .914). Oh, and Miami scored 11 more goals during conference play. It's not like we were winning games 5-4. Give me some rationale for picking Reichard over Hunwick. Reichard outplayed him head to head. That's it. For the course of the conference season it wasn't even close. I suspect Shawn doesn't care that much, but it's ridiculous that a guy with a 1.94/.931 for the conference champions finished 5th in the voting. That's turrable.
Having a Seat Over There: Alex Talcott
Nice find by Jason at MHNet, who has been killing it lately. Alex Talcott, a 5'11", 180 lb forward for Detroit Honeybaked has committed to Michigan, likely for the incoming class of 2013. USHR had him as the #7 forward in the Select 15 Tournament last year. There's lots of good stuff over in the linked article if you want to read more about him.
This is a couple years old, but here's what his high school coach had to say about him:
"For lack of a better word, he's a freak of nature, and in a very good way. He's mature, strong, and naturally very athletic, complemented by the fact that he's a great kid with a good work ethic who does the things that he needs to do to get better."
He has 8-13--21 in 37 games this year.
Future NTDPers?
Tyler Motte and JT Compher were invited to the NTDP evaluation camp.
Cappy's Back?
According to an article in The Wolverine, Billy Powers said that "the impression he gets" is that we could have Caporusso back for the CCHA Semifinals, should we advance past BGSU. That's great news given that the initial prognosis was 3-6 weeks, which could have knocked him out for the year.
Keep Patch in Your Thoughts:
Former Wolverine Max Pacioretty was injured on a hit by Zdeno Chara the other night. Pacioretty suffered a concussion and a broken vertebrae. You be the judge. Chara was not suspended for the hit, but did receive a five minute major and a game misconduct.
Thursday, March 03, 2011
CCHA Champs!
I was in Indianapolis this past weekend, working 6 pm - 7 am, which pretty much resulted in work, eat, sleep for four days.
I got to listen to parts of our games and the WMU games this past weekend, but you aren't going to get a whole lot of detail here.
It sounded like we kind of sleep-walked through Friday night's game and were fortunate to get out of there with a victory.
Saturday there was almost nothing in terms of shots on goal for either team for seemingly half of the game. The Wolverines broke it open and cruised to what looked like an easier win than it probably was.
Nice moment in the third period as Shawn Hunwick, who played really well all weekend from the sound of it, pulled himself from the game to allow Bryan Hogan some ice time so his last memory of playing college hockey (barring injury or ineffectiveness) wouldn't be getting hurt at The Big Chill. The two combined for the shutout.
After Notre Dame came from behind on Friday night, WMU shut out the Irish in South Bend. Notre Dame had three goals waived off in the game. Their loss was enough to propel Michigan to the top of the standings in the ccha.
It's actually kind of an amazing result given the amount of uninspired, undisciplined play we've seen for wide portions of the season. The offense sputtered, the special teams weren't (or were, depending on which definition you're using). And yet everyone is looking up at Michigan and there's a chance we could even up getting a 1-seed when it's time to play for keeps.
The best part of getting the top spot in the ccha is that it guarantees we can't see ND or Miami until the conference title game.
NMU played the Swedish anthem before their Senior Night game, and the result was pretty much the same as it was at Yost. Carl Hagelin regulated. I'm thinking that needs to be a fixture the rest of the year.
Anyway, Brian, Jason, The Daily, and AnnArbor.com all have good stuff from this weekend. I'm on my phone, so no links, but you know where they are.
Phone's gonna die so I have to wrap this up. Congrats to the guys. Hunwick better get First Team All CCHA...
I got to listen to parts of our games and the WMU games this past weekend, but you aren't going to get a whole lot of detail here.
It sounded like we kind of sleep-walked through Friday night's game and were fortunate to get out of there with a victory.
Saturday there was almost nothing in terms of shots on goal for either team for seemingly half of the game. The Wolverines broke it open and cruised to what looked like an easier win than it probably was.
Nice moment in the third period as Shawn Hunwick, who played really well all weekend from the sound of it, pulled himself from the game to allow Bryan Hogan some ice time so his last memory of playing college hockey (barring injury or ineffectiveness) wouldn't be getting hurt at The Big Chill. The two combined for the shutout.
After Notre Dame came from behind on Friday night, WMU shut out the Irish in South Bend. Notre Dame had three goals waived off in the game. Their loss was enough to propel Michigan to the top of the standings in the ccha.
It's actually kind of an amazing result given the amount of uninspired, undisciplined play we've seen for wide portions of the season. The offense sputtered, the special teams weren't (or were, depending on which definition you're using). And yet everyone is looking up at Michigan and there's a chance we could even up getting a 1-seed when it's time to play for keeps.
The best part of getting the top spot in the ccha is that it guarantees we can't see ND or Miami until the conference title game.
NMU played the Swedish anthem before their Senior Night game, and the result was pretty much the same as it was at Yost. Carl Hagelin regulated. I'm thinking that needs to be a fixture the rest of the year.
Anyway, Brian, Jason, The Daily, and AnnArbor.com all have good stuff from this weekend. I'm on my phone, so no links, but you know where they are.
Phone's gonna die so I have to wrap this up. Congrats to the guys. Hunwick better get First Team All CCHA...
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