Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

[KTDC]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

I thought MN looked 'soft' so maybe they were satisfied with yesterday but that does not give WI enough credit for one heck of an effort.

Yes, I want to give Wisconsin credit, too, they played a heck of a game.

[ne7minder]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

Yes, I want to give Wisconsin credit, too, they played a heck of a game.

Never doubted they were a good team. The only thing wrong (beside the score being 'wrong') was that it wasn't that interesting. what makes these games great is the 1-2 goal differential. this was pretty much decided half way through.

The last time I remember giving up 8 was Nov. of 1999, versus Harvard, the defending national champs. Strangely, the Gophers won the title come March. It's a long season, but UM has a lot to fix. The good news is that only counts as one loss.

I knew either you or one of the guys into stats would know, thanks. We probably only made 4-5 games a year back then (the kids were playing youth hockey) and must have missed that one.

[ne7minder]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

I knew that day would come! I knew it!!! I'm ripping these stitches out of my wrists right now. It's over. Don't send the check if you haven't already. If you did send it, I've instructed my family to spend it on UW hockey swag.

I would guess you are feeling a bit better today Will be fun to see Kessel back in January

[Eeyore]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

We have issues, but so does everyone else. Wisconsin's power play was dreadful all weekend, and their penalty kill wasn't much better.

Today was a lousy performance against a very good, fired up team that, for a variety of reasons might be one offs, snowballed entirely out of control. In retrospect, it was the wrong call to move Schipper up to the first line to replace Cameranesi, as it left the other lines overexposed. That combined, I think, with an overurgency to provide offense leading to some bad lapses in defense and horrible decisions in transition. Cara Piazza was on the ice for all six of the goals scored, both ways, in the first period. The second line in general had a nightmarish afternoon, no matter who was put on the wing opposite Reilly. Keller was openly yanked from the line after forcing the pass that led to the third Wisconsin goal, then Skarzynski took some shifts there in the second period, which led to the goals that put the game to bed.

None of these are especially new problems for this team, though they aren't usually exploited as ruthlessly as the Badgers did. Still, this is the same team that was masterful for the first two periods yesterday, before Cameranesi got hurt. If she's out long term, they have a big problem, but I'm not sure it's a lot worse than it would be for most teams that lost their top scorer. For right now, they have a week of practices to sort out some lines that work together and figure out how to have everyone stay within their role. Then it's a non-conference series followed by a month off, over which we'll hopefully see someone heal up.

[ManBehindTheCurtain]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

The play by play guy casually let slip that Woken is out for the season with one of those knee ligament things. Is he correct?

[FiveHoleFrenzy]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

Wisconsin must have been embarrassed after Saturday but that could hardly hold a candle to the embarrassing display that Minnesota put on today. There is no sugarcoating what happened and you very rarely ever see that kind of performance out of Minnesota. Might have to go back to the 4 goals that Minnesota gave up in the first period to BC in NCAA quarterfinal game back in March 2011. And even with that they played better after that first period. This game today was bad from start to finish and it was a total team effort in being bad.

I'm not diminishing what Wisconsin did, and in fact the loss yesterday may have been the kick in the rear-end they needed. They have the most talent of any team this year and that should be obvious to most except some particular Gopher posters. When they put it together i'm not sure anyone, including the Gophers, will be able to hold them back but not in the manner that we saw today.

I guess the best way to look at this is that it is one horrific loss but just that, one loss. The issue with the hugh drop-off in scoring after the first line was addressed by Frost in the third installment of the Gold Standard series http://rivalfilms.com/the_gold_standard/index.html, where he was talking to the team in the locker-room at Ohio State. The coaching staff has their work cut out for them if #21 misses significant time or worse yet, is out for the season.

[FiveHoleFrenzy]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

The play by play guy casually let slip that Woken is out for the season with one of those knee ligament things. Is he correct?

I heard that as well which is why I raised that as a question earlier. Maybe someone with more inside info could confirm?

[Golden Tuuk]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

That was something to shut out an undefeated, #1 team. A sweep would have been nice, but injuries aside, that was a good weekend for the Gophers.

[Timothy A]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

Never doubted they were a good team. The only thing wrong (beside the score being 'wrong') was that it wasn't that interesting.

Oh, I'm afraid it was more than a little interesting....How long will Frosty let Peters swing in the wind? How many more goals will UW score? Will the refs actually call a penalty? Will my voice hold up for the whole game, that's a lot of sieving to do in one game. Will UW let up and give the rodents a little hope? Will MJ put Cece in at any time? Will Wellhausen get a hat trick too? Can Nurse get 4!? The intrigue was almost too much to bear.

I do hope Dani C isn't seriously injured.

[FiveHoleFrenzy]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

That was something to shut out an undefeated, #1 team. A sweep would have been nice, but injuries aside, that was a good weekend for the Gophers.

Wisconsin had previously lost to UMD so they were not undefeated. I'm definitely more of a glass half empty person where a loss to end the weekend giving up 8 goals is not a good weekend.

[5mn_Major]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

I also think that while the gophers made a game of it for awhile, when they got 3 goals down they didn't have anything left in the tank.

[Timothy A]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

I also think that while the gophers made a game of it for awhile, when they got 3 goals down they didn't have anything left in the tank.

I was still nervous @ 4-2, once UW hit the 5 mark I was like, "there's no way ARD is giving up 5 goals today." Heck, when UW scored first I was more than hoping for a 1-0 win. What ensued no one in their right mind could have predicted. I wonder if the coaches saw any tell tale signs with the team before they hit the ice.

[ARM]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

The play by play guy casually let slip that Woken is out for the season with one of those knee ligament things. Is he correct?

Dan Hamman and Brad Frost announced that during their pre-game intro on Saturday.

[EastFan1]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

The 6th goal was offside though, but the linesman was sitting on the boards and wasn't watching. She was probably thinking up better ways to get frozen pegs out of the ice.

No challenge by the Minnesota coaches?

[5mn_Major]

Re: Minnesota Women's Hockey 2016-2017 (aka Season 20)

What ensued no one in their right mind could have predicted.

Yeah. Why would they? Its never happened before.

Just wish it would have happened in the WCHA final. Doubt the next game will see the ice tilted like that.