Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

[Chuck Schwartz]

All i can say is ooof.

I found this article that Chuck wrote last February. I bet it's worse now than we all thought.


http://www.buckys5thquarter.com/wisc...-alarming-rate

For the sake of clarity, that was 2 years ago.

[LordofBrewtown]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

So it's come full circle in my head now,whatever system he uses takes too crappin long to figure out and execute properly. Let's see some stats freshman scoring stats to prove this out.

Reading other threads I found something that might support this. Omaha has 10 freshmen & 7 sophomores on their roster; and they are not 1-10-1. That's pretty ****ing. I don't think it's unreasonable for badger fans to expect our program to be better than Omaha's; which in theory are both in down/rebuilding years.

[Wisko McBadgerton]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

I said FORWARD in the context of Kerdiles "shocking" departure no one could ever plan on having happen. Way to cherry pick Minnesota and conveniently include 7 dmen in your analysis. If you exclude total and complete busts like Pat White (career best year was NINE goals) and Sacchetti (whos' 4 year career total of 33 points equaled Kerdiles freshman year where he missed 10 games to a NCAA suspension). You realize neither of those guy have played an ounce of hockey professionally since leaving the U which might be a telling sign that neither had a viable option to "go pro"? Added in a semi-busts like Hoeffel and explain to me which FORWARD drafted in the first 2 rounds of the draft stayed at Minnesota beyond 2 years where there was any much less massive joy in gopherville? Bjugstad, Budish, and who else?

Instead of cherry picking Minnesota

I appreciate the effort you put into this list, and the fact that you have posted more on this day than you have at any one time in the last two years. I hope that continues a bit more, as you always bring something good to the discussion.

To begin with, all I said was Kerdiles marked the 5th straight year of Soph. departures. Not sure who you're getting at that thought it was "shocking"?

My apologies, but I didn't "cherry pick" Minnesota guys on purpose, it was simply convenient list as I was short on time, and also relevant to Hammy's point that MN has had players stay longer. As WI is compared to MN often around here (as though they're in exactly the same boat ) I felt it relevant to the general discussion as well. Without going through the history of every single player on this list and speculating about each one, I can't say exactly whether your statement that "For every 1st/2nd round forward that sees a third year of college, I bet there are 5 or 6 if not more that leave." is true or not with all the specific caveats you add to it. As a standalone general statement, it's not true. A little less than half (46%) of the 1st and 2nd round forwards on this list stayed.

Incidentally, Sachetti put up 63 in 43gp in England's pro Elite league and Pat White has played 4 years in the European Pro leagues (currently in Slovakia) since graduating. Hoeffel is in his 5th AHL year. I'm surprised Dubby didn't jump in to point that all out, but they have in fact played "an ounce" of pro hockey. And how about compare these guys to Jason Clark and Brendan Woods and tell me those two should have left early based solely on career moves?

On Kerdiles, (which I certainly didn't suggest was at all shocking) I hate to quote Lucia, but this is what he said recently on early departures when asked, "I really have little to do with it, but my advice has been that they should stay unless they are NHL ready." Personally I agree with the sentiment. And the only people who have a say in Kerdiles being in the show have said he's not ready. He's doing ok, he's 6g-11a for 17 (-3) in 27gp, at the moment. That's not getting him very far anytime soon though, barring a big rash of injuries. Besides the fact that he's still only 20. Your points are all well taken, but it's not absolutely crazy to suggest there was possibly some benefit to him in staying however unlikely history suggests that might be.

[LordofBrewtown]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Here is a thought.

Maybe the 4 year cycle with uneven classes is the Badger coaching strategy and not an anomaly. 1st year of cycle with many freshmen results in a poor won/lost record and disgruntled fans. 2nd year produces mediocre results, 3rd year produces a competitive team on the rise, 4th year results in a high national ranking and a deep run to The Frozen Four with happy fans.

The 4 year cycle can also produce job security if the coach times the cycle so the 4th year occurs 1 year before his contract expires. A deep run into Frozen Four guarantees the coach a new or extended contract and buys him slack for the 1st year of the cycle. The AD will not let him go after a good year which would also mean paying a large buyout.

Of course the above is meant to be tongue in cheek.

I've thought about that too. Agree that Eaves is probably not doing this on purpose. However, assuming that it is the strategy - I'm not sure that the strategy itself isn't OK, it's just the execution of it that's failed. Think about that first 4 year cycle - that would be the aim: 1st yr, under .500 miss ncaa's; yr 2 bubble team, maybe barely make it in; yr 3 in ncaa's comfortably, and yr 4 national title contender. I think we'd all be happy with an NCAA championship every 4 years, and making the tournament 5-6 out of 8 years.

I would even cut Eaves some slack for going out in the first round last year, as in a 1 game playoff, anything can happen. The problem is, we are not doing well enough in those other years. Two years ago, we do not make the tournament without winning the conference tournament, and missed out three years ago also.

No matter how you look at it, Eaves is underperforming. I hate calling for anyone to be fired. Honestly, if we could have just approached .500 this year, it would have given me hope for a 4 year cycle as described above. Instead, this start is a debacle, and logically it follows that this 4 yr cycle will be a little worse than the last (meaning maybe only barely getting a bid in year 4).

I think it's time for Eaves to go.

[Wisko McBadgerton]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

When comparing to more talent rich/fertile local recruiting bases, the recent string of misses from Eaves and company on the local talent is more and more exasperating.

The only thing I'd say about this is that with having 5 top end talents at a position in your area, you can miss on 4 of them and still get a great kid. If you have one Will Butcher and you miss, you're out of luck. In Butcher's case he wasn't opposed to playing at UW and probably would have if not for Miller. He's not sitting a year though to change back.

[Wisko McBadgerton]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

No, Thurber would have been a senior last year and did the master class balancer a favor by getting into a misunderstanding with his lady friend allowing Eaves a chance to rebalance his roster a couple years earlier instead of having another roster spot that would have had to be filled this freshman class had he stayed.

Great post but unfortunately it's entirely wrong. Thurber came in and left with Stepan. He sat a year and was a senior at NMU in 12-13.

[Wisko McBadgerton]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Reading other threads I found something that might support this. Omaha has 10 freshmen & 7 sophomores on their roster; and they are not 1-10-1. That's pretty ****ing. I don't think it's unreasonable for badger fans to expect our program to be better than Omaha's; which in theory are both in down/rebuilding years.

This is a good point. Their top line with Soph's Ortega(18pts.) and Guentzel (16 pts.) are tearing it up playing with Sr. Dominic Zumbo (34 and 35 pts. the last two years) Guentzel is arguably one of the best soph's in the country, but they are definitely playing a number of underclassmen. Fair enough to question why UW doesn't have a line like that here.

On paper, perhaps LaBate could be centering Besse and Zulinick instead of 17 year old Cameron Hughes carrying a big load. But Hughes has impressed with his skills and attitude...

Thing is, Labate was supposed to be a flight risk last year. Anybody care to comment on how far his has stock fallen with only 1 goal so far? There's gotta be some expectation he could produce something more for Bucky. He, probably more than anybody, was supposed to be a guy to make something happen offensively and he's been mostly a disaster thus far, IMO. Why?

[badgerhawk]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

You'll have to excuse the poor graph, but here is a list of some teams, freshman production this year. Hopefully you can decipher it and make of it what you will. Sorted from lowest to highest points per game.

Team , # of freshman, games played, goals, assists, points, PPG
Michigan St. 3 39 0 6 6 0.15
Northeastern 4 52 3 7 10 0.19
Colorado College 5 43 4 5 9 0.21
Connecticut 9 109 10 15 25 0.22
Maine 6 90 7 16 23 0.25
Minnesota 5 38 2 8 10 0.26
Wisconsin 9 86 5 17 23 0.26
Providence 4 36 3 7 10 0.27
Western Mich. 7 83 10 13 23 0.27
Miami 3 46 4 9 13 0.28
Notre Dame 9 122 11 26 37 0.3
Ohio St 7 73 5 18 23 0.31
Massachusetts 8 92 13 16 29 0.31
New Hampshire 9 94 9 22 31 0.33
St. Cloud St. 5 67 9 14 23 0.34
Minnesota Duluth 5 56 7 13 20 0.35
Vermont 7 74 13 14 27 0.36
Penn st 3 40 5 10 15 0.37
Merrimack 9 118 21 23 44 0.37
Nebraska-O 10 124 18 31 49 0.39
North Dakota 5 78 12 21 33 0.42
Umass L. 9 89 18 23 41 0.46
Boston U. 9 129 18 43 61 0.47
Boston C. 2 34 4 12 16 0.47
Michigan 7 71 10 33 43 0.6
Denver 3 33 6 16 22 0.66

[markwojo]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

You'll have to excuse the poor graph, but here is a list of some teams, freshman production this year. Hopefully you can decipher it and make of it what you will. Sorted from lowest to highest points per game.

Team , # of freshman, games played, goals, assists, points, PPG
Michigan St. 3 39 0 6 6 0.15
Northeastern 4 52 3 7 10 0.19
Colorado College 5 43 4 5 9 0.21
Connecticut 9 109 10 15 25 0.22
Maine 6 90 7 16 23 0.25
Minnesota 5 38 2 8 10 0.26
Wisconsin 9 86 5 17 23 0.26
Providence 4 36 3 7 10 0.27
Western Mich. 7 83 10 13 23 0.27
Miami 3 46 4 9 13 0.28
Notre Dame 9 122 11 26 37 0.3
Ohio St 7 73 5 18 23 0.31
Massachusetts 8 92 13 16 29 0.31
New Hampshire 9 94 9 22 31 0.33
St. Cloud St. 5 67 9 14 23 0.34
Minnesota Duluth 5 56 7 13 20 0.35
Vermont 7 74 13 14 27 0.36
Penn st 3 40 5 10 15 0.37
Merrimack 9 118 21 23 44 0.37
Nebraska-O 10 124 18 31 49 0.39
North Dakota 5 78 12 21 33 0.42
Umass L. 9 89 18 23 41 0.46
Boston U. 9 129 18 43 61 0.47
Boston C. 2 34 4 12 16 0.47
Michigan 7 71 10 33 43 0.6
Denver 3 33 6 16 22 0.66

On the surface, having a large quantity of frosh with massive playing time/pp roles available might lead you to think UW's frosh are not that good given their opportunity. On the other hand, having little or no upper class help to complement (or simply take the pressure off them) may explain why they are one of the worst scoring teams in the country. If you are a frosh and are playing on the "top line", you are going to go against one of the other teams top d pairings. If you are on the top PP unit, again you will face the other teams top dmen and top defensive forwards.

[gwhinwi]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

All i can say is ooof.

I found this article that Chuck wrote last February. I bet it's worse now than we all thought.


http://www.buckys5thquarter.com/wisc...-alarming-rate

According to the final press notes from the 2013-14 season, "Wisconsin saw its attendance average climb 957 fans per game from last season’s
average to 10,478 for the 2013–14 season."

They are averaging 10,228 per game as of the U-18 game on Friday night.

Having said that, that is no where near the attendance in the building. If there were 9,200 people at the Friday night Ferris State game, I'll walk back up to Madison and apologize to each of you individually.

[XYZ]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

You seem to be suggesting that losing last night to PSU was somehow an embarrassment to the program because it's Penn St.

That was absolutely not what I was suggesting. My point was very straightforward; if you chose to ignore it that is not my problem. But since I'm in a good mood I'll address your misguided assessment of my point: While I'm not inclined to use the word "embarrassing," a program like Wisconsin losing to Penn State two nights in a row isn't good. But it isn't necessarily terrible considering the nature of hockey. Losses can come in all sorts of unexpected and unfortunate ways.

However, a program like Wisconsin getting skated up and down the ice for 109 minutes by a second-year NCAA program is simply inexcusable. Whether that program is named Penn St., Minnesota Mankato State Cornfield Tech, St. Norbert or Alaska-North Pole doesn't really matter.

Now that all that has been settled, you're free to address my original point. Or, speaking of embarrassing, you could go back to your half-assed troll thread.

Up to you.

[Wisko McBadgerton]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Originally Posted by Wisko McBadgerton
You seem to be suggesting that losing last night to PSU was somehow an embarrassment to the program because it's Penn St.

That was absolutely not what I was suggesting.

However, a program like Wisconsin getting skated up and down the ice for 109 minutes by a second-year NCAA program is simply inexcusable.

It's not what you were suggesting but then you suggest the very same thing? Are we even speaking the same language here?


Not that it matters, but they're a 3rd year program. They beat us in OT in '12-'13.

[Wisko McBadgerton]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Thanks to badgerhawk for posting those stats. I looked up goals scored by each of those teams as it seemed relevant to me to compare ppg by fr. to what kind of scoring each team was doing overall in order to gauge fr. contributions. Did a little back of the envelope math and came up with this about a hypothetical "average" team:

It's comprised of a little less then one third freshman. (i.e. if you had 20 skaters, around 6-7 would be freshman.)

A team with 18 skaters (6 freshman) reaching 18 goals could be said to be averaging 1g /skater.

But based on badgerhawk's sample, freshman average a little under half as much as goal contributors. So the hypothetical team with 18 goals could only expect the 6 freshman to have had 3 goals, and the other 12 players totals equaling 15 goals.

If that makes sense.

[Timothy A]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Freshmen scoring.....during Eaves' tenure, freshmen have scored 903 total points, same time frame for tDon's rodents, 1142 pts. I can post a scoring chart for every Eaves' recruiting class if anyone is interested.

[MadCityRich]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

For the sake of clarity, that was 2 years ago.