Michigan State Off-season

[owslachief]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

According to the schedules thread, NoDak will be coming during Thanksgiving weekend. With LSSU coming to Munn it's shaping up to be a good home schedule.

That is awesome! Can't wait.

[WeAreNDHockey]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

With LSSU coming to Munn it's shaping up to be a good home schedule.

I hope this means they are finally off the Notre Dame home schedule. Maybe we'll replace them with a dazzling series against Holy Cross. Did they even ask Anastos for a return trip or were they just glad to play a weekend of hockey and not have to pay anyone to resurface the ice or turn on the lights at Taffy Abel? My guess is if they could play a couple of WCHA home series on the road they'd do so.

[Spartanforlife4]

I hope this means they are finally off the Notre Dame home schedule. Maybe we'll replace them with a dazzling series against Holy Cross. Did they even ask Anastos for a return trip or were they just glad to play a weekend of hockey and not have to pay anyone to resurface the ice or turn on the lights at Taffy Abel? My guess is if they could play a couple of WCHA home series on the road they'd do so.

I almost hope we give them a return trip, just because they could really use it, but I have no idea.

ASU's schedule is out, no Sun Devils coming to Munn. I believe we still have 5 or 6 games left on the non-con and its severely under scheduled by HE teams, so we can probably expect to see foes from out East start to pop up.

With Denver, NoDak, and LSSU already on the schedule that's a decent representation of the West, though I would like more CCHA teams on the schedule.

[owslachief]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

With Denver, NoDak, and LSSU already on the schedule that's a decent representation of the West, though I would like more CCHA teams on the schedule.

Agreed. To me BGSU is a natural, especially given how competitive they have become again. It's a 2-hour trip either way, not much further than Big Rapids, and there's a good history. And where the heck has Notre Dame gone?

[WeAreNDHockey]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

Agreed. To me BGSU is a natural, especially given how competitive they have become again. It's a 2-hour trip either way, not much further than Big Rapids, and there's a good history. And where the heck has Notre Dame gone?

If you're question is regarding where we've gone as far as being a competitive NCAA type team, look no further than to two of the three guys in suits behind the bench. The staleness in the program can be traced directly to one or both of them.

If you're wondering where we've gone from a scheduling standpoint, look no further than the bearded guy in the suit in the athletic department, answers to the name Jack Swarbrick. Notre Dame is no longer interested in playing non-conference games against teams that will require a return trip. In exchange for getting a team to annually appear at the Shillelagh Tournament, they agreed to give Western a home and home arrangement for the next few years. I think that agreement has 3 more seasons to run. Once Mario Lucia is gone (maybe this summer -- he has stated he is definitely finishing out the current semester -- maybe he returns for his senior season) Minnesota will be off the schedule. After that, I doubt Notre Dame will be enticed into any road non-conference games, other than neutral site in-season tournament type games. So playing a team like MSU in South Bend would be fine for Notre Dame, but going on the road for the return trip that teams like MSU will require, ehhhh, not so much. What that ends up meaning will be 5 or 6 home non conference weekends, almost exclusively against bottom feeder teams from Atlantic Hockey or the nWCHA.

Until the next wave of conference shake-ups occur, I figure there will be quite a few NCAA hockey teams using the NCAA basketball model of non-conference scheduling. And interesting non-conference home schedules for many teams will be a thing of the past.

[aallenpollreisz]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

According to the schedules thread, NoDak will be coming during Thanksgiving weekend. With LSSU coming to Munn it's shaping up to be a good home schedule.

"Please no ASU, please no ASU, please no ASU"

Good to hear about LSSU - I've really missed seeing them every year on our schedule. Part of me always wanted Hollis to sign perpetual home-and-homes with BGSU, Western, ND and LSSU after we broke off into the Big Ten.

[aallenpollreisz]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

I almost hope we give them a return trip, just because they could really use it, but I have no idea.

ASU's schedule is out, no Sun Devils coming to Munn. I believe we still have 5 or 6 games left on the non-con and its severely under scheduled by HE teams, so we can probably expect to see foes from out East start to pop up.

No offense to the teams out east, but, yeah, I'm getting tired of us saturating our schedule with teams from Massachusetts. I know we kind of have to because of the B1G/HE challenge, but I would appreciate a break. (It's not quite at NMU levels of "I'd rather not see them anymore," but it's getting there.)

We have to be getting a return trip from Princeton at some point, right? I'm pretty sure Tech owes us a return trip, too.

[Spartanforlife4]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

Our trip this year was the return trip for their 2013-14 season trip here, so unless that was a 2 for 1 we're done with them.

I believe Tech was supposed to come last year but I'm pretty sure a Huskie told me their series with Wisconsin pushed ours back a year, so we might see Tech at Munn this year too.

Then there's the matter of returning going to BC for a game, but maybe we could take care of that during the Northeastern trip.

[Decatur Spartan]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

1. I think at the end of the year we missed Walsh more then people realize. It changed our D pairings that had been the same all season up until that point. It is hard to build chemistry with a guy in a couple weeks.

2. In terms of next year every guy we lost to graduation can be easily replaced except for Berry. That being said, Maceachern reminds me a lot of Berry when he was a sophomore. Flashes of great skill and the ability to single-handedly take over the game. He just needs to be more consistent which hopefully he can figure out in the off-season. Also most of our team are sophomores and juniors. If say one, two, maybe three guys (i.e. Haag, Ebbing,Wood?) figure out how to score consistently along with Mac, Ferrintino, Keller, Cox, and Deblow, we will be just fine next year. Fun fact: we return 75% of our scoring next year.

3. I don't see where all the panic is coming from after just one bad game to end the season. If we can just average three goals a game next year we are pretty much guaranteed to win 75% of our games due to the one factor most teams struggle to find, A REALLY REALLY GOOD GOALIE. -In Hildebrand We Trust.

4. In terms of comparing us to other programs out there remember that we were in a serious talent deficit thanks to Comely. It takes time to build up a program the way a new coach wants it (especially with our biggest/nearest rival taking advantage of Comely's poor recruiting). I believe when Anastos took the job he said it would take around 7 years to get the program to where he would like it to be so we have to be patient at least one to two more years. But I agree that if next year, with all the returning talent, we don't go well over .500 it will be hard to keep Anastos around.

No panic, just a desperate feeling that MSU is going to be like MTU was for 30 years. In looking at recruits, you must discount roughly 40% of their scoring impact when they join the next level. The kids arriving in 2015 are not going to be much, if any help. I have seen a number of the 2016 and 2017 kids play. Not impressed at all. I will say that the scoring has picked up this season from the last two. From 2.08 goals a game in 2012/13, to 2.19 in 2013/14, to 2.4 in 2014/15. A whole 3 tenths of a goal per game! Over thirty games, that's 10 goals. I just don't see enough scoring coming back. Or coming in.

[bcmsu9196]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

Brock Krygier has apparently joined Arizona State

http://www.thesundevils.com/ViewArti...B_OEM_ID=30300

[Pirateasaur]

Brock Krygier has apparently joined Arizona State

http://www.thesundevils.com/ViewArti...B_OEM_ID=30300

Well ****. I doubt we will ever find out why but I am quite curious. Did he not figure to be a part of the regular D rotation next year? Maybe he just didn't enjoy it at MSU.

[wsummers]

Well ****. I doubt we will ever find out why but I am quite curious. Did he not figure to be a part of the regular D rotation next year? Maybe he just didn't enjoy it at MSU.

No inside info, but with two incoming defensemen who are likely to see regular shifts and five other returning (3 of which would certainly be above him) I suspect he wasn't content being the number 6 or 7 guy. That said, after sitting out next year he should have a good shot at being one of ASU's top four dmen.

[32 Degrees!]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

Finally official, Sparty is coming to Pot-o-rado in October! I've been wanting this ever since I relocated to Denver from Lake Orion.... that will be a fun fun weekend. Each year we see DU's arena go green for UND; I would love to see the State fans show up

[wsummers]

No inside info, but with two incoming defensemen who are likely to see regular shifts and five other returning (3 of which would certainly be above him) I suspect he wasn't content being the number 6 or 7 guy. That said, after sitting out next year he should have a good shot at being one of ASU's top four dmen.

In taking a closer look, he is listed as a graduate student at ASU...must be graduating from MSU this spring and therefore able to play next year at ASU.

[Decatur Spartan]

Re: Michigan State Off-season

Let me tell you - there's some great young boys in the State pipeline right now, coming from the HoneyBaked system. I happen to know the families of a couple guys. Based on the year they just had there....With a year or 2 at thier respective USHL clubs, these kids are going to elevate the MSU program. Trust me. Remember the restaraunt scene in Mrs Doubtfire, when Stu was choking on shrimp? "Help is on the way Dear"!!!!!!

Did some research on the kids coming in this fall. Here are their stats found on the ushl.com web site.
Only one (kind of) stand out scorer. Appleton from Tri Cities. 40 pts in 54 games and a -3.
I see little to no scoring help at all here. And the plus-minus is nothing to be proud of.
I also found info on the collegehockeynews.com site

GP G A PTS +/-
Appleton, Mason F 54 12 28 40 -3
Milan, Cody F 60 11 15 26 -12
Godbout, Marcel F 21 2 0 2 -9
Osburn, Zach D 54 8 8 16 +3...See More