Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

[D2D]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

Whatever it takes to enable them to skate with the Nodaks.

Who incidentally get almost all of their players from places other than Nodak.

[The Rube]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

When did the slide begin? Was it the NCAA loss to Union?

They raised ticket prices, and re-organized all the season ticket holders (the latter pizzed off a LOT of fans). This season, IIRC, they dropped ticket prices, but raised the "voluntary" donation amount, which you can't write off anymore, so it is a wash on overall cost to consumer.

It's NOT cheap to be a season ticket holder. If MN isn't the most expensive college hockey seat in the nation, they are close. I would guess UND is probably the closest to MN in pricing.

[burd]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

They raised ticket prices, and re-organized all the season ticket holders (the latter pizzed off a LOT of fans). This season, IIRC, they dropped ticket prices, but raised the "voluntary" donation amount, which you can't write off anymore, so it is a wash on overall cost to consumer.

It's NOT cheap to be a season ticket holder. If MN isn't the most expensive college hockey seat in the nation, they are close. I would guess UND is probably the closest to MN in pricing.

I wonder how much effect our screen addiction is having on rink attendances country-wide. If the camera work is good, and more programs are getting that compared to years ago, it's pretty tempting for fans to save their money and watch the games from their favorite environment. Unfortunately, it's increasingly the way we interact with the world these days.

UND isn't filling all their seats either, and it's pretty much the only show in a hockey loving town. Putting a winner on the ice would probably change things, but you can't do that every year, no matter what program or what era they are playing in.

This isn't a new point here, I know.

[Pirateasaur]

I wonder how much effect our screen addiction is having on rink attendances country-wide. If the camera work is good, and more programs are getting that compared to years ago, it's pretty tempting for fans to save their money and watch the games from their favorite environment. Unfortunately, it's increasingly the way we interact with the world these days.

UND isn't filling all their seats either, and it's pretty much the only show in a hockey loving town. Putting a winner on the ice would probably change things, but you can't do that every year, no matter what program or what era they are playing in.

This isn't a new point here, I know.

There’s a lot more entertainment out there these days. Years ago, you were either gonna take the family to the hockey game or spend another weekend night watching Predator on VHS. We’ve all seen Predator a dozen times. Hockey game it is.

Not any more. Now you can stream anything or get the boys(or girls) up on the PS4 blower and play Battle Royales.

[SteveO]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

I wonder how much effect our screen addiction is having on rink attendances country-wide. If the camera work is good, and more programs are getting that compared to years ago, it's pretty tempting for fans to save their money and watch the games from their favorite environment. Unfortunately, it's increasingly the way we interact with the world these days.

UND isn't filling all their seats either, and it's pretty much the only show in a hockey loving town. Putting a winner on the ice would probably change things, but you can't do that every year, no matter what program or what era they are playing in.

This isn't a new point here, I know.

I thought to mention this as well. Other than ticket prices, this could be the second greatest factor affecting attendance. With FSN and BTN, the Gophers have one of the most comprehensive media packages in all of college hockey.

[burd]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

I thought to mention this as well. Other than ticket prices, this could be the second greatest factor affecting attendance. With FSN and BTN, the Gophers have one of the most comprehensive media packages in all of college hockey.

The key thing here is camera work, IMO. I can deal with bad play-by-play, but bad camera work for hockey can make watching nearly intolerable.

NCHC TV is not expensive, and I can watch the vast majority of UND games, home and away. Not that long ago, production in some smaller rinks was pretty bad due to inexperienced camera work. It has gotten much better now.

Hockey should be viewed in person--there's so much to see away from the puck. But if being there is a little too expensive, or the drive is too long or frustrating, or you have family commitments, watching from your own living room is pretty dam good. Drinks are cheaper, and depending on whether you have daughters, there's rarely a line at the head.

[D2D]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

The key thing here is camera work, IMO. I can deal with bad play-by-play, but bad camera work for hockey can make watching nearly intolerable.

NCHC TV is not expensive, and I can watch the vast majority of UND games, home and away. Not that long ago, production in some smaller rinks was pretty bad due to inexperienced camera work. It has gotten much better now.

Hockey should be viewed in person--there's so much to see away from the puck. But if being there is a little too expensive, or the drive is too long or frustrating, or you have family commitments, watching from your own living room is pretty dam good. Drinks are cheaper, and depending on whether you have daughters, there's rarely a line at the head.

Haha, good one burd. I like the mixture of going to most/all of the home games, for the reasons you mention, while viewing the away games on TV, with all the conveniences you mention. Good post.

[SteveO]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

I'm very interested to see the jazz Ryan Johnson, a 1st round pick of the Buffalo Sabres, will bring to the blueline this season. This kid has star power.

At the Sabres development camp which ended on June 29, he displayed high-quality skating and some awesome puck handling abilities. He showcased his stuff before the Sabres brass with a highlight reel shootout goal in the final win for Team Blue, who prevailed in the shootout over Team Gold after the game finished 1-1. HIGHLIGHTS

[Slap Shot]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

I'm very interested to see the jazz Ryan Johnson, a 1st round pick of the Buffalo Sabres, will bring to the blueline this season. This kid has star power.

At the Sabres development camp which ended on June 29, he displayed high-quality skating and some awesome puck handling abilities. He showcased his stuff before the Sabres brass with a highlight reel shootout goal in the final win for Team Blue, who prevailed in the shootout over Team Gold after the game finished 1-1. HIGHLIGHTS

The scouting pros and cons of Johnson.

[Bonin21]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

Don't forget Bob also brought in a 39th overall D man in LaCombe. So he brought in the two highest drafted D men since Skjei to a team that ended with a pathetic d unit under the old regime.

[D2D]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

Don't forget Bob also brought in a 39th overall D man in LaCombe. So he brought in the two highest drafted D men since Skjei to a team that ended with a pathetic d unit under the old regime.

Hopefully these two will push the returning D to become more complete players.

[Bonin21]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

Hopefully these two will push the returning D to become more complete players.

Brinkman will be fine. A few of the rest may be hopeless, but that's okay.

2020-21
Brinkman Junior (should not go pro next summer)
Johnson Sophomore
LaCombe Sophomore
Koster Freshman after one full USHL year

My goodness

[SteveO]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

The scouting pros and cons of Johnson.

I'm not sure about this guys scoring criteria. Ryan Johnson led the Clark Cup champion Sioux Falls Stampede +/- @ +24 last season, which is quite high. A Dman can't achieve that mark without knowing how to play position hockey. He made a couple negative comments about Ryan in the video stating there are "many, many times...I've seen instances where Ryan Johnson was clearly out of position and the intensity to get back in position was just not there"?

I wonder how many games and at what phase of the USHL season he made his assessment? I also wonder what criteria he's using for Dman to designate "high and medium danger zones"? He didn't list any of that data on his spreadsheet.

[SteveO]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

War on Ice (after two seasons the website was closed) was one of the first stat sites to really begin to break down their data into zones. They assigned each area of the ice a danger score of low, medium, or high. As a result, each player had a low danger shooting percentage, a medium danger one, and a high danger one. These are currently used in Corsica analysis of shot quality and expected goals. The original intent was to analyze saves from various zones. It can also be used to analyze a forward's shot quality, but to apply this analysis to defensemen seems redundant as most D would be shooting from a low danger area. In game time situations, the danger zone definitions as indicated below are arguably a bit subjective and arbitrary.

Low Danger: less than 3.0%
Medium Danger: Less than 9.0% and equal or greater than 3.0%
High Danger: Equal or greater than 9.0%

[woodenskates]

Re: Minnesota Golden Gopher Season 2018-2019: Fire Motzko

War on Ice (after two seasons the website was closed) was one of the first stat sites to really begin to break down their data into zones. They assigned each area of the ice a danger score of low, medium, or high. As a result, each player had a low danger shooting percentage, a medium danger one, and a high danger one. These are currently used in Corsica analysis of shot quality and expected goals. The original intent was to analyze saves from various zones. It can also be used to analyze a forward's shot quality, but to apply this analysis to defensemen seems redundant as most D would be shooting from a low danger area. In game time situations, the danger zone definitions as indicated below are arguably a bit subjective and arbitrary.

Low Danger: less than 3.0%
Medium Danger: Less than 9.0% and equal or greater than 3.0%
High Danger: Equal or greater than 9.0%

But it would be interesting to have the data on where the opponents shot from when a D man is on the ice? Does the particular D man give quality shot opportunities or does he force them out into the less dangerous zones? I understand that such a stat would involve the positional play of the whole team in their D zone, but it would be interesting to see how it varies from D man to D man.