Wisconsin Hockey 20-21 Give Us A Reason To Believe

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

I am baffled by this Moe business.

Does Granato really have that little faith in Rowe/Grannan? Is this really where we need to be putting scholarships when we have probably 5 of our top 6 forwards gone next year?

[WiscTJK]

I am baffled by this Moe business.

Does Granato really have that little faith in Rowe/Grannan? Is this really where we need to be putting scholarships when we have probably 5 of our top 6 forwards gone next year?

Me as well. Are they going to carry 4 goalies? Rowe, Grannan (NLI), Garrity and Moe?

[Lemonade]

Me as well. Are they going to carry 4 goalies? Rowe, Grannan (NLI), Garrity and Moe?

How they working 4 goalies into scholarship money? Maybe Rowe is starter, Moe is 2nd and Garrity is 3rd and push Grannan back a year?

[DPlaya]

A couple of random thoughts....

I wonder if Grannan comes to UW next year. He has a .874 save percentage in the USHL with Sioux Falls which is actually better than his save percentage with the USNTDP the past two seasons. None of those teams are/were very good though.

Granato may now understand you need older players to win, but you cannot change your team overnight. He is finally bringing in players with some junior experience who are more physically mature and no longer bringing in players directly from high school who are not ready to play like Gorniak and R. Donovan. That should make a difference. The guys being added seem more likely to be good four year players than early departures other than Ceulemans this year. Also an interesting move adding Max Johnson and Jared Moe.

Players moving up a line or two suddenly have different roles and more playing time. Their stats in some sense are not only a reflection of their abilities but their roles and playing time so if given more opportunities in different roles I think there are some guys on the roster who can “up” their points.

Ceulemans will definitely bring an offensive presence from the blue line the team did not have this season, and it sounds like Laatsch is good on the power play.

[solovsfett]

Thinking that Nodak, BC, Minnesota, BU and Denver don't play some form of the trap is simply ridiculous. Hint: every team plays some form of neutral zone trap. Is every team Jacque Lemaire style? No. But every team runs some form of neutral zone trap, otherwise the neutral zone would be a fly zone and that team would suck.

Titles since 2006:
UMD ~ 3
BC ~ 3
NoDak ~ 1
BU ~ 1
Denver ~ 1
Wisconsin ~ 1
Providence ~ 1
Union ~ 1
Yale ~ 1
MSU ~ 1
Michigan ~ 0
Minnesota ~ 0

Tied for 3rd most titles in the last 15 years Mr. "The only thing that matters is the NCAA title."

You make it sound like North Dakota is winning the title every other year... When in reality the only two programs with more than one title are UMD and BC and they took many years to establish their dominance. We are just in the early stages of recovering from the worst season in badger hockey history. Literally rebuilding the program. Tell me, when was the last time BC or UMD or North Dakota or Denver had to deal with rebuilding their program from the ground up? This expectation of instant success is insanity. Remember your boy Scott Sandelin took 15 YEARS to establish his dominant program.

Let’s be honest here. I said 30 years, not an arbitrary 2006 start date. In any given 15 year span a team can get hot and win it all. Consistently winning titles over time is the goal. Not one and done.

we must define trap differently because I have yet to see a team from Denver, Nodak, Duluth, Minnesota that can’t straight up fly up and down the ice. In fact, it was getting embarrassed by a team that can really skate that led to Mike eaves little meltdown in grand forks (along with Leavitt’s chirping).

and I don’t care about worst year in program history. For Christ sake, how many coaches has Nodak had since the 70’s? And I think every coach from the 80’s forward has one at least one title. Maybe burd can chime in on that.

so, no excuses here. No way.

[gwhinwi]

Junior D Ty Emberson has decided to go pro.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Harrumph. Changes the calculus on how nice it would be for Ess or Inamoto to come back.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Taking a stab at lineups…

Ahcan - Johnson - Stange
Mersch - Lindmark - Caufield
R Donovan - Gorniak - dSP
Brown - Malmquist - Morrison

Cuelemans - Kehrer
Peltonen - Vorlicky
Laatsch - LaMaster

I guess? Hard to know how to work those defensemen when there’s so many righties. But unless Ess or Inamoto comes back there’s only like 24 points and 150 or so games played among the returning defensive corps.

What do the PP units even look like?

[GoBucky18]

I was kinda stunned they brought in Moe as well, but you knew something was going to happen when LaFontaine wanted to go an extra year (I have no idea why). Just scratching my head over why he would want Wisconsin when they had three Goalies already. My two cents, he will be Rowe's backup, Garrity will be groomed for his Jr/Sr year, and Grannan is going to be asked to play another year in the USHL/NAHL. They must not like what they see from him yet. Garrity will prob be a healthy scratch for the great majority of games unless there is an injury. All that being said, Grannan could be released from his NLI as well, which isn't the worst thing to happen and gives him options, as long as the staff is honest with him.

[Timothy A]

Harrumph. Changes the calculus on how nice it would be for Ess or Inamoto to come back.

Losing Enberson is a big problem. I'd kinda rather just move on from Inamoto....D +/-
Emberson +15
Kerher +13
Peltonen +13
Ess+10
Inamoto +6
Vorlicky -4

[Timothy A]

I was kinda stunned they brought in Moe as well, but you knew something was going to happen when LaFontaine wanted to go an extra year (I have no idea why). Just scratching my head over why he would want Wisconsin when they had three Goalies already. My two cents, he will be Rowe's backup, Garrity will be groomed for his Jr/Sr year, and Grannan is going to be asked to play another year in the USHL/NAHL. They must not like what they see from him yet. Garrity will prob be a healthy scratch for the great majority of games unless there is an injury. All that being said, Grannan could be released from his NLI as well, which isn't the worst thing to happen and gives him options, as long as the staff is honest with him.

I do believe on NLI signing day, TG specifically said how important it was go land a WI product like Grannan. If he never developed like they were hoping, that's the way it is. Being a goalie-centric guy, I've always wanted to see a WI born goalie be THE guy at some point.

[Bonin21]

Taking a stab at lineups…

Ahcan - Johnson - Stange
Mersch - Lindmark - Caufield
R Donovan - Gorniak - dSP
Brown - Malmquist - Morrison

Cuelemans - Kehrer
Peltonen - Vorlicky
Laatsch - LaMaster

Yikes. We must break you.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Yikes. We must break you.

The Badgers won’t need any help being broken.

The only times in recent memory when we’ve lost such a huge percentage of our scoring has been after the 2006 title and after the 2010 FF run.

Those weren’t pretty seasons.

[WiscTJK]

So Granato gets the goofers backup goalie to transfer. Meanwhile, nodak gets bemidji’s starter..... face palm.....

[digitalbooya]

Let’s be honest here. I said 30 years, not an arbitrary 2006 start date. In any given 15 year span a team can get hot and win it all. Consistently winning titles over time is the goal. Not one and done.

we must define trap differently because I have yet to see a team from Denver, Nodak, Duluth, Minnesota that can’t straight up fly up and down the ice. In fact, it was getting embarrassed by a team that can really skate that led to Mike eaves little meltdown in grand forks (along with Leavitt’s chirping).

and I don’t care about worst year in program history. For Christ sake, how many coaches has Nodak had since the 70’s? And I think every coach from the 80’s forward has one at least one title. Maybe burd can chime in on that.

so, no excuses here. No way.

I don't give a rip what you said. I said 15 years because it is recent history. No duh any team can get hot in any one year and win it all. Why do you think only two teams have more than one title in the last 15 years? There is more parity nowadays than the golden years you always reference, which is why you're expectations set you up to be perpetually negative.

2006, 2010, and 2014 Wisconsin could straight up fly down the ice and they ran the 1-1-3. 2020 Wisconsin was probably the fastest team in the country and they got dumpstered by a Jacque Lemaire style trap team in the first round. Your beloved Heater/Rhino team supposedly could fly up and down the ice and look what happened to them. This "one style is the winning style" is ludicrous.

North Dakota has had 4 coaches since 78' and they had at least one leave (not fired). Wisconsin has had 4 coaches since then as well, 3/4 with a title (Granato only without).

I'm more into building a winning program cause clearly we don't have continued success like UND, Denver, Duluth, etc. Can't put the cart before the horse, no? Prior to this year, I think culture has been more the problem. Guys were playing for themselves instead of for each other or for the team. If Granato figures the culture thing out, that is a foundational building block that each team needs to have. It's something I've seen with UWSP (2 titles in the last 5 years and an undefeated season btw). It's something I started to see this year and I hope continues into next year and beyond. Keep building on that foundation. I hope Granato takes that approach.