Wisconsin Hockey 22-23 Empty Dreams & Empty Seats

[solovsfett]

I say he lost on recruiting due to super poor assistant coach hires. That's what did him in.....

Absolutely. If he made the right hires he would have likely retired as Badger HC.

[Timothy A]

I say he lost on recruiting due to super poor assistant coach hires. That's what did him in.....

His last set of assistants were very good (Strand and Bitner), but the die was cast by that time with the lack of talent on the roster.

[MadCityRich]

Paul Chryst has been fired. Way less leniency for football I guess.

Obviously my opinion, but I don't think Mac wanted to pull the plug on Granato when he was only the A.D. for less than a year. IF he had a year and a half under his belt (as he does now), Granato would've gotten whacked.

I'll be honest, I didn't even know the UW club hockey team had a game yesterday. \_(ツ)_/

[WiscTJK]

His last set of assistants were very good (Strand and Bitner), but the die was cast by that time with the lack of talent on the roster.

Absolutely. Too little too late unfortunately. Strand is now back with Bitner at Ohio State.

[WiscTJK]

I forgot to post this tidbit: https://twitter.com/ToddMilewski/sta...32079906996225

Hopefully, they locked him up at the Kohl Center and didn't let him leave......

[Timothy A]

For a reference point, MI Tech beat Lakeland 6-0, outshot them 47-15.

CHN has the WI recruiting class ranked 6th.

[WiscTJK]

For a reference point, MI Tech beat Lakeland 6-0, outshot them 47-15.

CHN has the WI recruiting class ranked 6th.

That's a perfect reference point and probably not a good sign for at least the opening weeks. The Badgers will need to improve quickly to not get in a huge hole with the tough opening schedule.

[solovsfett]

For a reference point, MI Tech beat Lakeland 6-0, outshot them 47-15.

CHN has the WI recruiting class ranked 6th.

Yep. If Wisconsin was well coached with good players, they would have clocked Lakeland 12-2 and put up 60 sog.

this is going to be a nightmare year.

on the upside I’m not going to one game nor buying Btn+ to watch this dumpster fire.

[solovsfett]

Jesus god, Minnesota and Michigan are dominating recruiting: https://www.collegehockeynews.com/ne...lasses-For.php

[Hockeybuckeye]

I'm looking forward to seeing everyone's perspectives win or lose after this weekend's series. I'm going to miss part of the men's games as whoever did the scheduling didn't seem to take into account the women's and men's games overlapping!

[JohnsonsJerseys]

If Wisconsin was well coached with good players... this is going to be a nightmare year.

One of the unique aspects of college hockey is different goals in the minds of each player. For some, NCAA D-I will be the pinnacle of their career. They get a four (or five) year scholarship to play hockey and go to school pretty much for free. Then they will fool around in the ECHL for a couple years and eventually get a real job.

For others, from the day they step on campus, they are already counting the days until they leave and move on to the NHL/AHL. They go to just enough classes to keep their grades at a passing level and as soon as their "advisor" calls with the NHL contract and/or signing bonus, they are gone. Players can have all the talent in the world, but if they are already looking ahead to the next level, they'll never provide their maximum value in the present or gel as a team. If talent on paper won national titles, Michigan would have been handed the 2022 National Championship in October 2021. SEVEN first round picks on the roster and they couldn't even get to the championship game, much less win it all. Yes, they made it to the Frozen Four but looked like an average team at best and far underperformed their potential.

This is where the coaching aspect is huge in college. You need to have someone leading the team that understands the mindsets of ALL the players and how they can differ to get them to all give maximum effort. Michigan Tech had a similar disaster in the late 1990s to what I see WI going through now. We lost Coach Bob Mancini who took a better opportunity and replaced him with Tim Watters - long time NHL veteran, NHL assistant coaching experience. He took a team that finished mid-pack in the old WCHA with overall records around 0.500 (acceptable for MTU back then) and turned them into the doormats of the WCHA winning a total of 38 games over 4+ seasons (replaced early in season 5). It started a 15 year run of horrible hockey at Tech which ended with three consecutive seasons of six, five and four total wins respectively.

If you can't recruit talent to campus AND maximize the talent of the players you do land, you can't win in college hockey. Plenty of teams have managed to win titles with collections of older 2nd and 3rd line players simply because the coaches got everything possible out of them and they beat teams who had far more talent/potential on paper.

[drop_the_puck]

Yep. If Wisconsin was well coached with good players, they would have clocked Lakeland 12-2 and put up 60 sog.

this is going to be a nightmare year.

on the upside I’m not going to one game nor buying Btn+ to watch this dumpster fire.

This is the disappointing part...I really want to spend my money and time on these things for entertainment in winter, but it absolutely has not been worth it for awhile now and been painful to watch Granato teams (Caufield/Holloway year excluded).

[Timothy A]

I'm looking forward to seeing everyone's perspectives win or lose after this weekend's series. I'm going to miss part of the men's games as whoever did the scheduling didn't seem to take into account the women's and men's games overlapping!

WI needs a split at minimum as conventional wisdom says UW and OSU are on par, so a split would be ok on the road. They lost last weekend to a Canadian team that Tech crushed. My confidence is at ZERO. I will root for them to win, but I see OSU sweeping.

Looks like no TV in WI for the series and I will be attending the women's games, so I won't be listening the games either. The fact that the B18 can't televise these games on one of their alternate channels is a joke.

[solovsfett]

This is the disappointing part...I really want to spend my money and time on these things for entertainment in winter, but it absolutely has not been worth it for awhile now and been painful to watch Granato teams (Caufield/Holloway year excluded).

Yep. I want to go and we have 6 tickets center ice lower bowl about 18 rows up but I have no desire to watch a team that plays with no heart/desire and has 0 chance to get to the NCAA’s.

[Hockeybuckeye]

Looks like no TV in WI for the series and I will be attending the women's games, so I won't be listening the games either. The fact that the B18 can't televise these games on one of their alternate channels is a joke.

Actually both of this weekends OSU/UW games are on the BTN+ schedule. Perhaps you can watch them on your phone while at the women's games?