So, where does this program stand?
The Gophers are pretty comfortably the third best team in the WCHA, and the third best team in the country. NPI has a known issue of overrating a good team that puts up a great record against a weaker slate of opponents. Penn State isn't as close to Minnesota as it looks, and Ohio State is narrowly but clearly better than Minnesota.
The question is why this is true not just this year, but over the last five years and it looks like it will be true next year. Coaching affects a team in four ways: recruiting; building a culture; player development; and on ice tactics. In college sports, recruiting is by far the most important. That's not the fun answer, but it's true.
I have some questions about the culture Brad Frost has developed. There are too many games where the Gophers just fail to show up. The first game against Ohio State, the second in Madison, and the lost weekend against Mankato. They did play well in both games this weekend, but Ohio State is just a bit better. But the biggest issue is pretty clearly the recruiting. Player development is at least average, and I have no problem with the tactics, aside from covering my face when the breakout bogs down with passes behind the net.
Over the last decade, Frost and his staff have been lazy recruiting players to Minneapolis. They haven't done as well in getting the top athletes from Minnesota, and haven't adjusted to the rest of the country producing more talent relative to their homeland. They've started bringing in more Europeans, but everyone else is now doing the same. Frost also seems indecisive about how heavily he wants to rely on the transfer portal versus bringing in freshmen. My personal preference on that is to do the latter, as it makes rooting for the team more fun if the players are around for four years, but no one can just ignore transfers anymore. Recruiting high school students also takes more effort, which I haven't seen signs of from this staff.
The era when Minnesota coaches could just rely on mystique and local kids to just produce a championship level team are over. I don't think Frost has adapted well. The advantages Minnesota has allow it to remain near the top, but not at it. All of the Big 10 schools have resources that no one else can compete with, giving them a huge leg up. It's not an accident that it looks like all four NCAA quarterfinals will be at Big Ten rinks. Frost is coasting off of that. I do think that there's something deeper going on and that suboptimal choices are being made about who to bring in, but I don't know exactly what that is.
The decline in Minnesota's fortunes coincides with the departure of Nadine Muzerall to Ohio State, and I'm pretty sure that there is a causal relationship there. That said, there are aspects of Muzerall's approach that I find distasteful, so I wouldn't be interested in a trade of coaching staffs, even if it meant more winning
I don't see much prospect of things changing in the near future. Brad Frost is who he is, so I don't think it will or even can change so long as he's in charge. The program is successful enough that I don't seem him getting fired, and I'm not sure I want to get on to that treadmill anyway. This is the team that we have.
What to do about it? As I said, I think the problems, such as they are, are in the coaching staff. The players are, I think, giving it their all, so I don't want to start slagging them and being constantly critical of their play. I think that there may be a financial day of reckoning coming for the Minnesotas and Wisconsins of the world when the Michigans, Ohio States, and Penn States decide that they don't need to share the vast football revenues with schools that don't pull their weight in that regard. That may force a change.
In the meantime, I enjoy watching this team play. There are many worse things than spending my time rooting for the 3rd to 5th best team in the country that goes to the Frozen Four more often than not and could be a bounce or two away from playing for the national championship. I don't have a lot of use for the Gopher fans that are determined to keep bitching about how bad they are. They aren't bad. They're really good. They just aren't one of the two best teams in the country. I can live with that.
