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Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

Nothing much new to report. This weekend, the Gophers looked a lot like they have the previous times I've watched them. The Zumwinkle/Woken/Heise line continues to dominate; Woken was the best player on the ice on Saturday. The defense continues to impress; Emily Brown was the best player on Sunday. The Potomak/Potomak/Wente line continues to dazzle with their playmaking while still being chronically short on actual production. They at least generated better chances on Sunday, and if Amy Potomak ever harnesses her powers to actually fight evil . . .

One thing that's striking is how different the Gophers' breakout and transition play is from last year. For a long time, they were often dependent upon a defenseman just skating the puck out of their own end, often carrying it all the way down the ice. What began as deliberate strategy with Bozek/Ramsey/Stecklein/McMillan felt like it had become a legacy default option for a breakout that often didn't have another plan. Those rushes have all but disappeared, replaced by crisp, quick passes to an open forward. They look really good at finding the player with the best forward momentum coming through the neutral zone. It's been a lot of fun to watch, and I'm curious to see how it's going to play against Wisconsin.

This is the best St Cloud team in years, if not since I started watching in 2010. They aren't prone to panic, they keep a defensive shape, and they're more skilled. If they develop a real plan for how to score, they could be dangerous. Their current offensive zone philosophy of, "Just bang around and see what happens," is scary often enough to let them win some games with the other things they do right. Alder kept them in Sunday's game with some brilliant saves before letting in Brown's second, but rest of the team was good enough that great goaltending let them be competitive.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

ARM said:
Those were the good old days, when Wisconsin was the team losing 14-1. Wouldn't Tim have enjoyed that?
Click to expand...

How did they only kick an extra point? Must have been some strange rules back then.

Your new breakout system of passing the puck to your own players alarms me. I miss the good old days.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

Still Eeyore said:
Nothing much new to report. This weekend, the Gophers looked a lot like they have the previous times I've watched them. The Zumwinkle/Woken/Heise line continues to dominate; Woken was the best player on the ice on Saturday. The defense continues to impress; Emily Brown was the best player on Sunday. The Potomak/Potomak/Wente line continues to dazzle with their playmaking while still being chronically short on actual production. They at least generated better chances on Sunday, and if Amy Potomak ever harnesses her powers to actually fight evil . . .

One thing that's striking is how different the Gophers' breakout and transition play is from last year. For a long time, they were often dependent upon a defenseman just skating the puck out of their own end, often carrying it all the way down the ice. What began as deliberate strategy with Bozek/Ramsey/Stecklein/McMillan felt like it had become a legacy default option for a breakout that often didn't have another plan. Those rushes have all but disappeared, replaced by crisp, quick passes to an open forward. They look really good at finding the player with the best forward momentum coming through the neutral zone. It's been a lot of fun to watch, and I'm curious to see how it's going to play against Wisconsin.

This is the best St Cloud team in years, if not since I started watching in 2010. They aren't prone to panic, they keep a defensive shape, and they're more skilled. If they develop a real plan for how to score, they could be dangerous. Their current offensive zone philosophy of, "Just bang around and see what happens," is scary often enough to let them win some games with the other things they do right. Alder kept them in Sunday's game with some brilliant saves before letting in Brown's second, but rest of the team was good enough that great goaltending let them be competitive.
Click to expand...

I'm a little surprised you didn't mention their continued proclivity to mess up odd man rushes. ;)
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

FiveHoleFrenzy said:
I'm a little surprised you didn't mention their continued proclivity to mess up odd man rushes. ;)
Click to expand...
Clearly this is something they need to work on. They look great in generating those rushes, but it seems their "proclivity to mess up" rises the closer they get to the net.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

What a crappy period by the Gophers...It is kind of amazing they are in a tie game 1-1.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

FiveHoleFrenzy said:
What a crappy period by the Gophers...It is kind of amazing they are in a tie game 1-1.
Click to expand...

Zumwinkle's slap shot is a powerful equalizer. They've looked flat all around, and I'm not sure that the switch of Woken and S. Potomak between the top two lines is helping. Hengler in particular looks like she's struggling so far.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

FiveHoleFrenzy said:
It looks like a beach ball could get through the Gopher goalie. 3-1 Ohio State
Click to expand...

The Hengler/Ostertag pairing is not having a good game. They got overpowered in front of the net on each of OSU's first two goals, and, while Scobee certainly should have made the save on the third, Ostertag handed the puck to Maltais and then went out of her way to ease Maltais' path to the net.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

D2D said:
I see where Nicole Haase is predicting a split in the Minnesota/Ohio State series, then adds “…but both teams have the ability to sweep”. A little surprising, based on each team's results to date?

https://www.uscho.com/2019/10/25/wo...ction-as-ivy-league-schools-start-the-season/
Click to expand...

My non sassy answer is I'm not entirely sure Minnesota is as good as their record implies and I know Ohio State is better than their results imply. Mankato has had OSU's number for a few seasons now, so I take those results with a grain of salt. Should the Buckeyes be able to win those games? Absolutely. But MSU seems to be the one series they should win every season that they really struggle with. If they drop a number of games to SCSU or even Quinnipiac, then I'd have to reconsider. It's not that the ties to MSU aren't bad for them, it's just that I actually expected them at this point.

Much like Robert Morris vs. Minnesota, the Buckeyes hung around the Badgers for all but one period. As you saw tonight, Ohio State is not a team to take lightly and they very much will be in the running at the end of the season. They have plus talent at a number of positions and rookies that are already proving they'll make this team better.

That being said, Minnesota is going to get better than they are right now. I said in my preview that this was a team that would come together and look different than most other Gopher teams, but there's still three lines worth of very talented players there and I think it's a matter of them finding their way. Gopher fans forget how spoiled they are, sometimes, with the talent and ease with which your team usually just graduates, reloads and doesn't miss much of a beat. It's not been that simple this year, but I also don't think it'll be a season-long problem.
 
Re: Minnesota Gophers 2019/2020 Season Thread

See! I just KNEW we should have scheduled LIU so that we'd look even better than our record indicates!!!

As for taking the Buckeyes lightly, OSU has 8 players from Minnesota and its entire coaching staff is former Gophers. I think that the Gophers understand that they are always going to get that team's best effort.

Compare that to the Badgers. Who grows up dreaming of wearing the "Motion W" (that really isn't moving)? Maybe the three D-I players that the state of Wisconsin produces every decade. For the rest of the talent pool, if the movie "Miracle" hadn't been made, all they would know about the Badgers is that they are coached by a guy who played hockey back when their grandfathers used to play. So when the Badgers pass on them (they don't have room for all of the Gophers' rejects), they don't really get ticked at Wisconsin, because that wasn't their first choice anyway.

Thanks for stopping, BTW. It gets old trading the same facetious insults with Tim.
 
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