Re: MN @ WI: The Real Battle Of Interstate 94
wow...
I've been to a lot of gopher games at the mooch and that game flat out depressed me and I'm not even a gopher fan. 5 minutes in I knew the badgers would win. The defense was horrible. Atmosphere was horrible...fans were leaving halfway through the second. Quite a few empty seats...for the badgers?! Come on! Passing was horrible. I credit wisconsin for losing a ton of talent off of last year's team and remaining relevant. Eaves can coach. I'm convinced the problem right now is not with the talent on the team but the leadership at the top. Who were lucia's assistants at CC and alaska? I'm now thinking that his success had more to do with them than his abilities. There is no ying and yang with those coaches. Hill and lucia are clones and it's not working. It's going to be hard for me to go to sleep after that nightmare.
I don't remeber who Lucia's assistants were at CC, but I think that really says something. Generally I tend to remember those things but it was more like Blaiser at Nodak where you knew the success was 100% from the guy at the top.
I guess I'm not qualified to comment on Lucia more than to say he impressed the hell out of me at CC, won 2 NCAA championships already (should have been 3 w/1 at cc vs mich that was there's to win) at mn, but something is wrong and I'm not a rat fan so I generally only see the games when they play UW or Nodak and cannot deduce more than what I can see in 4 - 6 games per year.
What I saw last night from UW and UMN was telling.
UW - Coach Eaves has an excellent system (for lack of a better word) and work ethic in place. It seems now that the coaching changes at assistant positions have had little effect on his methods, and little effect on his team. The kids have thoroughly surprised me now through 9 games at 6-2-1 and the frosh are playing well, even the frosh d (well Faust did have one terrrible giveaway last night). They've gone from a methodical trapping team to now a more open run n' gun style of play and this season in particular Coach Eaves has changed his power play and offensive scheme's a bit as they don't at all resemble the 03, through 09 seasons. much more creative now. It actually reminds me quite a bit of how CC played offense under Lucia in 95. watch those trailers, what the back door or you you're team will get buried.
UMN - They were beaten to loose pucks in the offensive zone, and beaten badly at times on the walls in their defensive zone, + their d-zone coverage looked out of synch. I don't know what that says of Lucia, I don't recall his teams at CC playing like that at all, and definitely not his early gopher (er rat) teams. I think it's possible his assistants have let him down on that. I don't know what advantage Hill gives Lucia. I don't know what advantage the 3rd guy gives him. If he's hired one or 2 guys over the years to try and influence their kid to come to UMN that's a HUGE mistake.
the gopher posters are right in that it's perfectly fine if your team goes down swinging once in a while, but this gopher team I saw last night barely put up a fight. It almost felt anti-climactic to have my favorite team wipe them out 6-0. I know they're short-handed but that's still not that big of an excuse. I've seen Pat White and Larson play and they wouldn't have changed things dramatically. bjugstad and budish would have helped but I don't know about changing the outcome.
my best analysis is the type of goals Wisconsin scored were all hard-hat, gritty, gutsy plays. It shows how much the players have bought into Eaves' coaching. To the extent they reflect on UMN is that the gophs weren't clearing guys out or didn't know who to cover. My thing is I don't know if that's a reflection of Lucia, Hill (or both), or the types of players they bring in. 4 games a year isn't enough for me to know
But crap like that is what happens to mediocre teams, and they cannot overcome such mistakes. 
