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Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

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Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Wisko McBadgerton said:
Like I said, you have plenty of arguments to make, and things to complain about, but comparing this team to last year's MN team is just silly. Change 5 freshman out for Kerdiles, McCabe, Zengele, Barnes, and Mersch and you would have a similar situation as to what the Goof's had last year. Not hard to imagine Hughes and Rockwood having several points each already playing with those type of guys.
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Respectfully I'll agree to disagree. Wisko, I love your enthusiasm and passion. I really have it, too. But reality is setting in and changes need to be made. If my sister had balls, she'd be my brother....ifs.....ands....buts....we don't have those guys you mention.

Compare THEIR freshmen and sophomores to ours...it's not that you can't compare them, there IS no comparison.

Trust me; I'm not a gopher honk. I hate the ****ers, but respect them. I've been to the old Williams Arena many times, where I had Cokes "spilled" on me, Boy Scouts make faces at me, and generally been harassed by the fan base (not complaining, I love it. Returned the favor here in Madison. ;) ).

I realize when things aren't even close to going well.
 
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Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

MadCityRich said:
Compare THEIR freshmen and sophomores to ours...it's not that you can't compare them, there IS no comparison.
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Last year through 7 games gofer freshman had 7 of 31 goals. (22.5%)

Badger Freshman through 7 games have 3 of 9 goals (33%) The problem here isn't really the talent level of the top 5 or 6 freshman.

Eaves from last night: "Guys are looking around for somebody else to step up. There is nobody else."


This summer LaBate gave an interview in which he said something like "I wanted to come back because I've never really been "the go to guy" anywhere before..."

That is apparent.

Schulze has been pretty great for 4 or 5 of 7 games so far. Wittchow's been steady but he's out. (Which sucks also because we were hoping to use his big shot on the pp more.) Drake is trying to step up, but took us out with an own goal. On offense, Besse has started to show a little. There's not much else to point to from returnees.

Right, those other guys aren't here. So what it is, is the same unbalanced class problem that has plagued the Eaves era. I don't know how to solve it without recruiting over the top of 6 or 7 guys, and not just underclassmen, which can get to be a pretty tricky situation when it comes to recruiting other guys later on.

Ultimately, we love them when they are experienced upperclassmen, and hate them when they're not.
 
When do we say enough is enough? 0-8 is unacceptable by any standard. Yes they were going to struggle but come on. I am fed up with this.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

WiscTJK said:
When do we say enough is enough? 0-8 is unacceptable by any standard. Yes they were going to struggle but come on. I am fed up with this.
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I've been intimating this for a while. And one reason I've been on the fire Eaves wagon is the excuses are unbearable. You know, for a hard guy like Eaves it's kinda funny how many excuses he dredges up vs. taking responsibility for the team failures...

0-8...does anyone see them going 17-10 the rest of the way to finish at 17-18?
 
solovsfett said:
I've been intimating this for a while. And one reason I've been on the fire Eaves wagon is the excuses are unbearable. You know, for a hard guy like Eaves it's kinda funny how many excuses he dredges up vs. taking responsibility for the team failures...

0-8...does anyone see them going 17-10 the rest of the way to finish at 17-18?
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They played well last night so a few wins will happen.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

"As we told the young men in that room after the game, right now we're not measuring ourselves in wins and losses," Eaves said. "We're measuring ourselves in growth. And we had good growth tonight.

"I thought we had great energy. We legitimately had a chance to find a way to win that game. We just didn't get it done."

AHEM...EXCEPT WINS AND LOSSES ARE THE ULTIMATE MEASURE OF YOUR TEAM!
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

solovsfett said:
"As we told the young men in that room after the game, right now we're not measuring ourselves in wins and losses," Eaves said. "We're measuring ourselves in growth. And we had good growth tonight.

"I thought we had great energy. We legitimately had a chance to find a way to win that game. We just didn't get it done."

AHEM...EXCEPT WINS AND LOSSES ARE THE ULTIMATE MEASURE OF YOUR TEAM!
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Just out of curiosity, coming into this season, looking at the roster, and setting aside the Bob Johnson Legacy for a moment, how many wins did you expect we'd have for the year?
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

I just don't think it's unreasonable to expect that they could have at least split against the Alaska schools, Colorado schools and Northern Michigan. Even with getting swept against a good North Dakota team, that would put them at 3-5. Certainly not great, but I could see it as a work in progress. To be winless going into Thanksgiving weekend is hard to comprehend.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Wisko McBadgerton said:
Just out of curiosity, coming into this season, looking at the roster, and setting aside the Bob Johnson Legacy for a moment, how many wins did you expect we'd have for the year?
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To be forthright I expected a .500 season, so 17-18 regular season wins. They now have to go 17-10 for the remainder of the season to achieve that modest goal and I really do not see that happening.
 
Wisko McBadgerton said:
Just out of curiosity, coming into this season, looking at the roster, and setting aside the Bob Johnson Legacy for a moment, how many wins did you expect we'd have for the year?
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You ask that as if the roster just fell out of a Magic 8 Ball. So let me ask you: since your question is dependent on an implication that the roster is somewhat barren, when will you stop trying to **** shine a turd and instead start questioning the guy responsible for, by premise of your own question, the weak roster?
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Badger Booster said:
I just don't think it's unreasonable to expect that they could have at least split against the Alaska schools, Colorado schools and Northern Michigan. Even with getting swept against a good North Dakota team, that would put them at 3-5. Certainly not great, but I could see it as a work in progress. To be winless going into Thanksgiving weekend is hard to comprehend.
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Absolutely agree with this.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

Badger Booster said:
I just don't think it's unreasonable to expect that they could have at least split against the Alaska schools, Colorado schools and Northern Michigan. Even with getting swept against a good North Dakota team, that would put them at 3-5. Certainly not great, but I could see it as a work in progress. To be winless going into Thanksgiving weekend is hard to comprehend.
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Since solo agrees I'll just respond to this one by saying I think that's fair enough and I'm equally disappointed to be winless at this point.

As to going 17-10 the rest of the way, agree as well, and obviously it's difficult for even the most optimistic to make much of a case otherwise, however I'm encouraged by the play @ DU, a game in which the Badgers had the better of play most of the way and probably deserved a better outcome against a very good team on the road. First time this year LaBate led from the front, with even Pio fan's commenting that DU needed to track him. Now whether that game represents a big step forward, or is merely an anomaly remains to be seen, probably judged by how play goes this upcoming weekend. If it's the former, I don't think 17-10 is impossible yet, although it's obviously going to be uphill the whole way, especially given the schedule. Even PSU following, is no cupcake by any definition, and it's going to only get tougher from there.

As an aside, I do have to say that I think that folks in general overestimate the impact of (even very good) freshman, especially on scoring. Of the last 350 names to appear on the season ending top 50 in points list, only 16 (4%) were freshman. 6 are still in school and 9 of the other 10 have all logged NHL time already. Only gofer, Rau, is still in school, only Sue, Grimaldi, made his NHL debut earlier. DU's Joey LaLeggia is obviously still on that team as is Riley Barber in Miami. I imagine Kerdiles might have made the list had he not been out the first 10 games, but obviously, he's gone. The thing is, sometimes I feel like folks expect to have 3-4 of these guys in a class, when the fact is they are an extreme rarity in NCAA hockey. I'd also note that as hockey is not played in an individual bubble, some of these guys peaked in points their freshman years, presumably at least partly because of players they were surrounded with.
 
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Re: Wisconsin Hockey: Episode XXXI: A New Hope

XYZ said:
You ask that as if the roster just fell out of a Magic 8 Ball. So let me ask you: since your question is dependent on an implication that the roster is somewhat barren, when will you stop trying to **** shine a turd and instead start questioning the guy responsible for, by premise of your own question, the weak roster?
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You assume a lot. There are two separate things to discuss here. 1.) the play, expectations, etc. of the team we actually have on the ice this season. 2.) Issues with Eaves and the program. The answer to the question of this season's expected record is not "Fire Eaves", it's a number. You want to con-volute the two things into one, and I don't.

If I were the arbiter of all things (and I'm not suggesting I'm not, btw.) I would prefer to discuss Eaves in the long standing 'Fire Eaves' thread and discuss this team a bit more here as post after post of complaining about Eaves has a tendency to discourage other posters from discussing play of this team after awhile. And frankly, even if Eaves is fired today, the roster isn't changing and this season is going to continue with these guys for good or ill. At the least I'd prefer folks shared their ideas and insights into both issues with some recognition of their difference. These kids didn't have anything to do with recruiting imbalances, they're here to play. Having said that I certainly welcome any constructive discussions about anything. It's a free country. Fire away folks.
 
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