Re: WISCONSIN Hockey Vol. 22 - Let's not have another cheesy thread title... Wait, W
Late to the party on some of the discussion on some of the problems surrounding UW.
Yeap attendance is down and that is not a new story. There are a littany of factors that go into that and some certainly fall at the feet of Eaves while many also do not. Ticket prices, parking prices, on ice results (but let's be brutually honest....they are not all that different then the up and down we saw the last decade of Sauer), a crapy economy pinching discretionary income, and the one I think is underaprreciated is where hockey falls into the hierarchy of UW sports. For a long time, hockey was the flagship program for sucess while football and bounceyball floundered in mediocrity (or worse). There has been a prolonged run of succes in football and basketball and I think unfortunately at some point that has had an impact on where hockey sits in the conciousness of potential fans and their wallets. There's a whole new generation that thinks it's cooler to go to football or basketball games long before a hockey game and that simply was not the case as much a couple decades ago. Attendance for last seasons UNO series at the end of October was 20920 which is not all that different then the 19337 for CC this past weekend.
Eaves on the practicing on the Kohl surface is as many others have said more a dig at the folks deciding the facility scheduling then an excuse for his team in my opinoin. Solovsfett, North Dakota can show up and play well regardless of ice surface size because A) they are never second or third fiddle on their home rink and B) their facilities are phenominal and from their locker room they can either walkout and down a hallway onto the Ralph sheet, or up a short staircase onto the Olympic sheet depending on where they are playing that given week. North Dakota hockey is NEVER not going to have access to their ice sheet because of bounceyball, volleyball, wrestling, concerts because they are at the top of the foodchain for their building and not toward the bottom as UW hockey is.
Did Oz make Eaves or did Eaves make Oz? I suspect it is a little of both and bit more of Eaves AND the UW program as it was Oz. Oz has had some success elsewhere, but I'm pretty sure Blais wins at North Dakota with or without Oz in the one year he was in the right place at the right time. If Oz was so great and so awesome at D devlopement, why have the NHL advisors not steered their kids to OSU cause last I checked Oz is not rolling in blue chip dman recruits that are getting drafted in the top few rounds every year? I get OSU is not one of the premier programs as far as tradition lots of other factors, but neither was Notre Dame or Miami before there last coaching hires. I'm not trying to say Oz is not a solid coach and a very very good assistant at the college level, but I am trying to say some of his sucess/reputation is directly attributable to the Wisconsin hockey franchise (history, facilities, fan support, ect) and Eaves. While, I may seem to those that reveer Oz to have just tore down Oz, I do think him leaving (I think he was one of the best assistants when he was an assistant) and replacing assistants in general has been part of (many) problems that have hampered the program. In Oz's case, I think it was a lot of a victim of your own sucess (as you can argue was the case with Hynes and MAYBE even Patrick).
On the not getting top dmen recruits, we didn't always get them under Oz recruiting coordination either. McDonagh, McBain, & Gardiner were guys that the flagship homestate school were not full court press from the get go on and call it luck or a better eye at a younger age then most but it worked out for UW. At this point, UW has been getting commits from well regard 15/16 year olds that time will tell if they turn out like what will likely go down as an unprecedented era of elite dman at UW (or any other school for that matter). Whether it was Oz, luck, Eaves, or whatever, we got spoiled being able to run out a dcorp like we did for a few years.
Mark Johnson....ugggh. Taking a guy that has been coaching womans hockey for a decade to be the head guy at UW would not be a good hire.
