Post-Final Five thoughts

Congratulations to the University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux men's hockey team for bringing home its second consecutive Broadmoor Trophy. UND won the tournament championship in St. Paul by defeating two highly skilled teams -- Denver and Colorado College -- in games that should serve as a good tune-up for the upcoming NCAA playoffs.

  As should be expected this time of year, UND's seniors made the big plays when they were most needed to earn the wins. It was senior Matt Frattin with the game-winning goal for the championship, assisted by seniors Chay Genoway and Evan Trupp. What impressed me most about the play Trupp made to set up the goal was the fact that when he passed the puck back to Genoway, Genoway had just come off the bench and hadn't even entered the DU zone yet.

  Genoway not only used his speed to intercept the puck before it left the zone, but he also had the presence of mind to one-time Trupp's pass without breaking stride. It was the speed at which the play happened that gave Frattin the best look at an open net that any Sioux player had seen since the second period. As Colorado College learned on Friday night, if you give Frattin that type of opportunity, he's not going to miss.

  In Friday's game against the Colorado College Tigers, it was Genoway's pass that sprung Frattin shorthanded and led to senior Brad Malone's goal after what appeared to be a momentum-changing 5-minute major penalty against UND. And it was Trupp's no-look, behind-the-back pass to Frattin in the slot that gave the Sioux their 4-3 victory over Colorado College.

  Senior Brent Davidson deserves recognition for scoring big goals in both games. Just when you're wondering how the Sioux will make up for the loss of Jason Gregoire, along comes Davidson and sophomore Danny Kristo back from a serious bout with frostbite to add some offensive punch. Denver coach George Gwozdecky correctly noted that throughout the season, UND has found a way to roll with the punches whenever key players were out with injuries.

  That brings me to another point: Where would this team be without players like senior Jake Marto and sophomore Joe Gleason who have demonstrated their willingness and ability to change rolls from defenseman to forward and back again? Beginning with former Sioux Kyle Radke and Brad Miller, players with that type of versatility have become a staple of UND's teams the last several seasons.

  Senior Derrick LaPoint has quietly become the unsung hero on the blue line. Although he was considered an offensive-defenseman when he came to UND, he has turned into a defensive force who's seldom noticed simply because he rarely makes a mistake. Nobody should forget that he suffered a concussion at the end of his freshman season and a devastating leg injury in his sophomore season that would have ended the careers of many players.

  Turning to goaltending, I was disappointed that Aaron Dell was not named to the Final Five All-Tournament Team. It was Dell who kept the Sioux in the championship game when they were being outplayed and heavily outshot by the Pioneers. He made many saves on shots through traffic that perhaps were not as spectatular as some of the saves by Denver's Sam Brittain, but were nonethless difficult stops. He was also the goalie on the championship team that won two games against quality opponents. Dell was a major part of UND's tournament success and deserved recognition for it.

  Finally, the Sioux coaching staff -- Dave Hakstol, Cary Eades, Dane Jackson, Karl Goehring and Pierre-Paul Lamoureux -- all deserve kudos for keeping the team focused, prepared and motivated. Leadership from the upperclassmen no doubt makes their jobs a bit easier. However, in the ten season I've covered Fighting Sioux hockey for U.S. College Hockey Online, I've never seen Hakstol so determined to have the team forget the last game and concentrate on the next one. From a sports writer's perspective, it's a little annoying at times, but if it brings UND an eighth national championship, I won't complain.

  There are many others, such as UND trainer Mark Poolman, who work behind the scenes to help assure the continued success of the team throughout the long season. They, too, deserve kudos for putting the Fighting Sioux in position to win another championship. It's been a great run so far, and I suspect the best is yet to come.

Really?

Let's see...

1. Two guys back in the lineup who've been out for a while.
2. Three lines scrambled.
3. Defensive pairs scrambled.
4. Two defensemen playing forward.
5. Hottest scorer on the team out of the lineup.

And yet, the Fighting Sioux beat Colorado College 4-3 at the Final Five.

If only Dave Hakstol knew how to coach.

About that goal...

Almost nobody (excluding Fighting Sioux fans) seemed too upset about the goal Notre Dame scored with just over three minutes left in Saturday's game against North Dakota that resulted in the a 2-2 tie. It's usually not difficult to tell when Sioux coach Dave Hakstol is unhappy with a call that went against his team. But in his post-game comments, he seemed more than willing to accept the ruling that enabled the Fighting Irish to escape Ralph Engelstad Arena with a tie.

And Sioux goalie Aaron Dell? He's not exactly a wordy or an emotional kind of guy. He didn't say that he felt as though the Notre Dame player in the crease had interfered with him, although it certainly looked as if that was the case at the time the Fighting Irish scored.

So I didn't think there was any reason to make an issue of the game-tying goal until I watched this replay and reviewed the NCAA ice hockey rule book. I had assumed the goal was allowed because the puck was in the crease at the time Notre Dame's Bryan Rust (No. 21) appeared to slide into the crease totally on his own. But as this frame from the video shows, Rust was well into the crease and the puck was well out of it before Notre Dame's Sam Calabrese swept the puck on goal.



It's quite obvious in the video that Rust physically interfered with Dell's ability to make a save. So given that Rust went into the crease after the puck came out and Rust clearly interfered with Dell, how could the referee award the goal to Notre Dame? I submitted that question to the WCHA. Head official Greg Shepherd was kind enough to provide this response:

The only view that the officials have for replay is the overhead view, and talking to the on-ice officials live they thought the North Dakota player caused the Notre Dame player to go into the goalie by the use of his stick, and from the overhead view there was nothing to overturn that. If we had other angles it could have been different.

Unfortunately, Shepherd raises more questions than he answers. The North Dakota player in question would have been Matt Frattin (No. 21) who was closest to Rust. In the video, Frattin ties up Rust's stick with his stick and lifts it to keep Rust from putting in the rebound off Dell's save. Frattin appears to do nothing that would have caused Rust to fall. In sliding into the crease, Rust makes contact with Dell and comes between the goalie and the puck.

Had Calabrese swept the puck straight into the net, the referees might have been able to make the case that Dell was in no position to make a save. Thus, Rust's contact would have made no difference. But the puck appears to hit the post and then travel at an angle away from the goal line. It deflects in off either Dell or Rust. Dell had virtually no chance of making a save with Rust in contact with him and lying between him and the puck.

The most important question is this: If the officials saw Frattin use his stick in a manner that caused Rust to fall, why didn't they call a penalty? Certainly Frattin would have been guilty of interference on a Notre Dame scoring opportunity. A penalty would have been warranted. But because no penalty was called, it severely weakens the case that Rust went into the crease because of Frattin's stick work.

Besides that, the video from various angles in no way supports the on-ice officials' claim that Frattin's stick caused Rust to lose his balance, slide into the crease and make contact with the goalie. While I can sympathize with the fact that the referees don't have access to anything but the overhead view in making their call, the fact remains that their decision was based not only on something that didn't happen, but also on something that the one video replay they viewed didn't support.

Shepherd leaves open the possibility that had the referees been able to see the replays of the goal from different angles, they might have made a different decision. That's nice, but what does the WCHA do about an officiating crew which allowed a goal that shouldn't have counted, a goal that might have important implications at playoff time in March? What do you do with an officiating crew that claims to have seen a penalty on a scoring opportunity, but didn't call it and then uses the non-call as its rationale for allowing the goal?

It makes no sense.

Hockey needs to figure this out

What is and what isn't a legal hit? Is it permissible to blast a player in a vulnerable position -- such as having his head down -- or isn't it? For many years, the thinking in hockey has been that if a player puts himself in a vulnerable position, he gets whatever he deserves. But it should be evident by now that allowing such hits can cause serious injuries.

So does hockey want to eliminate these types of hits or not? The check UND's Brad Malone delivered to Denver's Jesse Martin during Saturday's game that sent Martin to the hospital is a perfect example of hockey's indecisiveness on the issue. (The latest reports say Martin was seriously injured on the play.)

Was Malone guilty of charging? Perhaps, but that's unclear from the video. I'd like to think that if what Malone did was a flagrant charge worthy of a five-minute major penalty and ejection from the game, it would have been obvious not only to the officials on the ice, but also to almost everyone watching the game, but that was not the case.

None of the four officials on the ice put an arm up to signal a penalty. UND continued to play for five seconds with possession of the puck. Matt Frattin had a good scoring opportunity during that time. If he had scored, would it have counted? Or would the officials have retroactively wiped out the goal when they retroactively got around to assessing the penalty they didn't originally call?

A score by UND at that point could have had a significant impact on the game's outcome. It demonstrates why it's necessary to have an established policy and concrete rules in place rather than making something up on the spot depending upon the seriousness of the injury to the player.

Either you say that some hard hits are part of the game and allow them or hockey's regulatory authorities should take substantive action to make it clear to players, coaches and officials that they will no longer be tolerated because they're simply too dangerous. It's too important an issue to make it up as you go, and hockey has put off dealing with it far too long.

Football, for the most part, seems to have figured this out. Players are no longer permitted to deliver dangerous hits just because an opponent is in a vulnerable position. As a result, sometimes players are flagged for hits that were completely accidental, unintentional or because an opposing player did something they couldn't have anticipated.

This leads to players occasionally being unfairly penalized for a situation that was completely out of their control. That's the down side of attempting to eliminate dangerous hits from contact sports. However, it is the best way to insure that player safety is the top priority.

Football hasn't suffered from attempts to take dangerous hits out of the game, and it's doubtful that hockey would, either. Hockey should follow football's lead.

Sioux in good hands with Eidsness

Worth noting at season's end is that Fighting Sioux sophomore goalie Brad Eidsness in on track to be one of North Dakota's all-time best goalies, especially if he plays four years. He's already made a name for himself in the UND record books.

For the second straight season, Eidsness tied his fourth-place record for most wins in a season by a UND goalie (24). His goals against average this season was 2.11, which ranks him fifth in UND's record book, with only Karl Goehring, Phil Lamoureux, Jordan Parise and Bob Peters above him.

Eidsness' .914 save percentage ties him with Lamoureux for the ninth best season ever by a Sioux goalie. His three shutouts this season tie him for seventh with Lamoureux, Ed Belfour, Goehring and Lefty Curran. His 41 games played this season is second only to Lamoureux's 42 in 07-08.

In career stats, after two years, Eidsness is already tied for seventh with 82 games games played. He's in sixth place with 48 career wins. He needs only five more wins to pass Jon Casey and Toby Kvalevog, eight more to pass Parise and 13 more to pass Lamoureux in second place. If he stays four years, he could potentially pass Goehring for all-time number of wins (80).

Eidsness' current career winning percentage of .667 ranks ninth and his 2.34 career goals against average ranks third behind Lamoureux and Parise. More impressively, his .910 career save percentage ranks fourth in the Sioux record book, tied with Casey and behind Goehring (.918), Lamoureux (.920) and Parise (.921)

What more could you expect from a sophomore goalie? Yes, Eidsness has given up some soft and untimely goals, but what goalie hasn't? Besides being very durable his first two seasons, he's also improved significantly. His save percentage went from .906 his rookie season to .914 this year and his goals against average from 2.56 to 2.11. It will be interesting to see if he can be even better in 2010-2011.

My greatest concern about UND's goaltending for next season is that Aaron Dell needs to develop into a reliable backup who can spell Eidsness on occasion and substitute for him should it become necessary.

It's a team game after all

As another Fighting Sioux hockey season comes to an unsatisfying end, I'll state the obvious: size, speed, skill, talent and past victories will only take a team so far. The team that consistently plays inspired hockey and plays together stands the best chance of winning a national championship. Until Yale ended UND's season with a 3-2 win yesterday, I had no reason to believe that the Sioux weren't such a team.

Little RIT brought down the regular season champions from the nation's two most powerful conferences, the WCHA and Hockey East. And if Wisconsin doesn't bring its best game against the Tigers in the Frozen Four, all the Badgers' NHL draft picks and Hobey Baker finalists won't save them from the same fate.

For the rest of the season, I'm a Wisconsin fan if for no other reason than to prove ESPN commentator Bob Norton wrong about the WCHA. Last night, he couldn't resist taking a swipe at the league when reporting on Yale's win over UND. I like Norton because he actually knows something about college hockey, but his perpetual eastern bias is annoying, and it doesn't help when he goes out of his way to put in on display.

So, on Wisconsin!

Right and Wrong
There's no sugarcoating a season-ending loss, but it's worth noting that the Sioux did some of what they needed to do against Yale. It's what UND didn't do that ultimately cost it the game.

UND didn't get the quick start it needed. Yale had played just three games in the past three weeks. Bulldogs coach Keith Allain took a gamble when he went with a goalie Ryan Rondeau who had played only three games all season. That made a strong Sioux start imperative, but UND came out flat, which gave the Bulldogs time to shake off the rust and Rondeau time to gain confidence.

Yale got the first goal of the game when the Sioux flubbed the opportunity to clear the puck from their zone. Denny Kearney made a beautiful deflection off Thomas Dignard's point shot, and suddenly the underdogs had momentum. The Sioux cause wasn't helped when Jason Gregoire made an uncharacteristically bad decision that cost UND a chance for a two-man advantage.

So why the slow start? Did seeing Rondeau in net give the Sioux a false sense of confidence? Did it have something to do with playing a sparsely attended game without the usual number of supportive Sioux fans? Was it too many injuries? Or did physical or mental fatigue finally catch up with the team? Whatever the case, UND coach Dave Hakstol said after the game that he didn't see the letdown coming, nor could he explain why it happened. He didn't, however, think it had anything to do with fatigue.

Going into this game, I believed that if the Sioux could get Yale out of its game, they would stand a good chance of success. In some respects, UND achieved that goal. Yale came into the contest averaging 40 shots on goal per game. The Sioux held them to 23.

Rensselaer was the only other team to hold Yale to fewer shots on goal. That happened Jan. 30 in a game Renssalaer won 4-0 while outshooting the Bulldogs 26-22. Defensively, UND deserves credit for limiting Yale's high-powered offense to so few opportuntiies. Unfortunately, the Bulldogs took advantage of the few they got.

I also believed that UND needed to stay out of the penalty box to avoid giving Yale's power play – second in the nation – a chance to be a factor. The Sioux did that, too, limiting the Bulldogs only three power plays and killing them all.

The Bulldogs' defensive strategy appeared to be that any time the Sioux had a "Grade A" scoring chance, they would take a penalty rather than risk giving up the goal. It worked because UND didn't capitalize on any of its four power plays and Darcy Zajac just missed on his penalty shot. UND's power play has run hot and cold for much of the season. In a one-and-done playoff game, it was a poor time for UND's power play to go cold.

I noted in this blog back on March 12 that 7 of UND's 11 losses to that point had come when the Sioux were outscored in the second period. Now it's 8 of 12 as the Bulldogs outscored the Sioux 2-0 in the second period, thus becoming the only team to accomplish that feat since St. Cloud State did it on Feb. 12 and won 4-3. This was also the only period in which Yale outshot UND (10-6). Until Saturday, the Sioux had put their second-period lapses behind them.

Missing Pieces
Freshman Joe Gleason is the type of defenseman who's well-suited to play a team like Yale. But an injury suffered during the playoff series with Minnesota kept him out of the game. And although Jake Marto played exceptionally well, Hakstol admitted that the junior defenseman has been injured, not practicing for the past month and operating with limited ability. The Grand Forks Herald's Brad Schlossman reported in his blog that defenseman Ben Blood was playing hurt, too.

Under the circumstances, UND did a remarkable job defensively by limiting Yale to 23 shots on goal and keeping the Bulldogs' power play off the board. And while there's no point in crying over spilled milk, it's difficult not to think about how much of a difference Chay Genoway could have made in this game, both as a player and an on-ice leader.

UND's downfall throughout the season wasn't defense, it was scoring. That turned out to be the case against Yale when the Sioux didn't begin to generate quality scoring chances until the third period, capitalizing twice. As forward Matt Frattin noted after the game, by then it was "too little, too late."

Defensively, the Sioux were two bounces away from doing all they needed to do to win the game. They cut Yale's average number of shots on goal nearly in half; they held the nation's top-scoring offense to a goal less than it averaged; and they shut out one of the most potent power plays in the country. If the Sioux underachieved in any area, it was on offense.

Was it Coaching?
In each of the nine seasons I've covered Fighting Sioux hockey for U.S. College Hockey Online, I always learn something new from Hakstol and other coaches with whom I'm fortunate to interact.

When unranked Ohio State defeated Bemidji State in overtime at the Subway Holiday Classic at Engelstad Arena, I asked Beavers coach Tom Serratore if his team had a hard time getting up for the game against the Buckeyes after defeating No. 1 Miami the previous day.

The ever-glib Serratore replied, "I'm a coach. I think our team should be up for every game."

That's an important lesson because no matter how much coaches and fans want to believe that their team is completely fired up and totally motivated to play any team it faces, human nature and plain-old bad luck are always waiting in the wings to throw a monkey wrench into the best laid plans.

It's easy to think that UND should win a national championship every year -- until you stop to consider all the factors that conspire against it. As Gen. Tommy Franks says, "...the enemy gets a vote." In other words, no matter what you plan for your team, the opposition will do all it can to make the plan go awry.

One of Hakstol's favorite expressions is: "Control what's yours to contol." Throughout six seasons of covering Sioux hockey under Hakstol's guidance, I have no reason to believe that he doesn't do his best to control what he can. In the course of a season, he must make hundreds of judgement calls with the potential to produce negative results. He deserves credit for getting the vast majority of them right.

Compared to even the elite teams in college hockey, UND under Hakstol has been a model of consistency, going to the Frozen Four four times, making the NCAA tournament six years, winning the WCHA tournament twice and claiming a league championship. That's to say nothing of the reputation UND has garnered for producing pro-caliber players.

Even some of the UND's harshest critics express grudging respect for what Hakstol and his coaching staff accomplish season after season. How many times has he been asked: "How do you do it?" To say that most college hockey programs are envious of UND's record of success is an understatment.

I'm as disappointed as anyone that another hockey season has come to an end without the Fighting Sioux adding a national championship banner to the rafters of Ralph Engelstad Arena. But I can't wait until next season when I walk into the arena, remind myself that, yes, I am in Grand Forks, ND, and feel confident that no matter happens, Hakstol, Cary Eades and Dane Jackson will have the team primed and positioned to make a run at No. 8.

There's really nothing else that anyone can reasonably expect.

Sioux shouldn't take Yale lightly

The Yale Bulldogs concern me because they're a small, fast team that scores a lot of goals. They're the top offensive team in a nation, averaging slightly more than 4 goals per game. Yale has the second highest rated power play in the nation (23.5 percent). They remind me of the skilled, offense-minded Hockey East teams that have given the Sioux trouble in recent years.

Nobody can say that Yale hasn't beat anybody. The Bulldogs beat Cornell twice, a team that split with UND. Having noted this, I'll also say that the Fighting Sioux are a better team than the one that split with Cornell. Barry Melrose aside, UND's record against Cornell in January isn't the most reliable measuring stick at this point of the season.

On the plus side, I can see the Sioux matching up very well with Yale. UND's size could give the Bulldogs problems, especially in front of their net. If Yale is forced to take penalties, they could be in trouble. The Bulldogs' penalty kill is ranked 29th nationally. It hasn't had to be great because Yale takes very few penalties (38th nationally). UND will have to stay out of the box to keep Yale's potent power play off the ice.

One surprising aspect about Yale is the fact that they don't seem to have a top goalie. They've played four different goalies throughout the season. Their top netminder, freshman Nick Maricic, is 46th nationally in GAA (2.95) and 73rd in save percentage (.888). That explains why the Bulldogs are ranked 32nd in the nation on defense, giving up 2.94 goals per game.

It seems a bit unfair that UND, the top-rated No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament, should have to play the top-rated No. 3 seed. However, Yale has lost three of its last four games, two of them to Brown, which finished 11th in the ECAC. The Bulldogs haven't been the same since losing senior forward Sean Backman, the team's third leading scorer.

Yale's had a week off since being ousted from the ECAC tournament by Brown. By the time the puck drops against UND, the Bulldogs will have played only three games (losing two) in 21 days. That might work in their favor when facing the Sioux, who are coming off six games in nine days. Or it could work to UND's favor because the Sioux are accustomed to winning playoff hockey games against good teams on neutral ice.

UND can't afford to take Yale lightly or look ahead to Boston College. Coach Dave Hakstol knows that and will be hammering the message home to the team throughout the week. The Sioux must also keep in mind that they won't be dealing with WCHA officiating, and that the games might be called much more tightly. They will have to be more disciplined than they were against St. Cloud State on Saturday.

Although the Sioux shouldn't look past Yale, I can. If UND gets past the Bulldogs, it will be an excellent tune-up game before taking on Boston College -- assuming the Eagles don't look past Alaska.