I love metaphors. As they go this one isn't complicated and my use of it isn't particularly creative. Nevertheless there is much truth to be found in the form. The buzzards are circling the Pioneers and not only has the roof blown away and mules darted off to parts unknown, there's a sniper just over the hill waiting to fire. The Pios troubles began when Brock "Mule" Trotter got himself into some unknown trouble and apparently was being booted out of the wagon train when a French-Canadian superhero swooped down and plucked him up. Bad timing; because it all happened just before the Pioneers trudged their way into the land of the hostile and abusives. They circled what was left of the wagon train but a terrible zephyr blew in and it all turned into prairie nuggets. The aftermath of this past weekends storm in Grand Forks is yet to be fully known as Bruce "Sniper" McLeod has been busy watching footage and will probably announce some additional sanctions to the Pioneers.
It's been an entertaining couple of weeks in the WCHA. I've had more good laughs at the Fighting Sioux's expense than I can remember. I busted their chops last week by telling them to shut up about the whole Miami Pairwise situation. And now their goon-squad did me a favor and made all that whining go away. But of course it's been replaced by a drone of "we're not thugs" and then weakly backed up by a series of inane excuses attempting to justify the continuing lack of discipline at the most penalized D-1 hockey program in the country.
Whatever additional punishments are handed out to DU are likely to be relatively insignificant to this weekends series against UAA. At most I'd guess Brandon Vossberg will get a one game suspension. It's possible that Gwoz might have to sit at home one night. Other than that DU probably won't be much worse off than they already are. And believe me. They're pretty bad off. They're 3-6-1 in their last 10 games and two of those victories came with Brock Trotter in the lineup. They're struggling, they're reeling and they're looking for a new identity. More than anything else a good weekend against UAA would put the cover back on the wagon and give them some shelter. The Seawolves can't let that happen. Excuse the mixing of metaphors here but; there is bait in the water and it's time to rise from the depths and feed with fervor. Every bite the Seawolves can take this coming weekend will certainly be sweet.
I'll be back tomorrow with more conventional analysis.
27 comments:
On Sat nite The whole arena was talking about the shot totals.. I also saw the discussion with the bearded guy and the WCHA official in the booster room..does anybody know who the long bearded guy is ......Im dieing to hear the excuses from the Official on SAT....Nobody can say shit about Johnny Os sv pct over this season because his own minor officials are not properly counting the shots him..The 11 shots on goal on Sat deal was near absolute utter incompentance..Being a Goalie right now is hard enough at UAA..We wouldnt dare ask to get the benifit of the doubt on maybe one or two because of being the home Friken team..Right now we need to just have them get it right..Dont think that it hasnt been going on for years..The last 3 Goalies REITER,DeCARO,and LAWSON have gone Pro..Realisticly if they are missing 10 to 20percent of the shots and add that into the sv percentage over three years and no wonder they are starting off in the IRON LEAGUES..... this really adds to the travesty...STATS COUNT BEYOND BELIEF NOW AND IN THE FUTURE for THE PAST AND PRESENT GOALIES..Some body ask the bearded guy to comment in to DDs coloum and inform us of the contex of the conversation with the official ..I mean disalowed goals,bad bounces,ties,freak injurys,Bad Stats,lost leads,How about a break Hockey Gods..
You create your own breaks. Skilled players find the net, not the goalie's chest. Good teams overcome bad breaks and bounces...time to quit whining and put the puck in the net.
I know who the "bearded guy is", I'l ask him the next home game.
So are you going to the Frozen Five or issuing refunds? If you issuing refunds make my check out to the University of Denver Hockey Program and I'll see that the donation goes towards recruiting another Alaskan. :-)
Looking forward to this weekend and UAA has a solid shot with DU missing about a quarter of the team Friday night. Hope UAA has a brutal flight to "even things up a little."
I think the Seawolves have more to worry about than shots on goal
What the heck is the obsession about shots on goal? I wish that the fans were more obsessed about wins and losses than a stupid stat. Last time I checked they don't allow NCAA berths by how many shots on goal you had.
Anon at 11:40 AM:
BINGO!!!!
Any UAA fans going to Denver this week-end?
yeah u all have a real dumb obsession with shots on goals and the refs 3 words "GET OVER IT". seriously you all should just move on , the officials are human, they make mistakes just like you all do in real life (do any of u have a real life?). if u listen to shyiak or any of the players they don't complain about the refs. GO SEAWOLVES
I agree Johny Os taken a lot of heat about his sv pct this year.. if the shit isnt right which it isnt then like anon 11:04 said it effects the Goalies and there futures..And I aggree There jobs are no picnics this year..This should never be talked about I cant believe it really is a valid Issue..Lets just hope Donalds Blog gets read and some one has a talk with the stat guy and its resolved in a business like manner..for the outsiders blogging in until recently Goaltending was getting some of the Blame for the Seawolves season..At this point its been Narowed down to No Scoring and untimely Defensive breakdowns..Which is probally fair..
anon @306:
I tend to believe that in general people who "matter" don't give any credibility to people on the Internet. That doubly applies to me since even when I make a reasoned argument I tend to mix in some harsh criticism of this or that. That harshness and/or sarcasm and/or obvious disdain that I have doesn't bode well for credibility. I don't concern myself with all that. I just try to be me. Pandering to anyone in particular isn't my style in real life so I certainly won't do so here. So my whole point here is don't assume that anything I (or we) say here has any effect outside of the circle of regular readership.
"I've had more good laughs at the Fighting Sioux's expense than I can remember."
Let's hear it for your last-place Seawolves!
You're right, that is good for some laughs.
:D
Tell Todd Christiansen to relax just because his kid is a goalie now and wont have a great save percentage, doesnt mean the shots are off that bad.
Justin Bourne has been recalled to the Bridgeport Sound Tigers of the American Hockey League.
Congrats Justin!
Good Coachs Show tonight..I liked hearing Coach Blairs comments on the games and the team..The team might be able to steal one this weekend..Hopefully The scoring will pick up
Bourne was recalled like a week ago, he already has a goal and two assists inhis first week of action in the A. Where have you been?
Heres to "The shots are not off that bad" guy. I have known most of the minor officials for UAA for 25 + years. A guy like John Jolly is as big as a class act as there is and one of the fairest people I know. I have recently started reading Donalds blog and occasionally will join the chatter on hockey. I am in complete Support on everything on and off the ice with the program,I havnt seen Bryce play in almost 5 months but am pretty excited to have him home after 5 years.He sacrificed alot to make it to the WCHA. I also was curious about the shots but understand that things happen. I truly have nothing but respect for all the minor officials.Im confident with a guy like John involved Im sure they will take a look at things..I act as an advisor to several Midget and Junior players from Anchorage and if I can help them in any way I will. That includes Bryce.you talk about me relaxing but as you might not know my passion for hockey allows for very little of that and if your talking about Sat night the emotions were flowing for our whole family.However I am convinced that The program is on the upswing and encourage everybody to come out and support..I had Dinner with Bob Motzko on Wed night. Bob Coached me back in the USHL many moons ago and we usually get together when he comes up. He also is convinced that Were alot closer than people think,and had great things to say about our Coachs and the program.I figured i would let the bloggers know some of the nice things Coach Motzko said about UAA and clear up my feelings on the minor officials in case people were wondering.
T.C.
Thanks for watching the coaches show. It has been quite an experience this year!
"I've had more good laughs at the Fighting Sioux's expense than I can remember."
Wow, that from a uaa fan. I mean really, wow. It's like a Raiders fan talking smack to a Giants fan right now.
I would love to Alaska sweep the Pioneers. DU was not that impressive last weekend, and speaking of goalie number's Mannino managed a save percentage of only .849 last weekend, he stopped 45 out of 53 shots he faced (DU gave up 1 ENG on Sat.)
I would also enjoy watching the UM getting swept by UW. That would give UAA a chance of passing up the UM and putting them in the basement this season.
Could you imagine Minnesota in Last..They would have a Shit Fit.
GO SEAWOLVES!!!!!
Todd:
Good on ya for coming here being honest and setting the record straight. You're a stand up guy.
David:
Thanks for doing the show. A couple of years ago when I worked at KAKM I fantasized about doing exactly what you're doing. Good luck to you as I hear your graduating this year. You represent the school well and we all appreciate your efforts as well as the rest of the JPC folks who all make solid contributions to the program.
UND Idiots:
Yes. I laugh at you. Overall your fanbase says the stupidest things on the college hockey Internet. The best representative of your program is probably the guy you overly-sensitive twits takes the least seriously; Dirty/Diggler. I have zero respect for you overall after the displays I've seen from podunkville this season. You have earned a permanent place in my ire-psyche. You're all more obsessed with Minnesota's demise than you are with your own teams success. I can count on one hand the number of relevant, useful or even interesting comments that I've read from anyone from your fanbase on any and every site I read. As verbose as I can sometimes be, it would be impossible for me to come up with enough adjectives to describe the stupidity that you people have plastered on the Internet this season.
Lastly dimwits, do you really think the performance of the team I support has anything to do with the relevance of my commentary? OMG. That is the funniest shit (and by funny shit I mean boneheadedly ignorant) that I've ever heard. Thanks for that because it is a priceless example of how stooopid you all really are.
Annabelle:
Keep the "Go Seawolves" coming!! ;-)
Goddard:
That fundraising effort was/is the most embarrassing thing I've ever done on the Internet. I really believed that it would be a slam dunk. I clearly over-valued what I brought to those people who I thought I was writing for. The net result is that I'll be carefully evaluating the future of any efforts that I make here. Your efforts on my behalf on USCHO were responsible for at least 90 percent of the money that was raised and most of those people that donated are not my target audience. My target audience was responsible for about 15 bucks. As you request (at some point) I will redirect your donation to DU.
Donald,
The JPC crew that works on the show is great, in fact those who help on the show are the same ones who sacrifice so much time to produce the games as well. I am graduating this year (FINALLY!!!) but I look forward to doing the show again next year and we have a number of ideas that we will work to implement so that it will only improve...much like our team, I look forward to taking a big step forward next fall.
I've enjoyed the coaches show as well. Hey, next week when you air the show, can you somehow manage to slip in there that kids under 12can get in free on Friday night if they ware green or gold? They get tickets at the student ticket table.
If they are still doing the 4 free ticket per person promo, that would be a good time to get the word out as well, because the U doesn't let anyone (except Blueliners) know about the promotions! And Blueliners already have their tickets.
Thanks for all you do, it is much appreciated.
Suze,
I will certainly do my best to remember because that is huge! The athletic department does a horrible job of promoting this team, I am hoping to have an opportunity this summer to address this issue with the department higher ups. I guess though, as long as the hoops teams are winning they are content with mediocrity in regards to hockey. Unfortunate as it is, but I guess we all have to realize that hockey is not high on the list of importance when the afore mentioned higher ups are not from shall we say...hockey hotbeds.
I totally agree with you David, I'd love to talk to you sometime about this issue. It is so frustrating and SOMETHING needs to change.
Thanks for your support and passion for Seawolf hockey!
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