Runnin' with the Dogs had a tour de force post that discussed, among other things, Minnesota State, the WCHA, and fan expectations.
The genesis of the article was the contract extension of Minnesota State coach Troy Jutting, which was at least in part based on the idea that Minnesota State has competed well against their "peer group" in the WCHA, despite not having a lot of overall success in the league.
The theory is that it is difficult for a program the size of Minnesota State to beat much larger, much more established programs like Minnesota and North Dakota on a consistent basis. The conventional wisdom is that Minnesota, North Dakota, Wisconsin, Denver, and Colorado College are the "Haves" of the WCHA, while St. Cloud, Minnesota State, Minnesota-Duluth, Michigan Tech, and Alaska-Anchorage are the "Have-Nots".
But does that logic hold up to the facts?
Click here to read the rest.
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16 comments:
I hope "tour de force" means awesome and genius. :^D
Readers note that Chris himself was interviewed for this article, but from a Mavs perspective, not a WCHA perspective.
kobkkSorry but that logic (two tiers of programs in the WCHA) does not hold water. Denver is a private school with 5000 undergraduate students - hardly a large school. CC is basically the size of a large high school. These programs went through some down years and then resurrected their programs by hiring very good coaches who recruited players with the ability and chemistry necessary to perform well as a team.
UMD making 1 NCAA tournament? I believe UMD has made it a few more times. Maybe in '83,84 (lost in Championship Game), 85, 93 and UMD's last tournament appearence 2004 (Frozen Four)
"It should be noted though that Duluth has had the most postseason success of the bottom five programs, making one NCAA tournament, and getting to the Frozen Four."
To continue from my previous post. Your facts on UMD are either incorrect or you need to go retake your grammar classes.
Are you going to question Chris' self proclaimed "I'm the know it all about hockey and don't doubt me"? If you do, he'll start posting on this blog again about high school hockey because then he can act like he knows it all and doesn't get many people challenging him, as not as many people know stuff about high school hockey.
That's not a bad thing though. I think many people that read this site have noticed that he can't take the heat when people question him or challenge him when it comes to College Hockey. Also, most have also noticed he basically steals all of his stuff from Chris H. anyways. Must be rough to take everyone else's material and claim it for yours and that YOU are the hockey god.
Thus, anon. and George...don't take anything he writes too seriously, as he just ACTS like he knows it all.
To clairify the last post, I meant that not many people who'll challenge what he's saying on the high school posts read this blog, as compaired to college hockey fans.
Thus, it's easier for him to go into the mode of writing mostly about that once he's confronted on something about college hockey.
George & Anonymous 2+3,
Figure it out, Chris wasn't talking about all time UMD tournament appearances - only those appearances falling in the last 7 years (the sample period for his numbers). Try reading the post prior to acting like dick bags.
I find it funny that you carve Chris, stating that his site is a rip off of other peoples work - yet you're on his page reading his material (or stolen material, as you say).
Dick Bags, LOL... You sure you didn't mean dirt bag or dick weed?
Actually, I think some of the fans are a little hard on Jutting, in fact I do like the way his teams play, mean and nasty.
It's easier to come here and see all the work he's ripped off compiled into one spot than surf all the other sites! I'm not saying he doesn't do a good job of gathering info, just that he's not the expert he thinks he is.
My main point was that if people start to confront what he says about college hockey, he'll wuss out and go back to writing mostly about high school stuff, like he did prior to this. He can't take people disagreeing with him...which if he ever wants to be a professional sports writer, he should get over SOON!
Yup ... It's obvious Chris knows nothing about what he is talking about.
All his readers should just start reading Anon's blog at
www.anongeniushockeyblog.com
Or maybe he'll write about high school hockey when it's the high school hockey season, during the Minnesota playoffs/select tournaments, like before. And you can go back to making completely unbased statements. And everybody else can continue to ignore you. kthxbyestfu.
Anonymous@9:59: Did you even read the article? It says nothing about the tiers being divided by school's population.
Sports programs have a lot of inertia. If you're good, you'll stay in the limelight, keep attracting top recruits and coaches, and draw in some revenue. If you haven't been doing that well, then you're pretty much only going to get the leftovers from the better programs, and not have a much support, which makes it difficult to improve your position. Sometimes key coaches can turn things around, but miracles like that are a lot easier said than done, or else you'd be seeing it all the time. There always has to be some teams at the bottom, and since sucess breeds success, teams mostly stay in the same place over time.
The "tier" theory isn't something that I made up, or something that Chris made up.
And Donald, you're yet again proving why I love you and feel you are underappreciated.
And linking to other people's sites is not "ripping them off." I've NEVER seen Chris fail to give credit where credit is due. Granted, I live in a dream world where people like my blog, so who knows what actually happens in reality.
And who said tUMD only had one NCAA appearance?
The rest of the article tracks how well the WCHA teams have done the past 7 years, in which tUMD has only made one tournament appearance.
LOL. I didn't click to read the rest... all I cared about was my part. Hehehe.
Donald, LOL that was funny. There are a lot of people out there under that alias.
RWD's I like your blog its a lot of fun to read. Execpt for the grading hockey players looks. LOL...
We're forgetting that Chris is a worthless antigopher troll (well, he is whenever he criticizes the Gophers anyways. Everyone's cool when he compliments them) who knows nothing about hockey. Please. The facts are that Chris knows nothing about hockey to these people unless he says something they agree with. Then they say nothing. I am starting to believe that a successful blog is measured by how many posters show up to call you an idiot. The more you have, the better your blog is because the more people feel threatened by what you have to say. Congrats, Chris, you've joined Brad Schlossman's blog in the realm of greatness.
I've never seen Chris refer to himself as an "expert." So, obviously, his detractors first promoted him to expert so that they could conveniently slam him for supposedly thinking he is. Neat-oh!
Anyways, I love the two-tier idea! It's perfect for Minnesota sports. I don't know why McHale, Ryan, LeMaire, and Childress haven't caught on to that yet. Ok, less of Terry Ryan because, though the Twins haven't gone past the AL Championship series since 1991, they've still done something with their season. Anyways, the other teams in Minnesota should have caught onto this because it is the "perfect" rationale that promotes the mediocrity that so many Minnesota DI and pro teams cling to so tragically!
Jutting, you truly have taken the mediocrity concept to a new level.
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