The Mavericks will practice in Mankato at 1 p.m. Thursday before heading to Omaha. Normally, they travel first and get a Thursday workout on the home team's ice. However, looking at the Qwest Center's website, it appears that there's a college basketball game being played in the arena that night between Creighton (it's the Jays' home court) and Northern State, so the ice isn't available. ...
Next Wednesday (Nov. 10) begins the early signing period for hockey recruits, and MSU likely will ink their committed players: forwards J.P. Lafontaine and Max Gaede and defensemen Brett Stern and Zach Palmquist. There was a question on the blog (call this a mini-You Want Answers?!?!) about the Mavericks having just four commitments at present. Remember: MSU has just five seniors on the roster (forwards Galiardi and Sackrison and defensemen Boe, Davis and Youds). They also have Matt Leitner waiting in the wings. As for the year after that, the coaching staff is working hard on that right now. Considering the current climate of recruiting, I'm a little surprised they don't have a verbal or two for 2012 yet, but I'll bet they start trickling in soon. ...
I had a column in The Free Press earlier this week about Mavericks goalie Phil Cook and his somewhat surprising rise to top of the goalie rotation. One year ago, Cook was seen, at least by outsiders, as a third-stringer/emergency guy, but by playoff time was MSU's No. 1 goalie. That column has sparked a couple of interesting comments on the blog, and I wanted to clarify a couple of things: 1) This was a column about Cook and, especially, his stellar play over the last two weeks; it was not an overall assessment of the MSU goalie corps. 2) The column was not an indictment of any of the other goalies on the MSU roster. ...
In Thursday's Free Press, I have a college hockey notebook that takes a look at some of the other teams in the area, including the Gustavus Adolphus women's team, which opens the season this weekend at Concordia (Wis.). The Gusties are ranked fifth in the country and will be going for their seventh consecutive MIAC regular-season championship this year. ...
The Minnesota State women's team will host winless St. Cloud State this weekend and are hoping that will be a reprieve in what's been a brutally tough schedule to start the season. The Mavericks are coming off two losses at No. 1-ranked Wisconsin. They appeared to play the Badgers tough, falling 3-2 in the first game and trailing 2-1 after two periods in the second game before allowing four more goals in a 6-1 loss. "We just ran out of gas," MSU coach Eric Means said. The Mavericks are 1-5-0 in WCHA play, dropping two games at Minnesota Duluth, splitting a home series against North Dakota and then falling twice at Wisconsin. "No question we played probably the three toughest teams in the league," Means said. ...
The eighth-ranked Gustavus men's team won a pair of 2-1 games in the MIAC showcase last week in Blaine. They will play a pair of home games this weekend, hosting Wisconsin-Eau Claire and Wisconsin-River Falls.
1 comment:
Speak of the devil, after the recruitment question was brought up, Mankato just got a commitment from a USHLer today. Dylan Margonari, a 6'1 forward from the Youngstown Phantoms is headed to the Mavs in 2012.
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