Yes, that’s right, the pool deadline has been extended to 9am Pacific Time on Friday, March 23rd, so, time is running out to submit your picks for this year’s pool — we will probably accept entrants until 11:30am on Friday.  If you can’t find your bracket, check your email inbox — it was sent out Monday night, 3/19, at 7:09pm.  Remember: It costs nothing to play, and the winner gets a prize. Also, send me your picks in a string of winners names in game  number order as indicated under the line where you would write the game winner. An example of  this is given below the bracket that was sent to you.

This year Gustavus Adolphus started out with a 2-4-2 record in November, as the team used John Jr. part-time, evaluating his play.  In December, John was put in the net full-time and the team went 5-0, and John was named the Gustavus Adolphus male hockey athlete of he month.  His record this year was 15-5-2, and he compiled two very impessive statistics — a 2.16 goals against average and a saves percentage of .923.  John lowered the GAA by about a half a goal vs. last year’s team average of 2.62, and improved on last year’s saves percentage of .900 as well.  And he’s a bit of an unusual goalie — he stands 6′ 8″ tall, and on skates he’s probably about 6′ 10″.  He was twice named his MIAC conference player of the week:  The first came January 9 after he had 89 saves over a three game period in which he surrendered only four goals; The second came March 6, after he had 39 saves in winning the MIAC title over St. Olaf’s by a 4-2 margin.  The very next day in NCAA tournament play, he limited Milwaukee School of Engineering to a single goal, earning a 3-1 win.  The next opponent was St. Norbert’s, a team already disclosed as completely on fire, and the eventual NCAA DIII champion.  John Jr. was an instant impact player, and a huge part of the success at Gustavus Adolphus this year.  And in many respects it was against all odds.  John Jr. suffered a devastating injury in high school on a hit that knocked off his helmet and sent the back of his head crashing into the ice.  He had a severe concussion — his recovery time was very long, and it took a physical toll as well.  With parents, God, and time at his side, he relearned and retrained some basic physical movement, and then on to the more advanced skills to play hockey.  It really took him almost entirely out of high school hockey until the end, when his recovery was complete and he was back to his old self, thanks to great self-determination.  He went on to play for the Wisconsin Wildrness of the SIJHL (which last year won the league championship, compiled a 45-11 record, and limited opponents to less than half the goals scored by the Wilderness, 264-122),  and from there on to Gustavus Adolphus.  It’s an against-all-odds triumph, and one that in the last couple of years has put thousands of miles on Dad’s Jeep, as he has travelled all over Ice Country to see the games.  Congratulations to John Jr., and his family – Dad, Mom, and Sister (who is also at G-A).  Go get ’em again next year!  (Note:  These John McLeans are no relation to Merrimack Assistant Coach John McLean)

We are also lucky enough to have had John McLean, Sr. at last week’s WCHA play-in game between North Dakota and St. Cloud State.  John McLean writes:

Not many coaches would take a sophomore goalie who was 24-12-4 with a GAA of  2.56 and a save percentage of .906, and then put him on the bench for his junior year. That’s exactly what Fighting Sioux Coach Dave Hakstol did last season and again this year with All WCHA tender Brad Eidness. The reason for the move was on full display at the Xcel Energy Center in St Paul Marsh 15-17.  His luxury for upgrading his goalie position is named Aaron Dell who put together a 30-7 record last year and, while nicked up much of this season, has managed to put together a record of 17-9 for a non typical Fighting Sioux club. Most North Dakota teams the past few years have been very good. This one has been very tough as demonstrated by gritty captain Mario Lamoureux, the last of the 6 collegian hockey playing children of former Sioux goalie Jean-Pierre.  Has a North Dakota captain forward ever been the 13th leading scorer on the team with 5 ‘D’ ahead of him? This writer watched the ND-SCSU game with 5 NHL scouts who, with the exception of two ND forwards, were focused on 4 of their D; a sign of how this team is built from the end boards out.  While Dell is 19-9 this year, the key stat is he has won 8 of his last nine and 11 of his last 13; talk about saving your best hockey for the end of the year!

Back to Thursday night. The WCHA Final 5 defending champion Sioux opened with St. Cloud in one of the play in games. The teams traded first period goals with Corban Knight converting a nice give and go from the slot followed by   Ben Hanowski cuntering for the Huskies with a beautiful cross ice snipe from 2 feet off the goal line on the power play. The game stayed very tight until the 15:51 mark of the second period when Brock Nelson of American’s Hockey Town, Warroad Minnesota, took Ben Blood’s pass from the boards and glided through the slot until finding a spot to launch a shot over former Roseau, Minnesota nemesis Mike Lee to put the Sioux ahead with what proved to be the winning goal.   Throughout the 2nd   period and first half of the 3rd period, the Huskies had trouble penetrating the scoring zone impeded by the 6’5” Derek Forbert (yet another outstanding player from Duluth, Minnesota) and the 6’4” Blood (great hockey name, eh).   For the last 12:00 of the 3 rd the Huskies were able to draw the D out and got some great opportunities against Aaron Dell who yielded no ground. Significant shots and rebounds were turned aside with 6:15 and 3:20 left forcing Husky Coach Bob Motzko to pull US National team goalie Mike Lee with 1:50 remaining setting the stage for two open net goals from Danny Kristo and Brock Nelson’s second of the game. If Nelson’s goal’s looked like gold it’s because he grew up surrounded by the precious metal.  His uncle David Christian was called the most valuable player on the 1980 Olympic team by coach Herb Brooks after he moved from one of the top scoring forwards to quarterbacking the breakout from defense in Lake Placid and both his grandfather Billy and great uncle Roger played key roles on the US gold medal winning team in Squaw Valley in 1960.  Except   for Aaron Dells stopping 73 of 77 shots on the weekend and winning the Final 5 MVP, Nelson’s 4 goals (including 2 game winners and the tying goal vs. Minnesota) surely would have. In doing so, the Sioux became just the second team to win the tournament via a play in game and also the first team to win 3 straight titles.

While the Sioux finished in 4th place in the WCHA, and lagged in the Pairwise much of the year, they now stand 13-2-1 in their last 16 and with Nelson and Dell hitting on all cylinders, the only people more worried about them in St Paul this weekend other than the opposing goalies are the bartenders who suffered the Sioux fans rath after running out of beer in at least two beer gardens on St Patrick’s day last Saturday, the greenest of all green days in Grand Forks, I mean St Paul.

Send me your picks!!!

That’s all for now.  Stay tuned, and go Terriers!

— Tom