...I have it on good authority the recent changes in ownership at the SBT has resulted in suspension of all non-football road game coverage.
Not sure if anyone is going to the ACC tournament for men's hoops, but....
already. Had it already started with men's basketball? It's been true of the hockey team since the 1980s anyway. John Fineran, who freelances, was at the recent Frozen Fours, but I don't believe the paper sent anyone to cover first or second round NCAA hockey games.
That paper sadly, at least in its print version, has to be on its last legs. Half the football games do not have coverage in the Sunday paper due to the fact the papers are no longer printed anywhere near South Bend and the press time comes when the games are in the third quarter.
half the team. Outside from Janicke, there doesn't appear to be any natural scorers or dynamic players in the freshman class like Bjork, Hinostroza, etc. Landsell was the only other freshman forward to receive consistent playing time and he may have had only 1 goal. Its too bad Jack Perbix decommitted last year and went to the Gophers as he looks like he has some scoring ability. They better hope that there are some scorers in the incoming class or we could be in for a prolonged dry spell. Hopefully we aren't developing a reputation as a school where high-end scoring talent need not apply. One wonders why Alex Steeves brother,who is a Mr.Hockey Minnesota finalist is going to UMD and not ing his two brothers here
distinguish himself from his brothers?
A lot of people assumed Mario Lucia was going to Minnesota to play for his dad. After all his brother Tony did. But I think he wanted to skate his own path.
A more snarky response would be that Ben Steeves wants to win an NCAA championship, and the odds seem better at Duluth than in South Bend.
While we've been in a gradual decline w/r/t goal scoring/scorers over the last several seasons, they've fallen off the cliff from 10 years ago.
The 10/11 team scored 151 goals in 44 games on 1439 SOG with six players registering double digits in goals scored. At least five guys on that roster are playing in the NHL currently. While I know that our approach to building our roster has changed since then, it's a pretty stark contrast nonetheless.
Including that season, we've had just seven 20 goal scorers in our system - Lee (2x), Tynan, Rust, Lucia, Bjork and Oglevie. In that same time period we've had two in the same season just twice - 10/11 and 16/17. Both seasons had six guys who registered double digits in goals scored. This season we had two.
Obviously you need to bring in players that can function within the abilities of the coaches to teach and their own strong points. Also you need to recruit student-athletes who will fit into Notre Dame's academic expectations, although with hockey this is not the same challenge as it is with football or men's basketball. But clearly Notre Dame needs to recruit players with more skill.
I wouldn't think that with the success Rust and Lee are having on good NHL teams it should be impossible to get players to come here who have the potential to be decent scorers in the NHL.
From Jackson's second through sixth seasons here (06/07-10/11) the team finished outside of the top 20 in scoring just once, in 2010. From 2007-2009 they also finished in the top 5 in both defense and on the PK. We generally have not seen teams as complete as his first few since then. The 2018 team finished in the top 10 in defense and on both the PK and PP but was only 25th in scoring.
You don't have to do it all to win, but you either have to be pretty good at both ends of the ice or great at one. The 2008 team was only 19th in scoring and their PP was awful, but their overall defense was great and they had a shut down penalty kill. The 2011 team was really the only successful team that was not particularly well rounded. They had some great scorers but they did not defend well and the special teams were anything but special. That Frozen Four was really the result of a late 6-0-2 stretch that cemented an NCAA spot and then some very timely goaltending out east.
high first round.
Hopefully this is just a one year decline for Jackson, but I agree that there are several aspects of the program that need to be improved markedly. Next year will be a big year for Jackson in terms of the overall direction of the program and his future.
ND has a number of venerable coaches whose teams have declined in various degrees over the past few years. I'd imagine that some major turnover is in order soon and my hope is that Swarbrick won't be around to replace those coaches.