Hermantown vs. Denfeld

[Looks easy from here]

hermantown 6-3

[Firetruck12]

gunna be at this one, i dont usually pull for H-town but bein east grad, denfeld is not my fav school haha, guess for one night ill be a fan of hermantown hawkey...

[stick]

gunna be at this one, i dont usually pull for H-town but bein east grad, denfeld is not my fav school haha, guess for one night ill be a fan of hermantown hawkey...

My prediction, 4-2 Hermantown.

[Sats81]

Hermantown 5-1.

[RangeHockeyFan1817]

6-2 Hermantown

[Firetruck12]

good game overall i guess, 5-2 final score, 3-2 with 1:35 left in the game denfeld had a power play but hawks scored a nice shorthanded goal and then sealed it with a short handed open netter. hawks were good but not one of their best games im told (by hawk fans...) but overall good. denfeld needs some work and they could be a decent team, as a team they are very poor passers and puck handlers, they had to my count 3 3v1s and each of them they passed the puck to far ahead of their teammate and ended up as icing.

[HawkeyPower]

Without Thompson playing very well in goal Hermantown wins by at least 4. Still too many dumb penalties from Hermantown. Fun game though. Close till the end.

[mulefarm]

good game overall i guess, 5-2 final score, 3-2 with 1:35 left in the game denfeld had a power play but hawks scored a nice shorthanded goal and then sealed it with a short handed open netter. hawks were good but not one of their best games im told (by hawk fans...) but overall good. denfeld needs some work and they could be a decent team, as a team they are very poor passers and puck handlers, they had to my count 3 3v1s and each of them they passed the puck to far ahead of their teammate and ended up as icing.

Sounds like a couple of average teams and not in the mix for a state title.

[east hockey]

good game overall i guess, 5-2 final score, 3-2 with 1:35 left in the game denfeld had a power play but hawks scored a nice shorthanded goal and then sealed it with a short handed open netter. hawks were good but not one of their best games im told (by hawk fans...) but overall good. denfeld needs some work and they could be a decent team, as a team they are very poor passers and puck handlers, they had to my count 3 3v1s and each of them they passed the puck to far ahead of their teammate and ended up as icing.

Sounds like a couple of average teams and not in the mix for a state title.

Hermantown will be. Denfeld probably will not.

Lee

[Firetruck12]

hawks have a chance, they will be ready by the end of the season, they have hustle, denfeld no... i felt like they werent trying at times

[The Enlightened One]

Hermantown looked very good tonight and at times Denfeld looked OK ,sort of, but that was about it. At one point Denfeld was in a 5 on 3 with them and got one shot on goal in the two minute power play (both of the minors got called at the same time) and that was it. When it comes to back checking and not getting caught out of position Hermantown wrote the book. They are back checking machines and did not let a single breakaway go on Hermantown's goalie and I think only a couple of odd man rushes. If you go to the dictionary and look up "back checking" I think it will refer you to the Hermantown Hawks, they never seemed to break down. Denfeld's goalie had a great game, he stood on his head a couple of times, got lucky a couple of times and over all looked like a very good goalie with a pedestrian team in front of him. Denfeld is not going anyplace this year and why they are ranked that high is sort of a puzzle, they aren't that good. Hermantown on the other hand is very good.

In a previous thread somebody commented on how they thought Hermantown's D is "suspect". I think the only way to use the words suspect and Hermantown's D in the same sentence is to say that you suspect that a couple of those kids will play someplace else after high school, they are good.

If Hermantown has an Achilles heal it will be their lack a ability to stay out of the box. They take way too many penalties, dumb ones.

[rainier]

Anybody know if Hermantown ever considers moving up to AA? I'm not saying they should or shouldn't, but they would seem to be a perfect candidate with their long streak of Class A success and excellent youth teams. They would have been a top 3 7AA team for awhile now.

Once again, not saying they should, just curious if it gets discussed.

[pekyman]

Hermantown looked very good tonight and at times Denfeld looked OK ,sort of, but that was about it. At one point Denfeld was in a 5 on 3 with them and got one shot on goal in the two minute power play (both of the minors got called at the same time) and that was it. When it comes to back checking and not getting caught out of position Hermantown wrote the book. They are back checking machines and did not let a single breakaway go on Hermantown's goalie and I think only a couple of odd man rushes. If you go to the dictionary and look up "back checking" I think it will refer you to the Hermantown Hawks, they never seemed to break down. Denfeld's goalie had a great game, he stood on his head a couple of times, got lucky a couple of times and over all looked like a very good goalie with a pedestrian team in front of him. Denfeld is not going anyplace this year and why they are ranked that high is sort of a puzzle, they aren't that good. Hermantown on the other hand is very good.

In a previous thread somebody commented on how they thought Hermantown's D is "suspect". I think the only way to use the words suspect and Hermantown's D in the same sentence is to say that you suspect that a couple of those kids will play someplace else after high school, they are good.

If Hermantown has an Achilles heal it will be their lack a ability to stay out of the box. They take way too many penalties, dumb ones.

Accurate analysis of Hermantown.
As far as the Herm Defense, 2 Sr. D could have already left and another Jr and Sophmore D are on the same path. The "suspect D" guy is HShockeywatcher who does the Class A "rankings". Go read the stuff he writes about H-Town.
Spot on about the penalties also. For whatever reason, they seem to get alot of penalties, expecially after they have shown they can dominate a team like they did in the 1st period of this game. Shots 1st period: 16-0 and only 1 penalty. 6 penalties in 2nd period, 9-5 overall! Why all the dumb penalties after they completely dominate the 1st??

[Looks easy from here]

Anybody know if Hermantown ever considers moving up to AA? I'm not saying they should or shouldn't, but they would seem to be a perfect candidate with their long streak of Class A success and excellent youth teams. They would have been a top 3 7AA team for awhile now.

Once again, not saying they should, just curious if it gets discussed.

I think less than 40 tried out for the varsity and jv this year.

[pekyman]

Anybody know if Hermantown ever considers moving up to AA? I'm not saying they should or shouldn't, but they would seem to be a perfect candidate with their long streak of Class A success and excellent youth teams. They would have been a top 3 7AA team for awhile now.

Once again, not saying they should, just curious if it gets discussed.

I think less than 40 tried out for the varsity and jv this year.

Not sure how this is going to format out, but look at the past 12 years of state class A results. If not for Hermantown and Warroad it's a Total Private School Domination in Class A. I Think you need to look at the AAA Privates before the public small community schools like Warroad, Hermantow, etc.

Class A State Tourney Results 200 to 2011
Year Winner Loser Score
2000 Breck (23-3-1) Warroad (21-5-2) 3-2
2001 Benilde (21-9) Rochester (24-5) 2-1
2002 Totino Grace (26-2-1) Red Wing (24-5-1) 3-2
2003 Warroad (27-2-1) Simley (19-10-1) 3-1
2004 Breck (27-1-2) Orono (26-3-1) 7-2
2005 Warroad (28-0-2) Totino Grace (27-3) 4-3 (2 ot)
2006 St. Thomas (23-5-1) Duluth Marshall (27-1-1) 4-3
2007 Hermantown (28-0-2) Duluth Marshall (24-4-2) 4-1
2008 St. Thomas (25-5) Duluth Marshall (25-5) 5-1
2009 Breck (26-3-1) Warroad (28-2) 7-3
2010 Breck (28-2) Hermantown (27-3) 2-1
2011 St Thomas (24-6) Hermantown (25-3-2) 5-4 (ot)

[rainier]

pekyman,

Is this a touchy subject in Hermantown? In my original post I mentioned twice that I'm not saying they should or shouldn't. I guess I didn't mention anything about the private schools because it's so insanely OBVIOUS those most of those schools should be playing in AA.

Take it as a compliment, Hermantown has built something special in a small community and the fact that they even could be a consistently competitive 7AA team is impressive.

I was simply wondering if it ever has been discussed. I can't imagine the other 7AA schools (assuming Htown would be in that section) would be too happy to see them be added.

[pekyman]

I'm not from hermantown so no idea. I am from a small town though and pull for the underdog. Kudos to any small public school that can compete with them. As you can see, not many can.

[HShockeywatcher]

In a previous thread somebody commented on how they thought Hermantown's D is "suspect". I think the only way to use the words suspect and Hermantown's D in the same sentence is to say that you suspect that a couple of those kids will play someplace else after high school, they are good.

The words "bad" and "suspect" are by no way synonomous.

As game scores is mainly what I look at, I made that statement based on the GA they have had against certain opponent. Being in the box plays into not being able to play great defense. I made the statement after about 4 games I believe and I stand by it.

This is another perfect example. A few different posters on this thread say that Denfeld is not deserving of being ranked after seeing them play and yet the team these same people consider the 'best in class A' is playing them very close.

Looking over the stats, shots were very close for the second and third periods (hub doesn't have denfeld's first period shot). Both goals Denfeld scored were on power plays, so maybe if Hermantown worked on their penalty situation they'd allow much fewer goals. I imagine if they averaged 1-2 penalties a game they'd be ranked #1 on every ranking, including mine. But you simply can't excuse that, which many seem to want to.

I am still quite confused how you expect people not physically at the games to look at scores and stat sheets that show Hermantown playing relatively close games with below average teams and come away from it thinking, "this must be the best team in state."

[HShockeywatcher]

Not sure how this is going to format out, but look at the past 12 years of state class A results. If not for Hermantown and Warroad it's a Total Private School Domination in Class A. I Think you need to look at the AAA Privates before the public small community schools like Warroad, Hermantow, etc.

Well, that's one way to look at it. In the last 12 years a private school has beat a public school in the final 6 times, 4 of them have been 1 goal games, I wouldn't call that domination.

Totino-Grace has won the 4A state championship in football 6 of the last 8 years. One of the years they didn't win, they lost in the section final game, the other the quarterfinal at state. Would you agree with the following statement:
"4A football has been dominated by private schools for the last 8 years."

I wouldn't, personally. It's been dominated by one school that happens to be a private school.

6 of the last 8 years the Class A title has been won by a private school, but in that time frame it has been won by the same number of private schools as public schools.

In 2005, if you were to ask someone who the top 3 teams in the state were they probably would've told you Warroad, Holy Angels and Moorhead. Three Class A sized teams, but two of them were playing for the AA title.

Right now, half to two thirds of the "really good" small school sized teams play in AA. Personally, I don't see it as a private/public issue, I see it as the issue that high school hockey in MN looks at a team and thinks the class they play in intuitively has anything to do with ability. If teams weren't allowed to opt up (or simply didn't) we'd have two great state tournaments every year...where most years the better team would probably be playing in the tournament no one watches now.

And the kicker; few private schools would be winning titles. But I digress. You have your opinion and I have mine

[PuckRanger]

...hub doesn't have denfeld's first period shot

Thats because they had none. The hub is correct. Denfeld did not get a shot on goal in the 1st period. Penalties and goaltending are the only thing that kept the game close.

[rainier]

Given the ratio of private to public schools in Class A, I would say it absolutely is a public/private school issue. There are 75 public schools in Class A, and there are only 11 private schools. That's just about a 7:1 ratio. If the privates were on the same level, as HSHW asserts, then of the 24 teams that have played in the Class A title game over the last 12 years, about 3 or 4 of them should have been a private school. But what we see is 14 of the 24 have been a private school.

This is what it boils down to:
14% of Class A schools are privates, YET
58% of the teams playing for the Class A title the last 12 years have been privates.

Privates draw from MUCH larger talent pools than the vast majority of Class A publics, talent pools that are AA sized. Hermantown is an anomaly, they have built a perennial powerhouse using a legitimate A sized talent pool, therefore I would never begrudge them staying A.

I see Hermantown or Warroad get to the title game, I say, "That's a heck of a program they have there." When Breck or STA go, I say, "Must be nice to have a major metropolitan area to draw from."

BSM did the right thing by moving up. It would be nice to see Breck and STA do the same thing. If you can put a top 15 AA team out there year after year, why not move up?

[pekyman]

Given the ratio of private to public schools in Class A, I would say it absolutely is a public/private school issue. There are 75 public schools in Class A, and there are only 11 private schools. That's just about a 7:1 ratio. If the privates were on the same level, as HSHW asserts, then of the 24 teams that have played in the Class A title game over the last 12 years, about 3 or 4 of them should have been a private school. But what we see is 14 of the 24 have been a private school.

This is what it boils down to:
14% of Class A schools are privates, YET
58% of the teams playing for the Class A title the last 12 years have been privates.

Privates draw from MUCH larger talent pools than the vast majority of Class A publics, talent pools that are AA sized. Hermantown is an anomaly, they have built a perennial powerhouse using a legitimate A sized talent pool, therefore I would never begrudge them staying A.

I see Hermantown or Warroad get to the title game, I say, "That's a heck of a program they have there." When Breck or STA go, I say, "Must be nice to have a major metropolitan area to draw from."

BSM did the right thing by moving up. It would be nice to see Breck and STA do the same thing. If you can put a top 15 AA team out there year after year, why not move up?

14 players from the St Thomas Team that won state last year were former players from the MN Blades AAA program. The Blades, one of, if not the top AAA program in the state. Read it on the Blades website after St. Thomas won state again last year. 14!! The next closest team was a large AA school with 4 or 5. With that kind of feeder program, winning class A for them should be like kissing your sister, yet Herm still gave them a game.

[HShockeywatcher]

...hub doesn't have denfeld's first period shot

Thats because they had none. The hub is correct. Denfeld did not get a shot on goal in the 1st period. Penalties and goaltending are the only thing that kept the game close.

Listing zero is much different than having a listing blank, which is how it was listed last time I checked. Thanks for the info though, crazy to see that.

Not in response to you, but the premise in general; SOG, imo, does not in and of itself imply "control" of game. It can, but by itself does not. Any person who has been around the game for any amount of time knows this.

Given the ratio of private to public schools in Class A, I would say it absolutely is a public/private school issue. There are 75 public schools in Class A, and there are only 11 private schools. That's just about a 7:1 ratio. If the privates were on the same level, as HSHW asserts, then of the 24 teams that have played in the Class A title game over the last 12 years, about 3 or 4 of them should have been a private school. But what we see is 14 of the 24 have been a private school.

This is what it boils down to:
14% of Class A schools are privates, YET
58% of the teams playing for the Class A title the last 12 years have been privates.

Privates draw from MUCH larger talent pools than the vast majority of Class A publics, talent pools that are AA sized. Hermantown is an anomaly, they have built a perennial powerhouse using a legitimate A sized talent pool, therefore I would never begrudge them staying A.

I see Hermantown or Warroad get to the title game, I say, "That's a heck of a program they have there." When Breck or STA go, I say, "Must be nice to have a major metropolitan area to draw from."

BSM did the right thing by moving up. It would be nice to see Breck and STA do the same thing. If you can put a top 15 AA team out there year after year, why not move up?

Selective reading? If teams weren't allowed to opt up those numbers would be much different. We have an optional tier system.
What is this "same level" I have apparently mentioned?

Of the teams in the championship game in the last 12 years in Class A, 6 have been private schools (one of them now AA) and 5 have been public schools.

I hope you are not naive enough to believe that a sport that has inherent advantages to having money would have an equal distribution of results between those schools with more money and those without. With a possible exception here and there, every successful program in the last generation has been private, in a "hockey community" or an affluent area.
Further evidence is the percentage of schools with a football program that have a hockey program. If these numbers are not similar between public/private schools, why would you expect success to be? I wouldn't.

We already have one good tournament and one that is greatly diminished and less respected. You want even less good teams in one of them, not more? Why not have two great tournaments?

What continues to amaze me about this topic (and sadly many areas of our lives) is that the majority simply blame those who are successful for being successful instead of discussing what can be done to help those not as successful be more successful, which is the real issue at heart

[rainier]

Fair enough HSHW, you say "the majority simply blame those who are successful for being successful instead of discussing what can be done to help those not as successful be more successful, which is the real issue at heart"

So I will take up the "real issue at heart". If we want to help those not as successful be more successful, getting Breck and STA out of Class A would be a great start.

[The Enlightened One]

In a previous thread somebody commented on how they thought Hermantown's D is "suspect". I think the only way to use the words suspect and Hermantown's D in the same sentence is to say that you suspect that a couple of those kids will play someplace else after high school, they are good.

The words "bad" and "suspect" are by no way synonomous.

As game scores is mainly what I look at, I made that statement based on the GA they have had against certain opponent. Being in the box plays into not being able to play great defense. I made the statement after about 4 games I believe and I stand by it.

This is another perfect example. A few different posters on this thread say that Denfeld is not deserving of being ranked after seeing them play and yet the team these same people consider the 'best in class A' is playing them very close.

Looking over the stats, shots were very close for the second and third periods (hub doesn't have denfeld's first period shot). Both goals Denfeld scored were on power plays, so maybe if Hermantown worked on their penalty situation they'd allow much fewer goals. I imagine if they averaged 1-2 penalties a game they'd be ranked #1 on every ranking, including mine. But you simply can't excuse that, which many seem to want to.

I am still quite confused how you expect people not physically at the games to look at scores and stat sheets that show Hermantown playing relatively close games with below average teams and come away from it thinking, "this must be the best team in state."

The game was not really that close. It seemed that at times Hermantown was playing with Denfeld like a cat with a mouse. You watch and know that the mouse is dead meat when ever the cat wants to finish it but before it does it turns it over to the kittens to let them have some fun. Hermantown seemed to play a lot of different kids in the game. I kind of wonder if a few of the kittens (fledglings I suppose) are not getting some early season ice time before the coaching staff decides to turn up the heat and get serious as they get ready for another run at state.

Thompson (Denfeld) is a very good goalie and other than one break down and an empty netter they had to really work to score on him. From what I understand the other close game that they played was in Rogers and that goalie stood on his head and turned himself inside out as well, I was not there so maybe I have bad info that can be corrected by somebody who was. A good goalie can keep an inferior team in the game, that was the case for Denfeld.

It is tough to not be at a game and to have to do a ranking system early on in the year I am sure and have it be fairly accurate. However in this case I really do think that Denfeld is not as good as their stats show. They are decent and physical but clearly not in the same league as Hermantown is.