2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Discussion of Minnesota Girls High School Hockey

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MNHockeyFan
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2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by MNHockeyFan » Mon Oct 11, 2021 9:26 pm

The 2021-22 season will be underway in less than a month.
Predictions? Thoughts? Observations?
Yes, Minnetonka, Andover and Edina are the preliminary favorites, but who else could surprise, and why?

PhunnsieMcHockeyDad
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Re: 2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by PhunnsieMcHockeyDad » Tue Oct 12, 2021 11:05 am

Minnetonka is going to be really tough to beat. Edina has the talent to stay with them. Andover lost alot, but the pipeline is still full of players.

Centennial has talent and great goaltending

Stillwater young but loaded

Hill-Murray with a good mix of young and old talent and great goaltending

Gentry brings almost everyone back

Sucks to be in Section 4

Lakeville South's top line can score

Holy Family bringing everyone back, can they beat the Skippers' Super Team in Sections?

j4241
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Re: 2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by j4241 » Sun Oct 17, 2021 12:21 am

Fun thread (even if no one is reading or commenting) - I'm excited for this season! Here is a bit of analysis rooted in U18 team selection and elite league rosters.

USA Hockey thinks highly (via selection on the U18 team) of:

Holy Family (Kaiser - ’04 F, and Blair - ’05 G)
Chisago (Burgen ’04 F)
Lakeville South (Enright - ’04 F)
Benilde (Peschel - ’04 D)
Gentry (Gazdik - ’04 D)
Minnetonka (Lindsay - ’05 F)
Stillwater (St. Martin - ’06 F)

I have a few opinions about these selections (I don’t think these are the best 8 players from Minnesota - Katelyn Roberts, as an example, has been the most impressive senior forward to me in elite league play this fall), but these are all very good hockey players. At worst, among the best in Minnesota. Their high school teams are worth looking closely at, and all are on my list later in this post.

In terms of elite league, the best seniors in the elite league are on Tradition White or Black, and the best juniors on Vegas or MSP Grey. Upperclass tend to drive success of AA schools, so the best teams will tend to have the best juniors and seniors. The next best group of juniors and seniors are combined on Tradition Red. The best underclassmen (with a few juniors thrown in) are on the remaining MSP teams - white, red and black. The following table shows three numbers for each school (with multiple levels represented):

1. Top juniors and seniors
2. Next tier juniors and seniors
3. Kids on remaining MSP teams.

They are sorted by total, then by total in each descending tier.

*Minnetonka (7, 1, 6)
Edina (7, 1, 5)
**Holy Family (9, 2, 0)
Andover (6, 1, 2)
*Gentry (5, 1, 3)
Blake (6, 2, 0)
Hill Murray (3, 1, 3)
*Stillwater (2, 1, 4)
Maple Grove (1, 1, 4)
*BSM (4, 0, 1)
*Chisago (3, 0, 2)
Mound (2, 0, 3)
Centennial (1, 1, 2)
Orono (1, 0, 3)
*LVS (3, 0, 0)
Chaska (2, 0, 1)
Blaine (1, 1, 1)
Elk River (1, 0 , 2)

*Represent U18 players

Lindborg and Corniea for Edina, and Zavoral for BSM are not on an elite league roster, and all three are very strong players - I’ve added them in the above totals (+1 for BSM and +2 for Edina).

I might make some qualitative adjustments - BSM will be better than Maple Grove and Stillwater - probably closer to parity with Blake and Gentry, LVS will be closer to the Stillwater level riding their senior trio, Edina lost a lot of scoring punch and might not be quite that good, Holy Family is old and experienced but the talent level might not quite match the numbers, Hill Murray might be a bit better given a very strong goalie, same with Centennial, but honestly, looking at this list, I don’t think the above would be a crazy way to construct an early top 15 ranking for AA girls hockey, with Chisago, Mound, and Orono my top three for single A. I’m sure there are some good metro teams missing (Wayzata? Burnsville? Eastview? Apple Valley?) - made up of fewer kids playing elite league hockey - but I'm sticking with this list.

Regardless, hoping for a fun and uninterupted season for the kids!

slowD
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Re: 2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by slowD » Mon Oct 18, 2021 4:12 pm

In the spirit of trying to get the discussion going a bit... j4241 I agree with most of what you said. I am a little surprised with some of the players selected and omitted on the u18 team as a whole. Either way it is great to see 8 girls from MN selected and great for MN hockey. They will represent well. On the elite league front... I agree with most of what you said, but I saw that Northern Elite 16U Green team was ranked in the top 15 nationally behind only MSP Grey and SSM as far as MN teams go. They have beat some good teams and it looks like they gave Grey a run yesterday. In checking out the rosters I see that P/H and Warroad have more girls than any other towns from the north. I think it is hard to not include P/H or Warroad in the top 3 conversation in single A. NIT Tournament this weekend. There will be lots of good games. I would think it will be MSP Grey and SSM will play off at the 16U level and can either of the Traditions teams beat the SSM Prep team to advance to the national tourney?

j4241
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Re: 2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by j4241 » Tue Oct 19, 2021 2:12 pm

I was more focused on AA - I'm sure Warroad and P/H will be near the top of single A. In terms of the Shattuck teams, neither are anywhere near as strong as they normally are (only two SSM kids on the 18 team?!?). They have a few good kids in the junior and senior classes (Syd Morrow is very good), but they are absolutely loaded in '05 and '06 players. Scannell (on the 18 team) looks solid playing for prep as a double underager ('06), Lalonde is effective playing 19s as a Jan 05, the goalie Klein as a late 05, Glaser is a good player, along with a few other 05s. If Shattuck fielded a true 16 team, with all of their 05s and 06s playing, I think they would be significantly better than Grey. The prep team when playing Tradition White, Black and Vegas doesn't look that strong, but both their 16 and 19 teams benefit from being real teams - practicing all fall, having power plays, first lines, etc. With that Grey still probably beats SSM 16. At 19s, myhockeyrankings has Vegas > Black > White right now at 19s, but that likely changes after a short-handed Vegas team added some blemishes to their record. White has not had a strong fall, so Black will be given the chance to play Shattuck, and that will likely be a toss up, in my opinion.

jg2112
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Re: 2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by jg2112 » Wed Oct 20, 2021 10:57 am

My predictions. I don't think they're controversial.

Single A - Chisago Lakes over either Warroad / Proctor-Hermantown. SSP will be the other semi-finalist.
Double A - Edina over Minnetonka. Edina has the best G and top defense corps in the State. That will be enough. Andover and the winner of 4AA are the other semi-finalists.

Ms. Hockey - easy. Look to Edina's D line.
Ms. Senior Goalie - Jones (Roseville).

moosepaw
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Re: 2021-22 Season - Your Predictions and Observations

Post by moosepaw » Wed Oct 20, 2021 8:56 pm

Single A CL
Double AA Minnetonka


Ms Hockey M Kaiser
Ms Goalie Johnson Minnetonka

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