State A Final: [2] St. Thomas Academy vs [1] Hermantown

[xwildfan]

Agree that it is definitely hard to get excited about STA winning A title. Would be interesting if AD and Headmaster came out with their reasoning of why to stay at A level.

Isn't their school about pursuing excellence in all endeavors? I guess this ends at hockey.

Also, on an unrelated topic, somewhat interesting that when CDH became a dominant power in football, STA couldn't quite fit them into their schedule.

And finally, what is the reasoning behind the MSHSL not letting SSM into the hockey tournament? Their program doesn't seem all that much different than STA's. Both have an on- campus arenas; both have players who don't live in neighborhood of school; and now that STA is allowed to have essentially their own bantam program (Sibley Area), they have a somewhat similar development program.

Seems to be a matter of degree rather than basic philosophy. SSM plays many more games and their players come from farther away.

Just my two cents about issue and probably about what it's worth.

[HawkeyPower]

In press conference Vanelli says no D1 forwards on his roster and he knows for sure they are playing where they belong.:
On a side note he did say he was taking the team to go play kickball against the local elementary school and said he didn't think he had any kids that could kick the slow and bouncy.

[puckster15]

I am curious about one thing, if STA has so many recruits and are so talented, reload every year with the best, why do these kids stay all four years? Two have left in the last 6 years. I doubt it is simply to trophy hunt.

Many more kids are leaving other schools early. Look at Apple Valley. Colin Olson, AJ Michaleson, Hudson Fasching. That team should have been at the X.

[HawkeyPower]

On a serious note I stated earlier in another post that STA would not be a upset beating Hermantown. And many of the posters tried to remind me who was #1. STA wins that game 8 out of 10 times. 3 solid lines and a very solid goaltender. On defense they clogged all the passing lanes and poke checked almost every puck that came there way.Hermantown has nothing to hang their head. The weakest part of the team (goaltender) was exposed for what it was. So many people tried to say how strong of a tender he was but when you only see 15 shots or less in 90% of your games, most goalies will look good. As much as it pains me to say the better team won. I think we all love to hate STA for playing A. But until something is done by the MSHSL to solve the problem or STA/ Breck opt up, it is what it is and we all have to deal with. Everyone hates the Yankees but they break no MLB rules. They work within a broken system. As does STA/Breck.

[puckhead58]

You are right, Hawkey, public A schools have 3 options.....1)concede championships to private schools, 2)find a way to develop what you need (goaltenders or whatever) from within, or 3)play dirty and recruit........as the system, for now, is broken.

[cooperalls4ever]

31 and 0 regular season....it's time for Hermantown to go AA after 2 straight class A title games. Stop sandbagging

I hope STA goes AA like the rest. Just don't cry next year when the AA semis are BSM STA and Hill Totino.

Umm...just thinking you won't see Totino in the AA semi's, let alone the A semi's with Breck/STA still around. You should check out how well Totino did up in Hermantown this year, 0 shots in the first to 17 & you can't give the road legs excuse there as Hermantown played the night before in the cities and Totino had it off.

That would be 3 straight Class A title games.

[HawkeyPower]

31 and 0 regular season....it's time for Hermantown to go AA after 2 straight class A title games. Stop sandbagging

I hope STA goes AA like the rest. Just don't cry next year when the AA semis are BSM STA and Hill Totino.

Umm...just thinking you won't see Totino in the AA semi's, let alone the A semi's with Breck/STA still around. You should check out how well Totino did up in Hermantown this year, 0 shots in the first to 17 & you can't give the road legs excuse there as Hermantown played the night before in the cities and Totino had it off.

That would be 3 straight Class A title games.

1 title. If Sta/ Breck would have opted up years ago you may have a point. It would have been 4 titles in 6 years. But after today, I think we all know Hermantown truly is where they belong.

[cooperalls4ever]

This one's OVER....and the pathetic thing is cronies like HSHockeywatcher and TheStickler07...think they are accomplishing something SPECIAL

What a joke...STA playing Class A and they're supporters trying to justify it...talk about trophy chasing...and not challenging they're kids to play against the best and win a title that actually means something. Props to BSM and HM. They might not be liked, but they are respected...STA is neither.

5-1 now...but still still OVER.[/i][/b]

This strikes me as so odd. All season long there were Hermantown supporters saying they thought their squad was the best team in state, regardless of class, that they could play with Duluth East, and that they hoped they'd get the #2 seed so they could beat both Breck and St Thomas.All season long I was called biased and a homer for putting St Thomas in the #1 spot on my rankings because Hermantown was clearly the better team and they've proven it. Winning all season with outstanding defense.



Now that we're at the tournament, where are all those comments? The head coach has made excuses for them to lose, all the fingers are pointed and people are conceding before the game even happens. Somehow the Hawks got the top seed, yet their coach and all the announcers call them the underdog.

All we'd had all season long was disrespect from the Hermantown supporters communities and now that this game has come around no one can just say "you're better, good job" but instead make more excuses. There has been no disrespect from the private school communities; just kids going out and playing hockey.

If they could opt up for one year, I'm sure St Thomas would for next year. They can't.

Good luck to all the seniors in the off season before continuing playing hockey post secondary.

Nobody in Duluth thought Hermantown was better than the Twin Cities powerhouses. The fact is, for strong northern programs (Duluth East, Duluth Marshall, Grand Rapids), they play a weak schedule and thus everyone knew their record was deceiving. They haven't been challenged all year and it showed today.

Nope, Hermantown @ Grand Rapids, GR didn't challenge them but somehow DE barely made it out with a win two days later. For some reason Randolph won't play NE (surrounding Duluth) MN teams because they aren't a challenge, his words last night, not mine but he schedules Superior, Wi who DE and Hermantown both struggled with wins and the highlight of DE and Randolphs schedule is that season final they play down in St. Paul and win each year by 10 goals (that must be a challenge to see if they can win by 10 each year? You can look up the school but it starts with an S....)

Duluth Marshall, well they recruit like all the other private schools with good hockey programs. Ask, Ely, Eveleth, Aurora Hoyt Lakes and other communities if any of their top players received any "offers" to attend DM? We all know they just happened to pick those top athletes to promote the acedemics of their school. This began with open enrollment in the mid 90s, in '92 DM had 12-15 kids out for hockey. They wanted to merge with Hermantown, H-town denied it, the recruiting began shortly after, but they mainly were getting DE kids. The difference is DM gets mainly NE MN kids, while STA and the others cherry pick from the 3 million in the metro area (sorry Bruce said 8 billion, but close enough for those privately educated adults that just don't get it yet from STA. BSM understood where their place was 10 years ago). What you metro kids and parents don't understand is that teams in class A (communities like Hermantown which has a population of about 8000 and around 250 boys that go to school there and maybe 98% of them since elementary) don't have 3 million people to choose from, in fact I don't think their is any room for "open-enrollment" @ HHS. Keep slamming a school that has a territorial boundary and a limited population from which their team is created. So much class, just like the 50 something women standing with her grown kid and spouse holding their infant after the game @ the elevator B*#CHING about how the most creative thing the H-town students could say was "we have girls" as I walked up. Really? Lady, the school you send your boys to just won another title and you're whinning about a student body chant? Because we all know the STA student body is the best most respected group of young men in all of MN because they put on a uniform. I like how classy they were when they were tossing the Hawk mascot head around.

Anyway, off track but I had to ask her when she was obviously disturbed about the girls chant how many "boys" STA had enrolled? 550? It must be nice to recruit, which was followed by "oh, there's no recruiting, they can open enroll from all over." Correct, I'm sorry. Better question would've been, where do you live? How well do you support the community you live in and their athletic programs? I'm guessing not many live within Mendota Heights.

But, Congrats STA. You were the better hockey team today. I did watch DE and LS Thurs night and honestly STA, Hermantown or Breck would've beat both of those teams by 3-4 goals the way they played Thurs night. My honest opionion was Hermantown didn't play well Fri or Sat. DE didn't play well against 'Tonka or LS in their 2 losses either. You can't sum up an entire season on one game, but yet that one game is what they played the entire season for. Tough luck, that's why you play the games.

But what is the excuse for STA not to opt up to AA? Is it they are waiting to defeat H-M?

Follow BSM's lead, and play where you should. You can pull in the best players from anywhere within an hour of your school, what is the issue?

I'll continue to hope for the small city/town community David's to knock off the Goliath's which is exactly what a private school is that can bring in kids from a metro area of 3 mil.

However, Hermantown commands respect in the Duluth community because they play a classy yet strong work ethic game and every year, Plante takes nobody players who have never played selects or elites and turns the team into a force. Hermantown has always been greater than the sum of its parts because he instills important hockey fundamentals in his teams that no other Duluth team has perfected as good as Hermantown.

[HawkeyPower]

2 quick ones and this ones getting outta control. 4-0 STA

This one's OVER....and the pathetic thing is cronies like HSHockeywatcher and TheStickler07...think they are accomplishing something SPECIAL

What a joke...STA playing Class A and they're supporters trying to justify it...talk about trophy chasing...and not challenging they're kids to play against the best and win a title that actually means something. Props to BSM and HM. They might not be liked, but they are respected...STA is neither.

5-1 now...but still still OVER.[/i][/b]

This strikes me as so odd. All season long there were Hermantown supporters saying they thought their squad was the best team in state, regardless of class, that they could play with Duluth East, and that they hoped they'd get the #2 seed so they could beat both Breck and St Thomas.
All season long I was called biased and a homer for putting St Thomas in the #1 spot on my rankings because Hermantown was clearly the better team and they've proven it. Winning all season with outstanding defense.

Now that we're at the tournament, where are all those comments? The head coach has made excuses for them to lose, all the fingers are pointed and people are conceding before the game even happens. Somehow the Hawks got the top seed, yet their coach and all the announcers call them the underdog.

All we'd had all season long was disrespect from the Hermantown supporters communities and now that this game has come around no one can just say "you're better, good job" but instead make more excuses. There has been no disrespect from the private school communities; just kids going out and playing hockey.

If they could opt up for one year, I'm sure St Thomas would for next year. They can't.

Good luck to all the seniors in the off season before continuing playing hockey post secondary.

" I am sure the would opt up for one year if they could"
Maybe you didn't hear your coaches press conference. What a empty statement to begin with. Easy to say we would do something knowing that you can't. Keep spinning your thoughts and keep chasing your trophies .

[dherman8]

Glad to finally hear you admit the obvious.

BTW have you ever played hockey? BECAUSE most hockey player want to play against the best. The " I don't believe in a class system where those who are good in it need to move up." argument might work for other sports...but not HOCKEY.

Finally? It's what I've been saying all along. More proof you don't actually read my posts before posting negatively about them.

No, it's not a hockey thing, it's a class system thing. Does the best D3 team move up to D2/D1 the following season? No; is it because they are sandbagging? No, it's because it's a class system.

Announced attendance of 9,157 new Class A record.

Double what I thought it would be (which is great)...but less than 1/2 of what the crowd likely will be tonight.

Which says a lot about the hockey community fans.

I really am beginning to understand why all of the northern teams are so weak and frustrated with teams like STA, because their parents/relatives who post on this site are soft and support making excuses rather than working harder to beat these tough teams.

This is my point of view also, and I am from the outstate up north. Long gone are our strong leaders who used to try and push us to be better, now we just get complacent and look for excuses, play in leagues that we can be a power in without much work for improvement instead of playing up to push everything forward. I kinda wonder if the fact that most of the babby boomer generation are now grandparents instead of parents has something to do with it.

A final thought...Congrats to the STA players!

It's not their fault they are stuck playing for a 2nd rate title.

But the administration, AD and coaches at STA deserve all the grief they are getting...because THEY KNOW BETTER..than to play Class A hockey. At this point, no excuse or justification has validity.

Congrats for what? Playing in a game they don't belong in? Try to make the 7 pm game and then we'll see who cares...

Have you guys read any of the comments about tonight's game?
The same disrespect given to St Thomas is being given to the two teams who made it to the "big boy" final.

First, what do you mean by saying something about hockey community fans?

Why are you clapping? It seems like he is ripping your Hermanwown or your Cadets for being scaredy cats.

And last, people are ripping Benilde and Hill Murray for cherry picking players but guess what THEY ARE PLAYING AA! It's easier to get over Benilde and Hill because they PLAY AA! Not sure if you're aware but I belive Benilde and Hill Murray look down on your school because they understand they belong in AA. How many titles did Benilde win before they moved up?

[rainier]

Congrats to the Cadets, they are a great team and showed it today.

Hopefully we will see them in AA as soon as possible.

[thestickler07]

Congrats to the Cadets, they are a great team and showed it today.

Hopefully we will see them in AA as soon as possible.

Seconded on both counts.

[HShockeywatcher]

On a serious note I stated earlier in another post that STA would not be a upset beating Hermantown. And many of the posters tried to remind me who was #1. STA wins that game 8 out of 10 times. 3 solid lines and a very solid goaltender. On defense they clogged all the passing lanes and poke checked almost every puck that came there way.Hermantown has nothing to hang their head. The weakest part of the team (goaltender) was exposed for what it was. So many people tried to say how strong of a tender he was but when you only see 15 shots or less in 90% of your games, most goalies will look good. As much as it pains me to say the better team won. I think we all love to hate STA for playing A. But until something is done by the MSHSL to solve the problem or STA/ Breck opt up, it is what it is and we all have to deal with. Everyone hates the Yankees but they break no MLB rules. They work within a broken system. As does STA/Breck.

It's funny to hear this now after the fact. All season I was called names for thinking St Thomas was better and everyone couldn't wait til this game to prove it to me.

Agree that it is definitely hard to get excited about STA winning A title. Would be interesting if AD and Headmaster came out with their reasoning of why to stay at A level.

Isn't their school about pursuing excellence in all endeavors? I guess this ends at hockey.

Also, on an unrelated topic, somewhat interesting that when CDH became a dominant power in football, STA couldn't quite fit them into their schedule.

You can listen to the voices of the school or you can not. They do not opt up in any sport because the school's focus is education. They play sports in the class the mshsl assigns them. Outside of the hockey community, St Thomas is thought of as a great academic school, as is Breck. Those donating to and funding the school are not hockey players.

Would it be nice to see? Many younger alumni would like it to happen and hopefully it will. But don't pretend that the reasons they are giving are not true.

Both schools have one non-conference football game a year. My guess is it was a mutual decision to stop playing. That being said, from a financial point of view, selling 8000+ tickets to watch my alma mater get beat makes more money than traveling to crush Denfeld and is possibly better for development. Hopefully they start playing again.

First, what do you mean by saying something about hockey community fans?

Why are you clapping? It seems like he is ripping your Hermanwown or your Cadets for being scaredy cats.

And last, people are ripping Benilde and Hill Murray for cherry picking players but guess what THEY ARE PLAYING AA! It's easier to get over Benilde and Hill because they PLAY AA! Not sure if you're aware but I belive Benilde and Hill Murray look down on your school because they understand they belong in AA. How many titles did Benilde win before they moved up?[/b]

a. Take it in any direction you will. People bash the A final because it has low attendance. For the last 20 years the quality of the A final has been on par with the quality of the AA final but it is still looked down on. More people liked more of the teams in the A final than the AA final, so that can't be the reason. It is how it is looked at by the hockey community.

b. He is calling out communities for simply pointing the finger instead of worrying about themselves.

c. Benilde won two A titles then played 4 more years in A before opting up to AA...

[HawkeyPower]

On a serious note I stated earlier in another post that STA would not be a upset beating Hermantown. And many of the posters tried to remind me who was #1. STA wins that game 8 out of 10 times. 3 solid lines and a very solid goaltender. On defense they clogged all the passing lanes and poke checked almost every puck that came there way.Hermantown has nothing to hang their head. The weakest part of the team (goaltender) was exposed for what it was. So many people tried to say how strong of a tender he was but when you only see 15 shots or less in 90% of your games, most goalies will look good. As much as it pains me to say the better team won. I think we all love to hate STA for playing A. But until something is done by the MSHSL to solve the problem or STA/ Breck opt up, it is what it is and we all have to deal with. Everyone hates the Yankees but they break no MLB rules. They work within a broken system. As does STA/Breck.

It's funny to hear this now after the fact. All season I was called names for thinking St Thomas was better and everyone couldn't wait til this game to prove it to me.

Agree that it is definitely hard to get excited about STA winning A title. Would be interesting if AD and Headmaster came out with their reasoning of why to stay at A level.

Isn't their school about pursuing excellence in all endeavors? I guess this ends at hockey.

Also, on an unrelated topic, somewhat interesting that when CDH became a dominant power in football, STA couldn't quite fit them into their schedule.

You can listen to the voices of the school or you can not. They do not opt up in any sport because the school's focus is education. They play sports in the class the mshsl assigns them. Outside of the hockey community, St Thomas is thought of as a great academic school, as is Breck. Those donating to and funding the school are not hockey players.

Would it be nice to see? Many younger alumni would like it to happen and hopefully it will. But don't pretend that the reasons they are giving are not true.

Both schools have one non-conference football game a year. My guess is it was a mutual decision to stop playing. That being said, from a financial point of view, selling 8000+ tickets to watch my alma mater get beat makes more money than traveling to crush Denfeld and is possibly better for development. Hopefully they start playing again.

First, what do you mean by saying something about hockey community fans?

Why are you clapping? It seems like he is ripping your Hermanwown or your Cadets for being scaredy cats.

And last, people are ripping Benilde and Hill Murray for cherry picking players but guess what THEY ARE PLAYING AA! It's easier to get over Benilde and Hill because they PLAY AA! Not sure if you're aware but I belive Benilde and Hill Murray look down on your school because they understand they belong in AA. How many titles did Benilde win before they moved up?[/b]

a. Take it in any direction you will. People bash the A final because it has low attendance. For the last 20 years the quality of the A final has been on par with the quality of the AA final but it is still looked down on. More people liked more of the teams in the A final than the AA final, so that can't be the reason. It is how it is looked at by the hockey community.

b. He is calling out communities for simply pointing the finger instead of worrying about themselves.

c. Benilde won two A titles then played 4 more years in A before opting up to AA...

At least it only took two titles to let them realize they needed to opt up.
Keep spinning and keep the chasing!

[urban iceman]

This one's OVER....and the pathetic thing is cronies like HSHockeywatcher and TheStickler07...think they are accomplishing something SPECIAL

What a joke...STA playing Class A and they're supporters trying to justify it...talk about trophy chasing...and not challenging they're kids to play against the best and win a title that actually means something. Props to BSM and HM. They might not be liked, but they are respected...STA is neither.

5-1 now...but still still OVER.[/i][/b]

This strikes me as so odd. All season long there were Hermantown supporters saying they thought their squad was the best team in state, regardless of class, that they could play with Duluth East, and that they hoped they'd get the #2 seed so they could beat both Breck and St Thomas.All season long I was called biased and a homer for putting St Thomas in the #1 spot on my rankings because Hermantown was clearly the better team and they've proven it. Winning all season with outstanding defense.

Now that we're at the tournament, where are all those comments? The head coach has made excuses for them to lose, all the fingers are pointed and people are conceding before the game even happens. Somehow the Hawks got the top seed, yet their coach and all the announcers call them the underdog.

All we'd had all season long was disrespect from the Hermantown supporters communities and now that this game has come around no one can just say "you're better, good job" but instead make more excuses. There has been no disrespect from the private school communities; just kids going out and playing hockey.

If they could opt up for one year, I'm sure St Thomas would for next year. They can't.

Good luck to all the seniors in the off season before continuing playing hockey post secondary.

Nobody in Duluth thought Hermantown was better than the Twin Cities powerhouses. The fact is, for strong northern programs (Duluth East, Duluth Marshall, Grand Rapids), they play a weak schedule and thus everyone knew their record was deceiving. They haven't been challenged all year and it showed today.

However, Hermantown commands respect in the Duluth community because they play a classy yet strong work ethic game and every year, Plante takes nobody players who have never played selects or elites and turns the team into a force. Hermantown has always been greater than the sum of its parts because he instills important hockey fundamentals in his teams that no other Duluth team has perfected as good as Hermantown.

I believe some of the Hermantown guy's played for the Lake Superior Stars, an Elite AAA team! Pionk, etc.

[DmanDad1980]

Same exact things were said about Warroad a while back....what's it like now????

Sorry Defense, look at the hockey base to pull kids from... Northern border town, yes with a wonderful tradition and Marvin's, or 3.5 million in the metro county district...

Not even a close comparison...

I mean look at todays hometown parade route for STA... Start in Lakeville, run through Rosemount, to Hastings, then up to Woodbury, make a short drive over to West St Paul, to St Paul... But I digress...

It is a collective community atmosphere... Wonderful!

Little cadets, wannabe "AA's" and their pretencious, and oh so precious cheers and antics... Leaders...? no, Daddys money has served them well to date...

[defense]

Same exact things were said about Warroad a while back....what's it like now????

Sorry Defense, look at the hockey base to pull kids from... Northern border town, yes with a wonderful tradition and Marvin's, or 3.5 million in the metro county district...

Not even a close comparison...

I mean look at todays hometown parade route for STA... Start in Lakeville, run through Rosemount, to Hastings, then up to Woodbury, make a short drive over to West St Paul, to St Paul... But I digress...

It is a collective community atmosphere... Wonderful!

Little cadets, wannabe "AA's" and their pretencious, and oh so precious cheers and antics... Leaders...? no, Daddys money has served them well to date...

Sorry DmanDad1980, I don't know what argument you are making but: The only comparison I made here is that people(not me) were saying the SAME EXACT THING about Warroad back when they were dominant.
I wrote nothing about comparing the population base and the teams themselves...;just that when Warroad was dominating class A, people were calling them out....now they don't....

[The Enlightened One]

STA and Breck are not the issue here. We could wave a magic wand today and make them move up and all that will happen is that we will be sitting here in a few years using different initials to talk about schools that need to move up. Instead of STA we will be saying SCC, instead of Breck we will be saying Marshal, etc etc. This whole deal boils down to one thing, private schools can create and fill a shopping list of needs to improve their teams and go fill it, public schools have to take a different route. If you watched this weekend's tourney and saw any of the Marshal games you know that they have a list of what they need to get better. It is a list that looks a lot like the list that HawkyPower submitted for Hermantown earlier in this thread. The big difference here is how do you as a head coach fill that shopping list? If you are Marshal's head coach you go shopping for a fix. You know that he is out shopping. If you are Hermantown's head coach you look at what the youth association is sending you for kids and hope that you see the fix in there. I think that what is going to have to happen is that the public school coaches are going to have to take a bit more of a long view on this deal. The high school programs are going to have to keep an eye on the associations that support them and help them to develop players that fit with what the high school teams need. The high school coaches (or their assistants or somebody that they designate) are going to have to start talking to the youth programs and say things like (making all of this up here to prove my point) "the kids that we get are not good at passing the puck, it needs to get better", "the D that we are getting from you don't understand the basics, let us help you train them at the PeeWee and Bantam levels so that they are ready for us to use", "we have to have better goal tenders, they are not what we need to compete at this level". and etc. Bitzer from Moorhead, #12 from BSM, those defensemen from STA and etc were all developed and trained by the time they got to high school by somebody. Sure, they got bigger, stronger and better but they were good at what they did already. The associations will lose some control over what happens if they go this route. The selection process for their PeeWee and Bantam A teams will probably have to change some what so that the best skill sets get on the team instead of the kid who is .... well .... anyhow. Your kid who really wants to play D might have to play winger if the high school coaches are saying that we have plenty of D but are going to be really short on wings when your kid gets here. The youth programs are going to have to get better at producing some of those specialists that are needed at the high school level. If you went to the expo this weekend you saw at least 5 different goal tender development "companies" there. Obviously there is an issue with goal tender training someplace. How much do these out state associations do with goalie training? From what I can see all of the companies were based in the cities. Does Duluth have anything like that? How about Rochester? Where does Bitzer from Moorhead get his training? Pretty obvious that he gets some. Can Little Falls go there too?

We can sit here and bash on STA. It is fun. The chants that those kids were doing were pretty funny. Breck's kids dressing in pink to take a poke at STA's all boys status we good. But all that this is doing is making sure that we as public schools are not going to fix this and that we will be sitting here until we run out of private schools to bash on and make move up.

We won't fix this over night. We won't be able to fix this in all places that want to go to the X and beat STA. We can fix this though so that STA or the newest set of initials does not just walk in the door to collect their trophy.

[2good4u]

This strikes me as so odd. All season long there were Hermantown supporters saying they thought their squad was the best team in state, regardless of class, that they could play with Duluth East, and that they hoped they'd get the #2 seed so they could beat both Breck and St Thomas.All season long I was called biased and a homer for putting St Thomas in the #1 spot on my rankings because Hermantown was clearly the better team and they've proven it. Winning all season with outstanding defense.

Now that we're at the tournament, where are all those comments? The head coach has made excuses for them to lose, all the fingers are pointed and people are conceding before the game even happens. Somehow the Hawks got the top seed, yet their coach and all the announcers call them the underdog.

All we'd had all season long was disrespect from the Hermantown supporters communities and now that this game has come around no one can just say "you're better, good job" but instead make more excuses. There has been no disrespect from the private school communities; just kids going out and playing hockey.

If they could opt up for one year, I'm sure St Thomas would for next year. They can't.

Good luck to all the seniors in the off season before continuing playing hockey post secondary.

Nobody in Duluth thought Hermantown was better than the Twin Cities powerhouses. The fact is, for strong northern programs (Duluth East, Duluth Marshall, Grand Rapids), they play a weak schedule and thus everyone knew their record was deceiving. They haven't been challenged all year and it showed today.

However, Hermantown commands respect in the Duluth community because they play a classy yet strong work ethic game and every year, Plante takes nobody players who have never played selects or elites and turns the team into a force. Hermantown has always been greater than the sum of its parts because he instills important hockey fundamentals in his teams that no other Duluth team has perfected as good as Hermantown.

I believe some of the Hermantown guy's played for the Lake Superior Stars, an Elite AAA team! Pionk, etc.

im sorry but if we are going off of selects and elite leagues then i gotta say those are the biggest freaking jokes to date all they are, are teams for the kids with $$$, i played AAA hockey back when you had to have skill to be on a team, now days anyone to everyone can get on a team, plante definitely makes the players a lot better, not AAA or elite leagues, those are just leagues for the daddy's money players to stroke their little egos

[Northhcky]

Nobody in Duluth thought Hermantown was better than the Twin Cities powerhouses. The fact is, for strong northern programs (Duluth East, Duluth Marshall, Grand Rapids), they play a weak schedule and thus everyone knew their record was deceiving. They haven't been challenged all year and it showed today.

However, Hermantown commands respect in the Duluth community because they play a classy yet strong work ethic game and every year, Plante takes nobody players who have never played selects or elites and turns the team into a force. Hermantown has always been greater than the sum of its parts because he instills important hockey fundamentals in his teams that no other Duluth team has perfected as good as Hermantown.

I believe some of the Hermantown guy's played for the Lake Superior Stars, an Elite AAA team! Pionk, etc.

im sorry but if we are going off of selects and elite leagues then i gotta say those are the biggest freaking jokes to date all they are, are teams for the kids with $$$, i played AAA hockey back when you had to have skill to be on a team, now days anyone to everyone can get on a team, plante definitely makes the players a lot better, not AAA or elite leagues, those are just leagues for the daddy's money players to stroke their little egos

I have to agree for the most part with this. My son played on a AAA team when it was only "select" players. Up north here it was the Northern Wings and down south it was the Blades. Who by the way the Wings never could beat". Those were the teams to be on and as far as up north the top players were. There were kids all the way from Little Falls to I Falls on the Wings. Now i "think" the Wings are a just a shell of their former selves and the so called AAA teams are so watered down due to quantity its nowhere near the same. Went to the Lake Superior Stars AAA tourney last year and there were so called AAA teams the some community Peewee A and Bantam A teams would put to shame. It was clear the level of play was not what it used to be. The Blades might be a different story i don't pretend to know.

[blindref]

I have to agree for the most part with this. My son played on a AAA team when it was only "select" players. Up north here it was the Northern Wings and down south it was the Blades. Who by the way the Wings never could beat". Those were the teams to be on and as far as up north the top players were. There were kids all the way from Little Falls to I Falls on the Wings. Now i "think" the Wings are a just a shell of their former selves and the so called AAA teams are so watered down due to quantity its nowhere near the same. Went to the Lake Superior Stars AAA tourney last year and there were so called AAA teams the some community Peewee A and Bantam A teams would put to shame. It was clear the level of play was not what it used to be. The Blades might be a different story i don't pretend to know.[/quote]

Who cares

[urban iceman]

I believe some of the Hermantown guy's played for the Lake Superior Stars, an Elite AAA team! Pionk, etc.

im sorry but if we are going off of selects and elite leagues then i gotta say those are the biggest freaking jokes to date all they are, are teams for the kids with $$$, i played AAA hockey back when you had to have skill to be on a team, now days anyone to everyone can get on a team, plante definitely makes the players a lot better, not AAA or elite leagues, those are just leagues for the daddy's money players to stroke their little egos

I have to agree for the most part with this. My son played on a AAA team when it was only "select" players. Up north here it was the Northern Wings and down south it was the Blades. Who by the way the Wings never could beat". Those were the teams to be on and as far as up north the top players were. There were kids all the way from Little Falls to I Falls on the Wings. Now i "think" the Wings are a just a shell of their former selves and the so called AAA teams are so watered down due to quantity its nowhere near the same. Went to the Lake Superior Stars AAA tourney last year and there were so called AAA teams the some community Peewee A and Bantam A teams would put to shame. It was clear the level of play was not what it used to be. The Blades might be a different story i don't pretend to know.

I thought we were talking about the current players on the hermantown team. The Superior Stars WERE a very good team when they played on it so its irrelevent if the team has fallen since then.

[mulefarm]

STA and Breck are not the issue here. We could wave a magic wand today and make them move up and all that will happen is that we will be sitting here in a few years using different initials to talk about schools that need to move up. Instead of STA we will be saying SCC, instead of Breck we will be saying Marshal, etc etc. This whole deal boils down to one thing, private schools can create and fill a shopping list of needs to improve their teams and go fill it, public schools have to take a different route. If you watched this weekend's tourney and saw any of the Marshal games you know that they have a list of what they need to get better. It is a list that looks a lot like the list that HawkyPower submitted for Hermantown earlier in this thread. The big difference here is how do you as a head coach fill that shopping list? If you are Marshal's head coach you go shopping for a fix. You know that he is out shopping. If you are Hermantown's head coach you look at what the youth association is sending you for kids and hope that you see the fix in there. I think that what is going to have to happen is that the public school coaches are going to have to take a bit more of a long view on this deal. The high school programs are going to have to keep an eye on the associations that support them and help them to develop players that fit with what the high school teams need. The high school coaches (or their assistants or somebody that they designate) are going to have to start talking to the youth programs and say things like (making all of this up here to prove my point) "the kids that we get are not good at passing the puck, it needs to get better", "the D that we are getting from you don't understand the basics, let us help you train them at the PeeWee and Bantam levels so that they are ready for us to use", "we have to have better goal tenders, they are not what we need to compete at this level". and etc. Bitzer from Moorhead, #12 from BSM, those defensemen from STA and etc were all developed and trained by the time they got to high school by somebody. Sure, they got bigger, stronger and better but they were good at what they did already. The associations will lose some control over what happens if they go this route. The selection process for their PeeWee and Bantam A teams will probably have to change some what so that the best skill sets get on the team instead of the kid who is .... well .... anyhow. Your kid who really wants to play D might have to play winger if the high school coaches are saying that we have plenty of D but are going to be really short on wings when your kid gets here. The youth programs are going to have to get better at producing some of those specialists that are needed at the high school level. If you went to the expo this weekend you saw at least 5 different goal tender development "companies" there. Obviously there is an issue with goal tender training someplace. How much do these out state associations do with goalie training? From what I can see all of the companies were based in the cities. Does Duluth have anything like that? How about Rochester? Where does Bitzer from Moorhead get his training? Pretty obvious that he gets some. Can Little Falls go there too?

We can sit here and bash on STA. It is fun. The chants that those kids were doing were pretty funny. Breck's kids dressing in pink to take a poke at STA's all boys status we good. But all that this is doing is making sure that we as public schools are not going to fix this and that we will be sitting here until we run out of private schools to bash on and make move up.

We won't fix this over night. We won't be able to fix this in all places that want to go to the X and beat STA. We can fix this though so that STA or the newest set of initials does not just walk in the door to collect their trophy.

Some great points, but what is stopping the kids that you develop from going to private schools. Look at Wayzata Besse, Opperman went private and Lucia baled out his senior year. What if the next 3 forwards in their association would have got the coaching and experience these players did. Would that have made Wayzata better this year. I'm sure they wouldn't have won the bantam state without these three on the team, and had they stayed, Wayzata would have had a great chance to win state. There really is no way to control this and I doubt there is a practical solution.