*** December 16th, 2012 - My Great Eight AA Rankings ****

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Which Team Ranking Do you Most Disagree With

#1 Edina
0
No votes
#2 Minnetonka
0
No votes
#3 Benilde
16
70%
#4 Blaine
0
No votes
#5 Hill Murray
3
13%
#6 Wayzata
2
9%
#7 Duluth East
0
No votes
#8 tie Eagan
0
No votes
#8 tie Burnsville
2
9%
 
Total votes: 23

Wallyworld
Posts: 107
Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 4:25 pm

*** December 16th, 2012 - My Great Eight AA Rankings ****

Post by Wallyworld » Sun Dec 16, 2012 6:02 pm

A wild week in AA hockey with some suprising outcomes.. Happy to see that Blaine demonstrated why they deserved to be at #5 in my rankings since week 1.. Here's this week's rankings.


1) Edina - Pretty easy choice here. No one else belongs.

2) Minnetonka - Skippers keep cruising along. Some tough games coming up which will be telling.

3) Benilde - Benilde took out their anger over the Hill loss against Holy Angels with an 11 goal outburst.. Tough loss to a very talented offensive team in Blaine after that.. Still belong here in the long term though. Just too much O talent and are adjusting to graduation and other losses on D/G.

4) Blaine Jump up a spot after upsetting BSM and have an offense that can compete with anyone. Still trying to find D/G answer which leaves them at #4 rather than #3.. Tough call. I thought about changing to a tie with #3 though I'll stick with my initial call..

5) Hill Murray Hill has been playing well on D and have one of the best goalies in the state (.97 GAA and .949 save % before STA game) though they are still trying to get their offense on track. The Lavalle, Brown, Slattery line hasn't been gelling the way most expected and the other lines aren't fairing much better, despite considerable talent. Lechner will continue tinkering.

6) Wayzata Trojans have been in my top 8 all along with the only blemish being an early 3-0 loss to Edina. Duluth East victory was a quality win. They remind me of Hill in terms of being a lower scoring team but tremendous on D/G. Dingman and Ahrens are a nice duo in net.

7 Duluth East - Regrouped after loss to Wayzata with a win over a mediocre Cloquet team. Don't play at home again until January 8th and this stretch will tell us much about the depth and offense of this team.

8 Tie Burnsville & Eagan Seems to be a gap between the top 7 and this 8th spot. Considered Grand Rapids, Lakeville North, and EP for this spot but have to go with the Blaze & Eagan by default. Eagan had a somewhat confusing win over LVS 6-5 which is a team that Hill beat 5-0. Burnsville, meanwhile, needed OT to get past Lakeville North, barely avoiding their 3rd loss of the young season.. So I'm not too high on either of these teams I'll let them break the tie when they play on Tuesday. I'm leaning towards Eagan...







[Previous Rankings]

Last Week = Benilde, Edina, Tonka, EP, Tie Hill & Blaine, Duluth East, Wayzata.

While I was one of few to have Duluth East ranked as low as I did and initially had them at #8 behind Wayzata, I misjudged Hill and EP in a major way.. Voters disagreed most with my ranking of Wayzata at #8 and Blaine tied for #5 but both have showed they belong... Here is week 2


[Great Eight] - December 9, 2012


#1 Edina - Moves up a spot after Benilde's loss and has shown no weaknesses this year..

#2 Hill Murray It's a stretch to move them all the way up to #2 but they have dispatched all comers and showed they can play with anyone. There is no longer this illusion that there is Benilde & Edina and then everyone else.. Hill's victory levels the top of the playing field somewhat and is good for high school hockey... Lavalle, Brown, & Slattery (SSM transfer) is now officially a line and Slattery showed why he belonged with the two returning 1st liners - and is an adequate Guentzel replacement for the line..The game winning 3rd goal against BSM was a thing of beauty as Brown had a chance to shoot but drew the goalie over before firing the pass to Lavalle where a near empty net awaited.. Good stuff.. Dugas is heart & soul of this team. He has faced #1,#7, #8, and LVS and has a GAA under 1...

#3 Minnetonka Eagan game was closer than I thought it should be though Tonka followed with a win over STA and definitely have shown that they belong in Top 5.. More of a D led team the past Tonka teams, perhaps, but until they lose, it's hard to argue about style..

#4 BSM Flip-flopped a little as I had Blaine here initially but one loss does not a slide make. Still a talented team and will be steaming in next couple of games...

#5 Blaine - Close win over Centennial surprised me a bit after the offense they displayed in previous games including 9-2 drubbing of Osseo but they did put 57 shots on goal in that OT win. In fact, they average over 45 shots on goal so far.. Tyler Cline leads the way though he has plenty of help.. They have Benilde this Saturday which should be a great and illuminating game. If this was Benilde's first game after the Hill loss, I would bet on them without reservation but Benilde will likely unleash their anger (as much as any Catholic school can allow:) from the Hill loss upon Holy Angels on Thursday.. Saturday's game should be a toss up.. I'm looking for a 4-2 BSM win..

6) Eden Prairie One of the biggest surprises of the season (besides Andover) has been EP's play.. On paper and based upon performance of players like Spinner, Bergh, Knudsen, Snuggerud & Warner last season as well as in the Elite League this fall, it seems like they should be playing at a higher level and beating lower caliber teams by a higher margin. Just not clicking yet though and Goalie may be an issue. Sophmore Jake Kielly has a .833 save percentage and allowed 5 goals on 26 shots against Holy Angels and 5 goals on 25 shots against Burnsville (Jake Gerdes has played one game, a 4-2 win over anoka w/ 26 saves on 28 shots). I was not at any of these games so I cannot comment on root of the problem though, from reports, it sounded like D was playing undisciplined as well. Snugs always thinks O first, though Hunter Warner is a solid, stay at home guy.. Likely a combination of factors at play here but they have to solve this to stay in top 8. Time will tell if they can play together as a team and collectively rise to the level of their individual talent.

7) Wayzata - I had the Trojans here briefly last week before flip-flopping and putting them at #8 behind Duluth East. Should have went with initial instinct.. I have seen them in 3 games and they are growing up as a team, even though Duluth tested them on Saturday.. The strength of this team is D and a great pair of goalies. The small, quick forwards like Wahl, Freytag & Zimmer should only get better as the season goes on..They do need to improve on the Power Play as that is a definite weakness..The penalty kill however is phenomenal, killing off all 17 shorthanded situations.. My post last week discussed my concern about the ability of this team to put shots on net.. The 12 shots against Duluth did not alleviate my concerns here and it would be difficult to see them higher than #7 until they can consistently put the puck on net.. In fact, they have scored less than two goals a game, on average, over their last 6 games. Still, a 6-1 start, with a 1.39 GAA, against some tough competition says a lot. They play D and just find a way to win..

#8) Duluth East Body of work so far is slim and a 1-0 loss to Wayzata was not encouraging. They did outshoot Wayzata 28-12 but a loss is a loss. Obviously a strong defensive team but they need to find their O on a consistent basis to compete with the big boys..

HappyHockeyFan
Posts: 926
Joined: Sun Nov 30, 2008 11:55 pm
Location: Lakeville

Post by HappyHockeyFan » Mon Dec 17, 2012 3:04 am

So are your rankings based on perceived potential?? Because I dont see how BSM could possibly be ranked at #3 this point in the season with two losses to teams you have ranked below them, that just doesnt make sense to me.
It's not the Best players, it's the Right players! HB

BodyShots
Posts: 1921
Joined: Fri Feb 29, 2008 9:44 am

Post by BodyShots » Mon Dec 17, 2012 8:54 am

HappyHockeyFan wrote:So are your rankings based on perceived potential?? Because I dont see how BSM could possibly be ranked at #3 this point in the season with two losses to teams you have ranked below them, that just doesnt make sense to me.
Agree 100% with this perceived potential ranking methodology. If that is the case, then just rank them once at the beginning of the year and do away with this week by week adjustment BS.

Wallyworld
Posts: 107
Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 4:25 pm

Depends

Post by Wallyworld » Tue Dec 25, 2012 9:30 pm

HappyHockeyFan wrote:So are your rankings based on perceived potential?? Because I dont see how BSM could possibly be ranked at #3 this point in the season with two losses to teams you have ranked below them, that just doesnt make sense to me.
If they played again, I believe that BSM would defeat Hill Murray and the Blaine game was so close (6-5) that I don't know that there is much, if any, meaningful seperation between the two.. Thus, when I have situations like that I give more weight to body of play as well as talent evaluation... It wasn't long ago that I was taking friendly flak for having both Blaine and Wayzata in my '8' rankings and now, what do you know, the AP has both of them in Top 5... So, I can understand and appreciate your arguement, but I'll stick to my methodology - which, in a nutshell, is 'if they played today, who would likely win'...

Another analogy is the NHL... If it was mideseason and Detroit (#1 in division) had a few game slide where they lost to FL, NYI & Anaheim - you don't necessarily drop them below those three teams.. Though there is more parity in NHL and it's an 80 game season, the Power Rankings (closest thing to HS Rankings) are about talent and body of work in season.. Fans don't say 'how can you have Detroit ranked above Anaheim when they lost 2 of last 3 games to them'.... It's not just about latest scores... See post about ranking based on scooreboard watching as opposed to seeing teams and talent in person... Same principle..... Respectfully

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