northern teams

[BrdHock]

brainerds game with moorhead scheduled for saturday the 3rd was cancelled because they said they didnt have enough guys for a team this year, and our coach is telling us that there is a strong possibility that we will be in moorhead's place at the fargo tourney which would be great for us <p></p><i></i>

[elliott70]

Moorhead has the numbers and will be at the Fargo tourney, that's the latest. <p></p><i></i>

[Duluthhockey]

I don't understand why everyone is counting Duluth out of the competition. They lost to Grand Rapids but it was before they got there team together. Now they have a great goalie and have added some depth. I see them as the favorite in the North seeing as they took second in the Spirit of Duluth tourney and beat Eden Prairie in the Minnetonka tourney, although they did finish 4th. <p></p><i></i>

[NPGandyDancer]

the ep dad i talked to about the duluth team indicated the win over ep could have either way. according to him, ep, at the beginning of the second ot, put in their weak line, which gave up a quick goal. also, SHAW, walked all over duluth in a semi-game. of course, SHAW is, in effect, a high school varsity all-star team from the milwaukee area. their going to give any good jr. a team a tough game. <p></p><i></i>

[Duluthhockey]

EP did outshoot duluth by a very large margin and they played very well. The game definetely could have gone either way but since the duluth team has added a couple players and are getting better every day. I would expect they will be the first seed in the north and make a solid run at state. <p></p><i></i>

[NPGandyDancer]

duluth...fair enough. question. who has the best rink in duluth? will they rebuild peterson? whats the hold-up? $$? <p></p><i></i>

[Duluthhockey]

The reason it is taking so long has a lot to do with money and location. The rink they are going to put up is supposidely going to be very large from what i hear. These kinds of things take time... i would say Fryberger has the nicest ice that the duluth team plays on but the nicest facilities would have to be mars arena. <p></p><i></i>

[rmkjfk]

Moorhead Tourney<br><br>Moorhead was 8th-Lost to Champlain Pk<br>Fargo 5th or 6th<br>GR 3rd -Beat Centennial 1-0 <p></p><i></i>

[JPCX5]

Ely is considering a team as well. They don't have a numbers problem, it is a budget problem for the school district. The arena is old and the district owns it. Ely may have to follow what Chisholm did. <p></p><i></i>

[Brown and White]

I've been reading the posts about Duluth Jr Gold, DAHA and the program. From personal experiences from the local rink programs, through peewee, bantam, high school tryouts, and junior gold, OUR BEST EXPERIENCE TO DATE HAS BEEN WITH JUNIOR GOLD. The east end of town’s high school program is a real travesty. The coach pre-selects his players at peewee age, then moved up bantams like crazy and is playing 9th graders on varsity and letting juniors sit. His kid is a first year Peewee A and he is getting a team lined up for two years from now. You might find it of interest that players were allowed to play Junior Gold but NOT allowed by their parents to play for the east end high school coach--the mental abuse he puts the kids through was not going to be allowed by the parents (For example, he wouldn't let varsity kids off the bus to eat dinner if they didn't play well, the pact required by the players that what goes on with the players and the coach stays in the locker room). Guess what---the Jr Gold coach expects all the kids to put out all their effort and rewards them with playing them, not yelling at them, and hoping he has enough kids to play the season. He will always give the older kids the first shot, so when they get cut by the end of December—he is willing to put 20 on his roster...<br><br>Someone posted something about if the Duluth Hockey Association knew something was wrong, they’d step in and fix it. What planet are you on? You ain’t from Duluth—are you? DAHA would let things go wrong in their organization-let me give you a real example that occurred for the 05/06 year with the Bantam team---<br><br>District has only 11 teams total so they opted to have a B league (5 top go to B1 regionals, 5 lower go to B2 regionals; Superior won't bein regionals). With that change, the association that supports and fundraises for the B teams, wanted to have two B1 teams (no B2 team this year) of equal numbers and the talent was acceptable for B league to have two teams. There were only 2-3 B2 players, and the association didn't want to penalize them. Eight families didn’t like their first year peewees being assigned to one of two B1 teams—so they got on the DAHA agenda with 24 h notice (the other 24 parents didn’t know they were going to try to change it by going to a meeting). <br><br>About 6 of those 8 parents went to a DAHA meeting on a Sunday night and DAHA overturned the team designation. This was AFTER the teams have been announced, formed, held practices, and tournaments were scheduled and paid for. DAHA voted to have a B1 team of 18 and a B2 team of 12 in the same league but would be sure they didn't play each other, and that the B2 if they were able to muster the winning record, still couldn't make the regional B1 playoff schedule of the top 5 and bottom 5<br><br>However, the Bantam A coach and his assistant, plus the central high school coach are members of DAHA – (major conflict of interest; DAHA should expect any coach to "recuse" themselves in a vote for the B teams which aren't "under DAHA" guidance). <br><br>Coaches were in place for B1 teams---how'd you feel if you were coaching and then “downgraded" to B2 coach? When the association went to the district manager, the manager has a grandson on East High, didn't want to anger the high school coach, so the ruling went in force!<br><br>BTW, the executive director gets a percent of the advertising money to supplement his income---the ranking sheets for the skill of the players are "shredded" by him after tryouts before anyone can see the evaluations. This year, one kid a place on the bantam team after tryouts because one family said they'd pull their advertising.<br><br>If Junior Gold is "needs fixin" in Duluth, I don't see it and the example and precedent set by men who own businesses that support the high school programs and the high school and varsity coaches has made the hockey families here cynical and suspicious of everyone. These families sell their souls starting at squirt A and could care less about the other youth in the program and continue this practice through peewee and bantam levels...there's actually little if any in the Jr Gold program....<br> <p></p><i></i>