Open Enrollment Closed

playfair · Post by **playfair** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 9:37 pm

Open Enrollment at EP Shut Down by Wayzata tonight in sections 3-2. It was fun to watch a group of girls that have played together since U12's go out and win as a TEAM Congratulations to Wayzata.

hockeya1a · Post by **hockeya1a** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 9:40 pm

playfair wrote:Open Enrollment at EP Shut Down by Wayzata tonight in sections 3-2. It was fun to watch a group of girls that have played together since U12's go out and win as a TEAM Congratulations to Wayzata.

At least they have their better education to fall back on!

ghshockeyfan · Post by **ghshockeyfan** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 10:08 pm

hockeya1a wrote:
playfair wrote:Open Enrollment at EP Shut Down by Wayzata tonight in sections 3-2. It was fun to watch a group of girls that have played together since U12's go out and win as a TEAM Congratulations to Wayzata.
At least they have their better education to fall back on!

I did laugh when I read this, but I also have some kids on that EP team that I know quite well and I do feel bad that their season is over. They're good kids, and while they've been wearing that HUGE target for quite a while no one has been able to knock them off until now. Not only will these kids walk away with a great education earned in the classroom, but they also have gained valuable life lessons from playing under the white hot spotlight and pressure that comes with what has been their existence these past two years.

I want to congratulate Wayzata for a HUGE win, but also EP for giving G Hockey another team that will go down as one of the best ever.

The real question now is who will win the State Championship, but before we answer that, we have a lot of section finals to play.

fan4fun · Post by **fan4fun** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 10:12 pm

playfair wrote:Open Enrollment at EP Shut Down by Wayzata tonight in sections 3-2. It was fun to watch a group of girls that have played together since U12's go out and win as a TEAM Congratulations to Wayzata.

You forget there are MANY girls from EP who are NOT open enrollment players. Pretty difficult when the whole state wants to see you lose, including one of the officials. EP has NOTHING to hang their heads about and still won a lot of games and faced a lot of pressure. Wazata did a good job tonight. FYI - Take a look back at EP-U14A team and see where they were 3 years ago - they took second at state that year. How sad you have to ruin Wayzata's win with such mean spiritedness and even more sad, how you discount many of those EP girls who have played together for so long. Hope Wayzata goes on to do well. Bummer people like you have to ruin good competition with such immature comments.

ghshockeyfan · Post by **ghshockeyfan** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 10:33 pm

3 of the Top 5 teams in state lost tonight - in fact many would argue that they were the top 3 teams in state. I don't know that we've ever seen anything like this before. In Section 6 this was mainly due to the depth of the Section and an upset in 5AA took down another great team. It sounds like there was some great hockey played tonight, and wish I could have seen all of it. Congrats to all the teams involved - Winners & Losers - as this has been a great indicator of how far the girls game has come!

playfair · Post by **playfair** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:22 pm

Well first off lets get a few things straight. The actual EP girls I would like to congradulate for a great winning streak. But I am sorry I do not believe in open enrollment for sports, and no one can claim the I switched for education reasons. Come on, that one is so old it is ridiculous. And the comment about the refs, whatever, we have had tough reffing all year, and tonight I actually thought that they weren't bad. Maybe you are just upset because of all the recruiting to put together the perfect team just failed. How sad for the girls that left their hometown teams high and dry to go play for EP. Not only sad, but terrible that they deserted their teams and now for what? Oh and are you so desperate to find an excuse for your loss, that you are actually going to blame the refs, that's a new one.

hotdog · Post by **hotdog** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 7:33 am

Congrats to Wayzata... They are a great team and deserve to be very proud of their efforts.

Playfair... You should stop talking... Your comments are tarnishing a great win and a great time for your daughters team! Taking the high road is a great lesson for your team and daughter!

As far as the EP and Edina girls... Great seasons... Everyone remember they're just kids!

Good Luck to Wayzata and BSM!

Slapshotdude · Post by **Slapshotdude** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 7:39 am

When David knocked down Goliath, everyone cheered - except for Goliaths mother. The moral of the story - Don't cry over spilt milk (unless your the cow)

hotdog · Post by **hotdog** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 7:48 am

[quote="Slapshotdude"]When David knocked down Goliath, everyone cheered - except for Goliaths mother. The moral of the story - Don't cry over spilt milk (unless your the cow)[/quote]

Nicely worded, although I'd give Wayzata more credit than David...
EP as Goliath... IMO they were much better (or should I say bigger) last year!

hockeywise · Post by **hockeywise** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:32 am

All 4 teams are winners or should I say 5 teams..EP, Wayzata,Edina,BSM and Hopkins. All these teams could could have made the trip to state this year if not for this section.
Hopkins has open Enrollment runners as well and they will be tough next year as well along with EP again.
So will they change the sections up a little so we don't have this next year again???? who knows...
All I know is we have 2 of the best teams in the state that will be sitting at home that we will not see this year and that is a shame.
I know there are people out there that hate hearing about how good this Section 6AA is but if you ever came to these games you would see some great hockey. I watched 2 incredible games last night and walked away saying this should have been saved for the state tourney..IMO

Thats what we are striving for right?

hockeygod · Post by **hockeygod** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:39 am

I have yet to see a girls hockey player so good that she can dominate completly, EP may have recruited, i don't know, they had a good team this year, but they were beaten by a fundimentaly sound TEAM. When is everyone going to get over the recruiting thing and appreciate great team play because as we have seen, thats what wins this time of year. congradulations to all the victors..good luck MAHTOMEDI !!!

tigerpower · Post by **tigerpower** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:41 am

hockeywise wrote: All I know is we have 2 of the best teams in the state that will be sitting at home that we will not see this year and that is a shame.

they are "best" on paper... the best teams will play and if the "best" lose to a team it means that team was ultimately better

the best teams move on

wingsrule · Post by **wingsrule** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:51 am

playfair wrote:Open Enrollment at EP Shut Down by Wayzata tonight in sections 3-2. It was fun to watch a group of girls that have played together since U12's go out and win as a TEAM Congratulations to Wayzata.

All this talk about EP and Open Enrollment what is the OE attendees at other Public Schools?

For the last 2-3 years Wayzata had a very high end player (Lee) that carried the scoring load and now attends Mankato. EP was in the spotlight, and rightfully so, due to the number of OE players, defending state champs and their undefeated season. Even South St. Paul may have had 1-2 OE players during their fabulous years although the top 5 girls were homegrown. Was Bloemers from Brooklyn Park or did the family move but she opted to stay at SSP?

It would be interesting to see where other public schools ranked in number of OE student athletes. Just curious or is OE being blown way out of proportion based on EP's winning record?

ghshockeyfan · Post by **ghshockeyfan** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:54 am

tigerpower wrote:
hockeywise wrote: All I know is we have 2 of the best teams in the state that will be sitting at home that we will not see this year and that is a shame.
they are "best" on paper... the best teams will play and if the "best" lose to a team it means that team was ultimately better

the best teams move on

Good teams win on paper or via computer. The best teams win on the ice. Head-to-head play is what determines which teams advance. While there are "upsets," we only see them as such due to our perceptions heading into any event. Usually these perceptions are impacted heavily by paper rankings, coach/section votes/seedings, and computer rankings. You can throw all that stuff out the window when two teams meet on the rink, where the games - and the better teams - should be decided.

ghshockeyfan · Post by **ghshockeyfan** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:01 am

wingsrule wrote:
playfair wrote:Open Enrollment at EP Shut Down by Wayzata tonight in sections 3-2. It was fun to watch a group of girls that have played together since U12's go out and win as a TEAM Congratulations to Wayzata.
All this talk about EP and Open Enrollment what is the OE attendees at other Public Schools?

For the last 2-3 years Wayzata had a very high end player (Lee) that carried the scoring load and now attends Mankato. EP was in the spotlight, and rightfully so, due to the number of OE players, defending state champs and their undefeated season. Even South St. Paul may have had 1-2 OE players during their fabulous years although the top 5 girls were homegrown. Was Bloemers from Brooklyn Park or did the family move but she opted to stay at SSP?

It would be interesting to see where other public schools ranked in number of OE student athletes. Just curious or is OE being blown way out of proportion based on EP's winning record?

It's been pretty well documented I believe that there are three powers in G HS Hockey history - Roseville of the mid-to-late 90's, SSP of the late 90's to mid 00's, and EP of the mid 00's through present. Of these teams, RV was almost entirely homegrown at first, but after that hype did attract some OE's, but not many, after their glory (although they never really fell off entirely after the early success - jsut became more top but not quite very best for a few years). SSP had some amazing homegrown talent, and this too was meshed with some OE's during their run as what some believe will forever considered the best G HS Hockey teams. EP had some success prior to getting their OE's, but the OE's really pushed EP to that level of dominance that got them mentioned in the same breath with the RV & SSP teams - as did the influx of some additional stellar internal talent. One common thread for these three was that they all had amazing youth programs at one point in time. RV came after/during their run as G Hockey was just getting started then. RV youth is still quite strong I believe. SSP had some of the best youth teams prior to & during the early days of their run. EP is the same way.

unbelievable · Post by **unbelievable** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:18 am

hockeywise wrote:All 4 teams are winners or should I say 5 teams..EP, Wayzata,Edina,BSM and Hopkins. All these teams could could have made the trip to state this year if not for this section.
Hopkins has open Enrollment runners as well and they will be tough next year as well along with EP again.
So will they change the sections up a little so we don't have this next year again???? who knows...
All I know is we have 2 of the best teams in the state that will be sitting at home that we will not see this year and that is a shame.
I know there are people out there that hate hearing about how good this Section 6AA is but if you ever came to these games you would see some great hockey. I watched 2 incredible games last night and walked away saying this should have been saved for the state tourney..IMO

Thats what we are striving for right?

hockeywise,

I believe it's much bigger than just going to the state tourney. Yes, I'd wager that every team's ultimate goal is to go to the big dance. And I concur that this year section 6AA had a number of very good teams. But it won't always be that way. It will ebb and flow. That's part of the beauty of it all. The rivalries that are being solidified (this year and last year)... that can be passed down to future players and generations for years to come.

On the boys side I'll refer to Section 3AA:

Centennial High School
Hill-Murray School
Mounds View High School
North High School
Roseville Area High School
Stillwater Area High School
White Bear Lake Area High School
Coop: 882
Irondale High School
Saint Anthony Village High School

What a list of perennial hockey powerhouses! Year in and year out this section produces some of the best boys teams in the state, culminating in semifinals and championship games that rival any state tournament matchups. Absolutely phenomenal hockey to experience. And yet none of the above teams are asking to be moved to another section so they can get an easier path to the state tourney. They feel it is a badge of honor that they have to work very hard (and get a couple of lucky bounces) to proudly represent Section 3AA at the state tournament.

Is our section/state tournament process perfect? No, but no system will ever be.

According to various "ranking" systems, EP and Edina should have won and met in the finals with EP prevailing. Did EP, Edina and Hopkins all have good years? Yes. Is the final betwen Wayzata and BSM going to be great. Yes. And whoever wins that game should not only be very proud of their accomplishment, but that they should be humbled that they are representing one of the strongest sections in the state this year. What an incredible honor.

You have been very fortunate to be able to enjoy hockey of that caliber all season long. Very fortunate indeed. If I were you I would hope it continues that way for a long, long time.

Good luck to all the teams that are advancing and good luck to all HS girl hockey players in their future endeavours.

gopher16 · Post by **gopher16** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:27 am

You forget there are MANY girls from EP who are NOT open enrollment players. Pretty difficult when the whole state wants to see you lose, including one of the officials. EP has NOTHING to hang their heads about and still won a lot of games and faced a lot of pressure. Wazata did a good job tonight. FYI - Take a look back at EP-U14A team and see where they were 3 years ago - they took second at state that year. How sad you have to ruin Wayzata's win with such mean spiritedness and even more sad, how you discount many of those EP girls who have played together for so long. Hope Wayzata goes on to do well. Bummer people like you have to ruin good competition with such immature comments.

fan4fun, can you elaborate on your comment re: including one of the officials wanted EP to lose. Did one of them tell you this, or is this your opinion. The game was officiated evenly both ways. Each team had PP opportunities, and each team scored on them. It was a close, exciting game, and one team lost. Winning streaks can't last forever. The teams decided the outcome, not the officials.

hockeywild7 · Post by **hockeywild7** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:35 am

Extemely well said unbelievabale. This talk of how desperatly we need to realign the sections is ridiculous in my opinion. If you want the best 8 teams in the state just hold your little poll and send them on and forget about the sections. Sections are probably the most exciting time of the year for hockey. Thats what makes getting to state so special. Girls hockey is becoming more and more competive. What we are seeing is great for the game. There will always be one or two sections that are "loaded" but thats the way it works. You can't micro manage everything each year to try and get the "best" 8 into the state tourney. You have to look at it like having a final 64 basically to start section play, just like the mens NCAA tournament. The "best" 4 accoriding to the experts and polls do not usually make it to the final four. Its all about who is playing the best at the end of the season. And believe me, luck plays a major roll.

Slapshotdude · Post by **Slapshotdude** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:15 am

Many would disagree with you. The MHSL has rearanged in the past for various reasons including parity between sections in boys hockey and now you may see some changes in girls hockey. May the best team (in February) win the big show. Should be a good tournament with some new faces to watch.

SEMetro · Post by **SEMetro** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:23 am

Today's rankings are nice to talk about, but what happens if you have great parity - 12-17 teams in the state closely grouped together in talent? I believe that 12-13 of the 16 AA section finalists could easily beat each other on a given night.

tomASS · Post by **tomASS** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 10:35 am

hotdog wrote:
Slapshotdude wrote:When David knocked down Goliath, everyone cheered - except for Goliaths mother. The moral of the story - Don't cry over spilt milk (unless your the cow)
Nicely worded, although I'd give Wayzata more credit than David...
EP as Goliath... IMO they were much better (or should I say bigger) last year!

DOWN GOES FRAZIER, DOWN GOES FRAZIER!

keepitreal · Post by **keepitreal** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 1:21 pm

hockeywild7 wrote:Extemely well said unbelievabale. This talk of how desperatly we need to realign the sections is ridiculous in my opinion. If you want the best 8 teams in the state just hold your little poll and send them on and forget about the sections. Sections are probably the most exciting time of the year for hockey. Thats what makes getting to state so special. Girls hockey is becoming more and more competive. What we are seeing is great for the game. There will always be one or two sections that are "loaded" but thats the way it works. You can't micro manage everything each year to try and get the "best" 8 into the state tourney. You have to look at it like having a final 64 basically to start section play, just like the mens NCAA tournament. The "best" 4 accoriding to the experts and polls do not usually make it to the final four. Its all about who is playing the best at the end of the season. And believe me, luck plays a major roll.

PRECISELY!!! The games last night completely validate this. And I strongly agree there is far more drama in sections than at state, boy's or girl's. It's beacuse of the rivalries!

With teams like Wayzata, EP, Edina, etc., often competing up through youth hockey, coaches and parents familiar with each other, etc., it would be tragic take this, or any other section with great rivalries, apart with heavy-handed intentions of parity. It will take care of itself, it always does.

And one more thing...the vitriol expressed by some on this forum (and at Parade last night; a vast majority from NON-Wayzata players and parents BTW) associated with EPs loss is too bad. These are kids after all. I am reminded of that after every section game and see the tear-streaked faces of these girls as they make their way to the bus. I wouldn't kick EP when they're down, they will be back with a vengence next season with all that returning talent. I am not an EP fan by any means, nor will I celebrate their defeat, only a team like Wayzata's success. Keep it classy

hotdog · Post by **hotdog** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 2:01 pm

keepitreal,

Well Said! I couldn't agree more!

Bensonmum · Post by **Bensonmum** » Thu Feb 15, 2007 2:09 pm

keepitreal wrote:

the vitriol expressed by some on this forum .... associated with EPs loss is too bad. These are kids after all. I am reminded of that after every section game and see the tear-streaked faces of these girls as they make their way to the bus. I wouldn't kick EP when they're down, they will be back with a vengence next season with all that returning talent. I am not an EP fan by any means, nor will I celebrate their defeat, only a team like Wayzata's success. Keep it classy

I was very surprised by the nastiness. Even the fruitcakes on the 1A thread

eventually kiss and make up after the game is over and they've had enough needling. I guess the 'vitriol' felt for EP runs very deep and personal. That's too bad.

southern-cross-check · Thu Feb 15, 2007 9:41 pm

who gives...hockey isn't about being nice

sportsmanship is for after whistles and periods.

beyond that, who gives!

congrats to the winners, and better luck next year to the losers

but geez pity the big guns had to go down b4 state

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