Class A Rankings 12-18-16

[HShockeywatcher]

Well, not a lot of changes this week in the rankings, plus a handful of meaningful games cancelled or postponed. With the holidays and lack of games, there will be no rankings next weekend; January 1st will be the next rankings.
We're also in the point of the season where we've gone down to the Top 15. Teams are solidifying themselves at this point; it seems like there is a clear Top 10 and then it's hard to tell after that.

Enjoy!

1. [1] Delano/Rockford (5-0-0)
The Tigers win their only game this week by a wide margin. Their biggest test will be the Hilltopper Classic, where they will play Cloquet and have the opportunity to play Hermantown.

2. [2] Hermantown (4-1-1)
The Hawks were the preseason #1 team and dropped despite not losing to any Class A teams. If their first Hilltopper Classic game has the same result as Delano's, the two teams will play each other and settle the debate.

3. [3] St. Paul Academy (3-1-0)
The Luverne game has been postponed, so the Spartans haven't played in a week. The best team they will play between now and playing Breck on Sat, Jan 7th is TRF. Expect them to hold or move down based on other teams' performance in two weeks.

4. [4] Breck (4-2-0)
After beating Wayzata last week, they crushed New Prague this week. They will for sure play Cretin-Derham Hall in the Schwan's Cup Silver Division and after that best case scenario would be games with Mahtomedi and St Michael.

5. [7] St. Cloud Cathedral (4-1-2)
The Crusaders' game this past week was a tie with Alexandria. Their next 5 games will all be against unranked opponents; can they keep their 1 loss going into their Jan 6th games with Hermantown?

6. [6] Mahtomedi (3-3-0)
The Zephyrs started the season with an OT loss to section rival SPA and since have played 5 conference games, with 1 goal losses to HM and Tartan, so they are still very much unknown in Class A. The Schwan's Cup bracket that includes Breck and St Michael will be a new barometer for them.

7. [20] Hibbing/Chisholm (5-1-0)
The Bluejackets are a question mark with the schedule they've played thus far. Their 1 loss is by 1 goal to 3-3 Roseau and they have crushed a good Greenway team. Outside of that, they haven't played another team of note but have crushed their other 4 opponents. They will travel to Coleraine to play Greenway again this coming week and host Alexandria in their holiday tournament the following week.

8. [5] Greenway (6-1-0)
The Raiders started out winning 6 in a row, but got crushed by Hibbing a section opponent. Over the next two weeks they have 4 home games in a row, including playing Hibbing again and a match-up with Alexandria.

9. [8] East Grand Forks (4-1-1)
The Green Wave have tied Cathedral, lost to Greenway by a goal, beaten Alexandria by 3, but also beaten Totino by 1. Bemidji and Warroad coming up this week.

10. [13] Alexandria (2-2-2)
The Cardinals tied Cathedral, lost by 1 to Fergus Falls, then lost to EGF. Their next 5 games are all against good teams and will tell us a lot.

11. [9] Warroad (1-4-1)
The Warriors are still 1-1-1 in Class A games with close results with both Cathedral and Sartell. Their next games are road games with section rivals EGF and TRF, followed by 3 home games they should win.

12. [10] Sartell (3-1-2)
The Sabres got shut out by St Cloud this week which isn't a good sign, but one game doesn't define them. They play 5 winnable games over the next 2 weeks; not stumbling would be a really good sign.

13. [12] Rochester Lourdes (3-3-0)
The Eagles don't look like they will be cracking the Top 10, but they have a very good win over Chaska and lots of good Class A and section opponents in the second half of the season

14. [14] Minnehaha Academy (6-1-0)
The Redhawks are 5-0 against Class A teams this season, with a 29-5 goals margin in those games, but haven't played against quality competition. They have a holiday tournament so we should see some good games and their conference allows them some really good opponents during the season half of the season.

15. [-] Princeton (4-0-0)
The Tigers are in the drivers seat for section 5A. They play Monticello again, but no other Class A teams of note.


Teams to watch

[17] Orono (4-2-0)
Losing to Luverne and Monticello doesn't look good for Orono, but they have won all of their other games, including a win over Blake.

[18] New Prague (4-3)
The Trojans have gotten crushed by HF, Breck and Hermantown while winning the rest of their games. They play Lourdes on the road, which will be a good test for both teams and then start the rounds in Wright County conference play in January.

[19] Blake (4-3-0)
No games last week, no games this coming week and then 3 games in the Bronze Cup.

Monticello (5-2-0)
After a hot start the Moose lost to Princeton, the team who beat them in the section finals last year. The game against Sartell in two weeks will be a good measuring stick.

North Branch (3-0-0)
The Vikings are undefeated still undefeated as their lone game this past week was postponed. Can they keep up with Princeton on the road in their next game?

Virginia (5-3)
The 6 goal loss to Warroad still lingers, but they keep winning. Cloquet, Alexandria and Hibbing over the next two weeks; can they win 2 of those?

[blueblood]

Warroad at 11?

If karl(east) had a team with a 1-4-1 record ranked in his AA top 15, YHH and ColdOmaha guy would likely suspend him from weekly podcast.

[HShockeywatcher]

Warroad at 11?

PageStat has them at 8th in class A; do you think I have them too low??
http://www.minnhock.com/ps2017.htm

[BlueLineSpecial]

Warroad at 11?

PageStat has them at 8th in class A; do you think I have them too low??
http://www.minnhock.com/ps2017.htm[/quote

If PageStat jumped off a bridge, would you?

[elliott70]

Warroad at 11?

PageStat has them at 8th in class A; do you think I have them too low??
http://www.minnhock.com/ps2017.htm[/quote

If PageStat jumped off a bridge, would you?

Pagstat . Needs more games to be more accurate

Mid Jan starts to get good
Seeding time pretty accurate

[blueblood]

Consider me old school, but the mantra "We played good, but lost, doesn't do it for me." It means you were beaten by a better team.

[HShockeywatcher]

Consider me old school, but the mantra "We played good, but lost, doesn't do it for me." It means you were beaten by a better team.

yup, which is why everyone they've lost to is, or would be, above them. Record is only as good as who you beat. If you're saying that a specific loss can't be more impressive than another win, we'll have to agree to disagree.

[blueblood]

This week's games against TRF and EGF will go al long way in soring out where should Warroad be ranked.

[Teak]

I don't see how you can rank Hermantown as anything but #1. They will walk through their single A schedule like a combine and enter the state tournament.

At the state tourney, they will be #1 seed and draw either the 3A or 1A school in the first round. After that rout, they will advance to the semi-finals and take on the 8A or 4A team. After that yawner, they will play Breck, Delano, or whomever for the state championship, and Bruce Plante will talk about how his squad overcame adversity to win their second A championship in a row.

Yawn. I think that the 5th and 3rd place games will be more exciting.

BTW, keep up the good work. You only need to concern yourself with #2-15. And don't put any 3A schools in the top 15 because everyone knows we're cr@p down here. Waseca should be given a look in 1A.

[HShockeywatcher]

I don't see how you can rank Hermantown as anything but #1. They will walk through their single A schedule like a combine and enter the state tournament.

There's 2 parts to this:

1. This discussion has come up every year for the last few years. When you are looking at scores and trying to be as objective as possible, how you win and who you play plays a big role. Of the 22 scheduled games, 10 are against Class A teams and 4 of those are non-section games; New Prague, TRF, Cathedral and Mahtomedi. The majority of their schedule is AA teams (usually with little overlap with the other top teams), the holiday tournament and section opponents they crush. This isn't the easiest to compare to other teams. If they lose a couple games to AA teams and have a close game with an unranked A team while another team is crushing their schedule, they aren't going to look, on paper, like they are "as good."

2. This year Hermantown started at the #1 team preseason. Both I and LPH have dropped them to #2 after some hiccups to start the season, tying the team karl now has at 14 and losing a lopsided game to a team he has at #20. Delano, on the other hand, beat a team on the road that the majority of voters last week think should be at #2 or #3. It's close, and right now the top 4 could probably be in any order (with Breck lower than Delano). Heck, PageStat has Delano at #1 in the state right now.

I think we're all hoping Delano and Hermantown meet a week from today and there will be no more discussion about either...

[elliott70]

I don't see how you can rank Hermantown as anything but #1. They will walk through their single A schedule like a combine and enter the state tournament.

There's 2 parts to this:

1. This discussion has come up every year for the last few years. When you are looking at scores and trying to be as objective as possible, how you win and who you play plays a big role. Of the 22 scheduled games, 10 are against Class A teams and 4 of those are non-section games; New Prague, TRF, Cathedral and Mahtomedi. The majority of their schedule is AA teams (usually with little overlap with the other top teams), the holiday tournament and section opponents they crush. This isn't the easiest to compare to other teams. If they lose a couple games to AA teams and have a close game with an unranked A team while another team is crushing their schedule, they aren't going to look, on paper, like they are "as good."




2. This year Hermantown started at the #1 team preseason. Both I and LPH have dropped them to #2 after some hiccups to start the season, tying the team karl now has at 14 and losing a lopsided game to a team he has at #20. Delano, on the other hand, beat a team on the road that the majority of voters last week think should be at #2 or #3. It's close, and right now the top 4 could probably be in any order (with Breck lower than Delano). Heck, PageStat has Delano at #1 in the state right now.

I think we're all hoping Delano and Hermantown meet a week from today and there will be no more discussion about either...

Hermantown
Breck
Delano
SPA
EGF
Cathedral
TRF

[blueblood]

Elliott -

You do know that Delano beat Breck and is unbeaten to date?

[elliott70]

Elliott -

You do know that Delano beat Breck and is unbeaten to date?

Yes, Delano was better than Breck a couple of weeks ago....
I am saying that if they played again, soon, Breck would win.

[Goldy Gopher]

I don't see how you can rank Hermantown as anything but #1. They will walk through their single A schedule like a combine and enter the state tournament.

There's 2 parts to this:

1. This discussion has come up every year for the last few years. When you are looking at scores and trying to be as objective as possible, how you win and who you play plays a big role. Of the 22 scheduled games, 10 are against Class A teams and 4 of those are non-section games; New Prague, TRF, Cathedral and Mahtomedi. The majority of their schedule is AA teams (usually with little overlap with the other top teams), the holiday tournament and section opponents they crush. This isn't the easiest to compare to other teams. If they lose a couple games to AA teams and have a close game with an unranked A team while another team is crushing their schedule, they aren't going to look, on paper, like they are "as good."




2. This year Hermantown started at the #1 team preseason. Both I and LPH have dropped them to #2 after some hiccups to start the season, tying the team karl now has at 14 and losing a lopsided game to a team he has at #20. Delano, on the other hand, beat a team on the road that the majority of voters last week think should be at #2 or #3. It's close, and right now the top 4 could probably be in any order (with Breck lower than Delano). Heck, PageStat has Delano at #1 in the state right now.

I think we're all hoping Delano and Hermantown meet a week from today and there will be no more discussion about either...

Hermantown
Breck
Delano
SPA
EGF
Cathedral
TRF

So glad to see there's at least one other person who hasn't anointed Delano as the greatest team ever.

[HShockeywatcher]

Hermantown
Breck
Delano
SPA
EGF
Cathedral
TRF

What about my analysis do you disagree with?

What do you see in TRF to ignore the losses to Totino and Blake?

[HShockeywatcher]

Tonight
Hibbing vs Greenway

Warroad vs East Grand Forks

New Prague vs Rochester Lourdes

Sartell-St Stephen vs Fergus Falls

Alexandria vs Moorhead

From Tuesday
4 Princeton
2 North Branch

5 St Michael-Albertville
3 Breck

4 Maple Grove
3 Totino-Grace

5 EGF
2 Bemidji

3 Thief River Falls
1 Warroad

[HShockeywatcher]

Some interesting scores from Thursday night. Greenway comes from behind to beat Hibbing, EGF shuts out Warroad, Minnehaha shuts out a Minneapolis team that Delano allowed 3 goals to, Sartell shuts out Fergus Falls, Alexandria ties Moorhead, and many more!


3 Greenway
2 Hibbing

4 Cathedral
3 Mankato West

4 EGF
0 Warroad

5 Orono
0 Hopkins

4 Minnehaha Academy
0 Minneapolis

9 Delano
1 Mound Westonka

6 Lourdes
2 New Prague

2 Sartell
0 Fergus

2 Alexandria
2 Moorhead

13 Mankato East
0 Winona

[greenwayraider]

The Hibbing/Greenway game did not go into overtime. Greenway outshot Hibbing 40-28. Hibbing's two goals came on a 5 minute powerplay. Greenway was without Grant Troumbly who sustained a foot injury in practice. Exciting, physical game. Hibbing's powerplay is impressive.

[HShockeywatcher]

The Hibbing/Greenway game did not go into overtime. Greenway outshot Hibbing 40-28. Hibbing's two goals came on a 5 minute powerplay. Greenway was without Grant Troumbly who sustained a foot injury in practice. Exciting, physical game. Hibbing's powerplay is impressive.

Ha, check this out...
http://www.mnhockeyhub.com/game/show/14 ... son=317781

If I recall correctly, wasn't the penalty thing an issue last year too?
How are they doing in that regard this year?

[greenwayraider]

That was two years ago (pre-Clafton) that Greenway had major penalty problems. Some re-occurence of it this year, but I'm confident Clafton will take care of that. The major taken last night was questionable from my point of view. Maybe an interference penalty. It was called "checking from behind on open ice". The kid is a big strong football player that hasn't quite made the change to hockey. He'd be great to park in front of the net in the power play. He could cause a lot of havoc.

[HShockeywatcher]

No new rankings this week, not much has changed. Most teams playing at least 3 games this week, things will be really interesting a week from now.
Let's look at some sections...

1A
Northfield is 6-1-1 and 6-0 in section games, beating Mankato East in OT and Lourdes 6-3. Lourdes could end up being a surprise here; Northfield is the only section opponent they've played and only play 3 more in Red Wing, Albert Lea and Austin in their last 4 games. Right now...

1 Northfield
2 Mankato East
3 Lourdes

2A
Delano is undefeated and 5-0 in section play, which includes beating Breck. Delano is obviously favored at this point, but Breck and Orono play each other on Jan 3 and Delano and Orono play each other twice. Technically, both Delano and Orono control their own destiny, while Breck would be at the whim of Delano stumbling to end up higher than 2. Being #1 in this section will be much more important than a lot of sections.
It looks as though these will be the top 3, with New Prague and Blake fighting for 4 over 5, with New Prague having the "advantage" playing each of Delano and Orono twice. As of now...

1 Delano
2 Breck
3 Orono
4 New Prague
5 Blake

More to come...

[HShockeywatcher]

3A
Litchfield and Luverne played an OT game in which 13 goals were scored last year to decide who goes to state with Litchfield coming out on top, after Luverne won the regular season meeting. This year there is no regular season meeting. Although Luvernce lost a lot of their top players, a couple to graduation and two went to play juniors they are getting production from all around. Litchfield lost a few of their top skaters, but return 5 of their 12 that had double digit points last year. Both teams return their starting goalies from last year.

There are currently 4 teams in the section with a winning record, the other two having been shut out by Luverne and one beaten by Litchfield, this seems to be a two horse race. They have 3 common opponents thus far, both 3-0 against them and Luverne's wins "look better," so that's all we have to go by.
Luverne has the nod as of right now, but they play in the SSP tournament starting today, and play Totino and New Prague later, while Litchfield plays a Wright County schedule, so ranking will be a little more objective in 2 months.

1 Luverne
2 Litchfield
for now...

4A
The year opened with SPA taking Mahtomedi to OT and winning their season opener. It seemed like that was going to be that, those two 1 & 2 seeds with 3 months to go, but there are multiple other teams in this section with winning records fighting to get in there.
Minnehaha Academy is 7-1, which includes a loss to a good Chaska team, an OT win over River Falls, and 6 games against Class A teams where they have allowed 5 goals and beaten three section opponents. One of those games is 8-1 over Highland Park. They won't play Mahtomedi, but they will play Johnson and SPA twice (as well as Breck once and Blake twice).
Johnson has is 5-1-1 with 4 shutouts this season, although they started the year with a loss to Minneapolis. They have games with SPA, Minnehaha and Highland Park, so we'll know more before seeding happens.
Totino has had some interesting game results, but are still just 1-1 in Class A games despite playing 10 games already. They have lost to EGF by 1 and beaten TRF by 2, so they aren't bad, but some of their losses don't look good. Next up is Luverne, with Mahtomedi Jan 3. The Mahtomedi game will likely play a big role in section seeding.

As I see it right now...
1 St Paul Academy
2 Mahtomedi
3 Minnehaha Academy
4 St Paul Johnson
5 Totino-Grace

5A
Princeton beat Monticello in the section finals last season.
Princeton beat Monticello on the road this season.
There are 3 teams not named Princeton in the section with winning records, Monticello, North Branch and Pine City and Princeton has won 4-2, 4-2 and 4-1 over them. Monticello beat Pine City (and just lost 10-0 to Becker), North Branch beat Pine City handily and lost to Princeton by 2.
It would appear that Pine City is going to be the 4 seed and running the table would only help if either North Branch or Monticello totally falls apart. North Branch has only played 5 games and still has another with Princeton and their only with Monticello, so technically they should control their own destiny in the section.

Princeton, on the other hand, is the clear favorite. They play Chaska in their first game of the Schwan Cup Open Division and play STMA later in the season. Outside of those games, they don't have any games that look like will be losses. They also don't have any scheduled games against other teams mentioned in any rankings. Minnehaha Academy is on the opposite side of the bracket as them as well...when will they get their first loss?

1 Princeton
2 Monticello
3 North Branch
4 Pine City

[silentbutdeadly3139]

3A
Litchfield and Luverne played an OT game in which 13 goals were scored last year to decide who goes to state with Litchfield coming out on top, after Luverne won the regular season meeting. This year there is no regular season meeting. Although Luvernce lost a lot of their top players, a couple to graduation and two went to play juniors they are getting production from all around. Litchfield lost a few of their top skaters, but return 5 of their 12 that had double digit points last year. Both teams return their starting goalies from last year.

There are currently 4 teams in the section with a winning record, the other two having been shut out by Luverne and one beaten by Litchfield, this seems to be a two horse race. They have 3 common opponents thus far, both 3-0 against them and Luverne's wins "look better," so that's all we have to go by.
Luverne has the nod as of right now, but they play in the SSP tournament starting today, and play Totino and New Prague later, while Litchfield plays a Wright County schedule, so ranking will be a little more objective in 2 months.

1 Luverne
2 Litchfield
for now...

4A
The year opened with SPA taking Mahtomedi to OT and winning their season opener. It seemed like that was going to be that, those two 1 & 2 seeds with 3 months to go, but there are multiple other teams in this section with winning records fighting to get in there.
Minnehaha Academy is 7-1, which includes a loss to a good Chaska team, an OT win over River Falls, and 6 games against Class A teams where they have allowed 5 goals and beaten three section opponents. One of those games is 8-1 over Highland Park. They won't play Mahtomedi, but they will play Johnson and SPA twice (as well as Breck once and Blake twice).
Johnson has is 5-1-1 with 4 shutouts this season, although they started the year with a loss to Minneapolis. They have games with SPA, Minnehaha and Highland Park, so we'll know more before seeding happens.
Totino has had some interesting game results, but are still just 1-1 in Class A games despite playing 10 games already. They have lost to EGF by 1 and beaten TRF by 2, so they aren't bad, but some of their losses don't look good. Next up is Luverne, with Mahtomedi Jan 3. The Mahtomedi game will likely play a big role in section seeding.

As I see it right now...
1 St Paul Academy
2 Mahtomedi
3 Minnehaha Academy
4 St Paul Johnson
5 Totino-Grace

5A
Princeton beat Monticello in the section finals last season.
Princeton beat Monticello on the road this season.
There are 3 teams not named Princeton in the section with winning records, Monticello, North Branch and Pine City and Princeton has won 4-2, 4-2 and 4-1 over them. Monticello beat Pine City (and just lost 10-0 to Becker), North Branch beat Pine City handily and lost to Princeton by 2.
It would appear that Pine City is going to be the 4 seed and running the table would only help if either North Branch or Monticello totally falls apart. North Branch has only played 5 games and still has another with Princeton and their only with Monticello, so technically they should control their own destiny in the section.

Princeton, on the other hand, is the clear favorite. They play Chaska in their first game of the Schwan Cup Open Division and play STMA later in the season. Outside of those games, they don't have any games that look like will be losses. They also don't have any scheduled games against other teams mentioned in any rankings. Minnehaha Academy is on the opposite side of the bracket as them as well...when will they get their first loss?

1 Princeton
2 Monticello
3 North Branch
4 Pine City

Re: Princeton, Seems like your not really familiar with AA teams or maybe it doesn't matter for these rankings but I don't think there favored against AA teams Rogers, Buffalo and N St. Paul, a team that is much improved this year.

[zamboniexhaustinhaler]

Hermantown
Breck
Delano
SPA
EGF
Cathedral
TRF

What about my analysis do you disagree with?

What do you see in TRF to ignore the losses to Totino and Blake?

Fwiw, TRF is a non-entity.

Only their goalie has prevented them from losing more than they have and the section is an EGF cakewalk.

[greenwayraider]

TRF lost 9-0 to Hermantown in TRF and only had 4 shots on goal the entire game.