Future Gopher Coach Discussion

[bonin21]

MN, Mich, MSU, WI, UND, DU, CC, UMD

This conference would be FUCKING INSANE but just doesn't seem realistic and you need some bottom feeders.

A super conference is more likely, where you have divisions and can recreate the WCHA more or less in the Western Division. But the leadership doesn't want to do what's best for college hockey which we see every year the regionals stay away from campuses.

 

[STPGopher]

No one said they were the kings of hockey. Just fire Motzko and St Thomas will be behind us like they should be after Barr cleans up the trash Motzko leaves behind.

3. UND
10. UMD
12. UST
15. uw
16. MNSU
17. Augustana
20. SCSU
.
.
38. Minnesota
50. BSU

Have not seen the 09-Feb-2026 poll yet. As of the second, St. Thomas was 15th (CCHA). Would any team in that league be ahead of Notre Dame?

Personally, I am somewhat neutral. I could see arguments being made to keep Motzko for one more season, but I'd be more than fine with the program going in another direction. That is assuming the program wouldn't go the cheapskate route.

 

[upnorthkid]

I included ASU because:
1. It makes the conference a "round" number
2. There will be a lot of NHL talent flowing through
3. It's an away trip destination. Remember when that was a thing???

Also did that as a favor to keep Augustana.

"Rivalries come from playing a lot and the games meaning something."

Not totally true. Rivalries for the UMN come from:
- Seeing guys you watched locally get "stolen" by other teams and come to Mariucci
- Going to away games (preferably a few hour road trip) to soak in the Gopher hate
- Those teams having good turnouts at Mariucci
- Talking trash at work with co-workers that went to the other schools in the conference

All this died instantly with the Big Ten and it's never been CLOSE to the same. The cherry on top is regional conferences can have something like the Final Five.

To manage a 12 team conference you just need to get creative with divisions or something. It's not that hard.

on part 1, yeah I go to games away every year. I don't really have a desire to go to ASU any more than I would MSU.
On part 2, I can't say I really agree. Augie, UST, and Kato aren't stealing anyone from us. We're missing on guys who develop and become good as they grow. That's some of the fun with UMD (and why i pick there for my roadtrip when we're there, plus duluth in October is always good) is the iron range dislike of the Gophers (even though I wish we would figure out recruiting there makes a hell of a lot of sense). UND steals some, but it's more legacy and because they're also a blue blood who make for a good school selection. Ditto on DU. On the crowds, we played UMD and it was pretty sparsely attended. It's why the games have to matter and you have to play a lot. Ditto on us playing UND now which just means we see a bunch of green pukes in the stands because hockey is all their fan base has (for better or worse). Can't say I've ever really talked to a UST fan who's brought up hockey nor do I have any desire to start that convo. even the UND chatter has faded a lot, which is sad.

This conference would be FUCKING INSANE but just doesn't seem realistic and you need some bottom feeders.

A super conference is more likely, where you have divisions and can recreate the WCHA more or less in the Western Division. But the leadership doesn't want to do what's best for college hockey which we see every year the regionals stay away from campuses.

Obviously these are all hypothetical and not realistic, but really the only way you could do any of these is to try keep the B10 together and then make "hockey only" conf members in truth. You can't say that last part, you're going to make Wodon show up and say some stupid shit no real fan of college hockey agrees with.


Regardless of how you do it, yeah agreed the B10 killed something in college hockey through how they had things written forcing the teams to join together. I still couldn't care less about ND hockey and would way rather have picked multiple other teams to be our hockey only members over ND

 

[bonin21]

Have not seen the 09-Feb-2026 poll yet. As of the second, St. Thomas was 15th (CCHA). Would any team in that league be ahead of Notre Dame?

The parity in college hockey is as high as it's ever been. Probably four teams in that conference would be ahead of the brutal Notre Dame team this year if they were in the Big Ten.

That's mostly because this Notre Dame team is one of the worst in conference history.

 

[UofMAlum]

P.S. The above 9 + DU/CC/ASU would bring back the magic in college hockey overnight.

Meh. DU / CC / ASU and their bandwagon fans can pound sand. Perhaps they can form a league with Air Force, and whoever else would be willing to make those trips. Besides, CO and AZ are producing next to nothing in terms of hockey talent.

Form a true, regional league with:
Minnesota
St. Thomas
St. Cloud State
Minnesota State
Duluth
Bemidji
Augustana
Wisconsin
North Dakota
Omaha

Maybe (for recruiting purposes):
Michigan Tech
Northern Michigan

 

[bonin21]

Meh. DU / CC / ASU and their bandwagon fans can pound sand. Perhaps they can form a league with Air Force, and whoever else would be willing to make those trips. Besides, CO and AZ are producing next to nothing in terms of hockey talent.

Form a true, regional league with:
Minnesota
St. Thomas
St. Cloud State
Minnesota State
Duluth
Bemidji
Augustana
Wisconsin
North Dakota
Omaha

Maybe (for recruiting purposes):
Michigan Tech
Northern Michigan

Have you ever done an away trip to Colorado for a Gopher series? You want that option in your conference over away trips to ND, MSU, UM, PSU, OSU...

 

[upnorthkid]

Have you ever done an away trip to Colorado for a Gopher series? You want that option in your conference over away trips to ND, MSU, UMN, PSU, OSU...

agreed with this 1000%. Though I do like East Lansing/Ann Arbor trips (and is part of why i'm pumped we play MTU next year to go up to the UP).

Happy Valley sucks to get to, but the rink is fun. OSU is a graveyard made of concrete though the town is fun for a good-sized college town.

South Bend, no desire to return whatsoever