Gopher Hockey Recruiting

Talk about rent free... It's not just a Motzko thing. I'll never want a team full of Minnetonka and Wayzata kids.

The reason is they're rich kids and get every camp or skills coach they need growing up with little adversity. Having too many prima donnas has been a concern for Gopher hockey for decades. You gotta mix as many kids with different backgrounds as you can. They're often bottom 6 guys.

Now of course, many of the outstate kids are rich, too...

But the outstate kids put their heart into the M at a much higher rate per capita than the metro kids. And that's why they become fan favorites even if they're not superstars. Seth Ambroz. Jaxon Nelson. Ben Meyers (Delano kind of edge of civilization/metro). Huglen. Fish as a STP public school kid. Travis Boyd (Hopkins). Aaron Ness (never reached what we hoped for him)
I know what the thought process is, I just don't really agree with it, but whatever. We could handpick examples from any demographic to debate this but I would rather not.
 

He is always complaining that Motzko only recruits kids from Minnetonka... That was a backhanded shot at Bob.
eh i don't really view that as a Bob comment and more how its been for at least the last 25 years given Lucia's propensity for that as well (while it being obvious that from an access and skill standpoint, you're going to get higher numbers from your backyard in one of the country's hockey hotbeds). It's just kind of what gopher hockey has been as the outlying MN programs have grown and that you are going to run into more recruiting battles the further outstate you get as well.
 

eh i don't really view that as a Bob comment and more how its been for at least the last 25 years given Lucia's propensity for that as well (while it being obvious that from an access and skill standpoint, you're going to get higher numbers from your backyard in one of the country's hockey hotbeds). It's just kind of what gopher hockey has been as the outlying MN programs have grown and that you are going to run into more recruiting battles the further outstate you get as well.
Even if St Cloud goes under, you will continue to see more and more Minnetonka area and Stillwater area kids on the Gophers in the coming decades. Hockey is just so expensive. UND will lean more to the CHL kids and I bet UMD will, too, as fewer kids on the range and on the North Shore can afford to play hockey.
 

eh i don't really view that as a Bob comment and more how its been for at least the last 25 years given Lucia's propensity for that as well (while it being obvious that from an access and skill standpoint, you're going to get higher numbers from your backyard in one of the country's hockey hotbeds). It's just kind of what gopher hockey has been as the outlying MN programs have grown and that you are going to run into more recruiting battles the further outstate you get as well.
So, then Bonin took a shot at the Gopher program for how its been for the last 25 years. You can defend Bonin all you want but his comment was a shot at Motzko (as usual).
 



Agreed. Seems like a bit more of a slow play across all of college, which makes you wonder if there’s some chl ripple and the impact of NIL slowing the process some with how contact works with recruits
 


4 star - Gunnar Conboy - Gophers

Seems like a good pickup. Like Casey, seems like his stock is climbing.
 




Conboy is a good player but Lakeville is too affluent of a suburb, I don’t want him.
Lakeville is going to go downhill quick with what happened to AV and Burnsville

As the son of a former pro, I have hope he has been taught to work and what it takes to make the NHL.
 


5* Oliver McKinney - Michigan

Joins his brother

So far the usual suspects, BU and UM, as well as Notre Dame with the 5 stars today.
 

5* Oliver McKinney - Michigan

Joins his brother

So far the usual suspects, BU and UM, as well as Notre Dame with the 5 stars today.
Tbh there’s about 5-10 kids (or a few more now with the Canadians) who fit more sure fire things at this age. Outside of those and rankings by puck preps and co are a complete shit show. Hell many people on GPL probably have watched more of some of the mn kids than the guys ranking them. Like you go look at the 05 (bedard class) and its all over the place with those guys (joy of how young they all are)

Scantlebury (he’ll need to grow a little still though and should) and McKinney seem like only guys in that category imo. Overall reasonably quiet and happy we got a solid commit early. Eases a little bit of anxiety about the pipeline just to have the seal cracked in a better looking mn class on paper at least

Additional plus imo so far is we haven’t seen a bunch of guys who have to be top targets have not gone elsewhere
 
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