Doused in Cold Water: Looking at the matchup with North Dakota
Michigan squeezed by Notre Dame in spectacular fashion this evening. My voice has taken a major hit for the weekend, and I have a fair amount to do with it, but oh well.
One of the problems with the current NCAA tournament format is the near-instant turnaround from round one to round two. For Michigan, only 22 hours separate the conclusion of the Notre Dame game and the opening puck drop against North Dakota; there's just not a lot of time to absorb, reset, and look forward to the next game.
But we'll try anyway. North Dakota, by most measurable statistics, is the best team Michigan will have faced this season. By a considerable margin. Their offense, for example, ranks 7th in the country, netting a respectable 3.61 goals per game. Not nearly as good as ours, but pretty good.
But their defense is 3rd in the country at 1.85 goals per game. That is, um, quite a bit better than Michigan.
It's a hard road for Michigan to win a title. The offense is dynamite, but as we saw today it is not infallible, and it is hard to win a national title on offense alone when all it takes is one team to flummox you for one game.
The expectations should be low. This Michigan team has a dynamite offense, but it is not very good at keeping teams out of the net. It is not a "complete" team.
It will take the game of their lives to win tomorrow.
...but it wouldn't be the first time Michigan has produced that in this situation.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:33 AM ^
North Dakota is a really good team but I disagree that it would "take the game of their lives to win tomorrow".
1) It is hockey so flukey stuff happens regularly
2) North Dakota isn't that much better than Michigan
March 26th, 2016 at 12:37 AM ^
This math doesn't add up.
You can split it into GF and GA all you want, but what matters (as Kenpom would say) is the differential. Let's look:
North Dakota avg. goal differential : +1.76
Michigan avg. goal differential : +1.87
This doesn't feel like cold water to me.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:50 AM ^
but the NCHC is much tougher than the Big Ten. To have a top offense and a top defense in that league is impressive. I'm thinking they're going to win by 3 or 4
March 26th, 2016 at 12:53 AM ^
Fine, but if this is the calculus you have to do it right, and admit that it isn't unfavorable for Michigan. Yes, "ranking" is one way to do it, but the fact is Michigan's offense wasn't just number 1, it was number 1 by a huge margin. Statistically, our offense is way, way better than North Dakota's, and that isn't well represented by ordinal rank.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:59 AM ^
Michigan scores goals in bunches when things are working well. They're like Chip Kelly Oregon--everything starts rolling. But clog them up and they never get going.
The purpose of establishing the rankings isn't so much to compare numbers as to demonstrate that North Dakota can score pretty well AND they are strong defensively as well. They are a more "complete" team. And yes, they've been playing tougher competition.
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The eye test confirms what the stats say. North Dakota is a much more complete hockey team than Michigan. Better D, better goaltending and a comparable O against superior competition. This will be a big upset when Michigan wins.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:39 AM ^
March 26th, 2016 at 12:45 AM ^
I don't feel like you've seen any Michigan or North Dakota games this year
Maybe you're in prision and the only time you can access the computer is 1am? Do they even show NCAA hockey in jails in Indiana? Stay strong Gucci, only a few more months and you'll be back on the outside. Remember, the soap just isn't THAT important.
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Michigan is a pretty good team bolstered by the best line in college hockey. North Dakota is an equally talented team, playing in a far better league, who is statistically much stronger than us. Anything can happen in one-and-done hockey (as we saw last time we played North Dakota), but they would probably win 4-0 or 4-1 in a 7 game series.
I'd put our odds of winning tonight at like 25-33%
March 26th, 2016 at 10:16 AM ^
Boo and Kile's line was the best line in the game against ND.
Michigan will be fine.
I think
March 26th, 2016 at 12:42 AM ^
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Hockey plays back-to-back most weekends during the season. The downside here is it is a new opponent for the second day.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:44 AM ^
March 26th, 2016 at 12:46 AM ^
It will probably take us out-gunning them to win it because I'd be shocked if we could hang in another 1-0 tussle. We're probably going to need to win 6-4 or something like that and with a D that good, I'm not seeing us landing 6 goals unless they have a meltdown
March 26th, 2016 at 12:46 AM ^
They're terrifying, but weighted plinko! Last time we made a run in this tournament, they were way better than us and we beat them.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:51 AM ^
Hunwick and a herculean defensive effort stole that game. Given we don't have Hunwick anymore, it's probably going to take an equally herculean effort from the offense this time. The CCM line has to be dominant
March 26th, 2016 at 12:57 AM ^
Completely different team, but yes, we did. Of course, in 06 and 07 we brought gobs of talent into regional level games against NoDak and got smoked. But those were completely different teams, too.
This team does one thing really well, and a lot of stuff so-so. It's hard to win a national title when you allow infuriating odd-man rushes and your goaltender gives up the occasional soft goal (FWIW Racine maybe could've stopped that second goal but he was otherwise brilliant tonight). Too many chances for things to go wrong.
The hope is that Michigan is able to find its groove more against North Dakota than against Notre Dame. NoDak is a better team than Notre Dame, but Notre Dame under Jeff Jackson has ALWAYS played that frustrating, disciplined, tight game that throttled us for much of the night. If Michigan can move the puck better and actually draw some penalties, the calculus shifts toward Michigan's preferred method of play.
Sometimes it takes a team's game of its life to make the Frozen Four. A 2001 team I find similar to this one (dynamite top line of Hilbert/Cammalleri, shaky back end, etc) produced a previously unseen, sacrificial team defensive performance to hang on against a superior St. Cloud team at Van Andel. The 2002 team beat what might have been the best team in the country that year with a near-perfect game at Yost.
And in 1998, a team with good offensive talent that Red said needed to "learn to play team defense" went down two goals to a national championship favorite, got stuck on the wrong end of a 5-on-3 power play in the second period, and won the game.
Against North Dakota.
March 26th, 2016 at 12:57 AM ^
March 26th, 2016 at 12:59 AM ^
I'd love to think we should win tomorrow, but you're right that this is the best team Michigan's played this year. Probably the best team in the country. But all it takes is one game and there's some history here. The last time Michigan played North Dakota in the tourney, that Michigan team played the game of their lives against the best team in the country that year.
It's going to take a much better effort than today, but this team can do it. Go Blue!
March 26th, 2016 at 12:59 AM ^
I've found that a college hockey team's online presence does not necessarily correspond to their larger fanbase. For example, I developed a strong dislike of BC due to a small handful of bad fans that i encountered on USCHO during their 2001 title season. In truth, BC does not have a particularly obnoxious fanbase, but a couple of bad apples spoiled the broth.
And FWIW I don't find North Dakota fans on USCHO to be particularly bad. Not sure where you're running across them.
Yes, a bulk of North Dakota fans are like a bulk of OSU football, MSU basketball, Alabama football, etc. fans. They think their team is gods gift to mankind, whatever conference they're in is the greatest hockey league ever, and if the Hobey hattrick doesn't have at least 4 players from their league it's a travesty.
Which made lurking on USCHO before and after the 2011 Tiny Jesus game truly fantastic
One counterpoint on the gloom: Michigan ran into Jeff Jackson, who is Berenson kryptonite. Notre Dame played exactly the game they needed to, playing to all of Michigan's weaknesses. Michigan did not get a single power play.
Yet, despite all this going wrong, Michigan still found a way to win.
If you had told me before this game that Notre Dame would have zero penalties called and Michigan would win it, I would have doubted.
March 26th, 2016 at 10:03 AM ^
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Certainly not great to need a big showing from the offense after ND held us to two, but their style is suffocating. Hopefully North Dakota will keep it open and we can out gun them
You will reap what you sow."
That's the alcohol talking.
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Their arena is also pretty amazing. I was shocked when I first saw it.
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- They're a legendary program. They've almost always been good.
- Their fanbase is the biggest and the best in college hockey
- Their arena looks and feels like it's an AHL/NHL arena and they sell it out
- Reasonably close proximity to Canada and not like our section of Canada. They don't have to go toe-to-toe with the OHL. So I believe they have more success in the plains territories vs. the WHL than we're able to have vs the O
It's a good thing NoDak scored nearly all of its allotment of goals for the weekend, and we haven't.
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It's like playing the reds all over again eh?
Live from Cincinnatti
First, to the let's go blue! chant, they yell let's go Sioux!
and still wear those Indian head jerseys.
Second, looking at season stats? not so predictive for today. Check out ND preview, and how often they scored more than two goals in a game the last two months.
Look at how Racine is playing now.
UND gave up plenty of good scoring chances to Northeastern.
Will they play a penalty free game today? Uh, no.
Will we give up good scoring chances? Uh, yes.
UND very good? yes.
Dominant? No way.
Our 1998 national title team was 0 and 4 against MSC, and not nearly as good as the 97 team that was upset 3-2 in the semis.
If Friday's crowd is any indication, it's as close to a home game as Michigan could get outside of Yost or playing in metro Detroit / Chicago.
I expect Chaos hockey. :)