Fire Lucia

[zepman]

I think Don will get one more year to right the ship because of the contract/money. If it isn't righted then Dean B. will be in town.

This.

[tonkapat]

The U is going to have a tough go of things no matter the coach. Look at the lineups of the top teams. Mostly Canadians with juniors experience. I would rather have a mediocre team filled with minnesotans than a bunch of foreigners. Look at UND, 2 kids that are actually from north dakota. If I want to watch a bunch of imports playing hockey I'll just turn the wild on.

[scsavre]

TonkaPat that is my exact feeling. College is suppose to give you that hometown feeling, cheering for kids that are actually MN gophers. Not a bunch of Canadian with Sioux jerseys. But I guess if you are from UND you dont know that feeling anyway.

The gophs will be better then just fine. they will be right back on top in a year or two. They just need a new staff. Coaches that can develop players. They have a good crop coming back and a couple of very good players coming in.

[Spike76]

I'ts not the coaches fault the players don't stay and graduate. Maybe along with the scholarship there should be a signed commitment so they would be there for four years and graduate. After all, college is for an education. With other players Lucia won, so a coaching change probably won't change much. He might need other scouts that rate the players different though. I would enjoy that job greatly, probably for less money too.

[scsavre]

Its not just players leaving early, look at how the players are not developing.

look at Hoeffel and White both 1st rounders

Sachetti 2nd rounder.

The list goes on and on, its not bad scouting, its not developing players.

[solbes]

How in the world could Maturi sit back and let this go on for another year to finish DLucia's contract? 3 years without an NCAA appearance is not acceptable for the flagship Minnesota program. I agree above, players do not develop properly there and the team really suffers because of it.

Best scenario for everyone I think would be for Maturi to make a move and hire Blais right after the season is over. DLucia should be picked up by Penn State. Don gets himself some new assistant coaches and restores his image as a great coach. Gwoz seems to be the other candidate at Penn State.

[Bear55]

I have to agree solbes, I am to the point now where I just don't see our current coaching staff as the guys to turn this program around. Lucia is still a good coach but obviously something has changed.

Development has been a problem but I think you could point to that as always being somewhat of a problem for the Gophers. All of their recruits are expected to come in and do great things, that just can't realistically happen for all of them. Things get magnified when you are not having a great season or 4.

[fishing tech]

Things changed when Geuntzel was let go!

[Quackaddict9]

Serratore loves it in Bemidji and is definitley a Family's man. He really gets along well with a lot of folks and kids in town. He's a nice fella and has great composure behind the bench and is willing to teach instead of yelling much and the team seems to do well with that. It is great to see the Beavs make the final 5 in their first year in the WCHA, they've not gotten a lot of wins but they went out and competed almost every night but when you go 5-0-1 agaisnt a well coached UNO team, that is pretty good.

Lucia won't go I don't think, he'll resign after his son Mario finishes playing at the U (no committments yet but I see him playing for Maroon and Gold)

[cbrooks]

I think the fact Mario hasn't committed tells me something. I guess my prediction is wrong. Its looking like Lucia will fulfill his contract. After that I can see him at Penn State. Lucia can coach. He was a great Gopher coach once maybe a change of scenery would be good for him. I mean its obvious he won't be fired but if another opportunity comes along I could see Lucia taking it.

[scsavre]

If I were the don I would think about retirring. Health reasons. It must be humbling to go from head coach of the gophs an.d end up anywhere else. I really don't think lucia was ever that good of a coach. I think it was quite evident that his early sucess was really due to his staff. Seems obvious since we go from haveing the best dcore with guentzl to the worst now. The same could be said about our special teams under guentz and motzko.

Mario is only a junior. I'm sure other teams are talking with him, if the gophs want him. He will end up here. I really think don would let him go wherever he wants though.

Oh and one last thing. If lucia was smart he'd retire and hang out in the booth. Wooger is gonna be out of there any day. The gophs usually take care of their former coaches.

[solbes]

I'd disagree about him not being a good coach. He's had the ultimate success with the Gophs and has an AMAZING record between the years of '93 and '07. On paper his .619 winning percentage is good, until you consider he started off his career at Fairbanks and his 4 most recent years were roughly .500 hockey. Then it looks pretty great over that 14 year span.

http://www.uscho.com/stats/coach/mid,41/don-lucia/

Just needs a change of assistants and a change of scenery to get back on track. But I agree there would be no shame in hangin them up to work in the booth. He has already had a stellar coaching career.

[scsavre]

Sorry, I did mean, that good of a coach at the U. He did pretty good at CC. Is he getting old or what then. Looking at this team and watching them every weekend. It is obvious that they are lost out there. If he was so great, why cant he do it any more. I just dont get it. Honestly, I used to get so mad at him even when we were winning the NCAA. He has made so many bonehead moves. I remember loosing games cause we had our fourth line out there in the closing minutes of a tied game. I also rember him always putting out the grinders on 4 on 4 situations durring crunch time. I have always hated his changing of the lines every game. This is something that didnt happen durring the Champ years.

As long as I can remember there have always been blunders he has made, and they seem to have cost us many times too. I know mistakes happen, but there were tons fo them back in the day wehre you would wonder what the heck he was doing. You would even hear wondering by Mazaco and Wooger.

[Bear55]

It is pretty hard to argue with Lucia's track record as a coach both at MN and especially before he got there. Winning at Alaska is no easy task and turning around a CC program that was terrible for a long long time was an incredible accomplishment.

I will agree what something is seriously wrong right now, I'm not even sure if Lucia knows what that is but something needs to change.

[solbes]

Guess I haven't watched closely enough to see the weird line changes. But you make a good point, those don't seem to be good scenarios to be in.

If he stays I hope he can turn it around. I'm not rooting against the guy, but the program deserves the very best. Obviously Maturi still thinks highly of him, but he needs to consider all of his options. Minnesota needs a highly competitive hockey program at the U.

[fishing tech]

Lucia's early success at the U was pastially due to the players that committed early when Woog was still here. Vanek, Riddle, Ballard, Leopold all verbally committed at 16 when Woog was still coaching. I don't think he is a bad coach, i think he needs a better support (assistants) staff.

[Bear55]

Lucia's early success at the U was pastially due to the players that committed early when Woog was still here. Vanek, Riddle, Ballard, Leopold all verbally committed at 16 when Woog was still coaching. I don't think he is a bad coach, i think he needs a better support (assistants) staff.

Sorry but a lot of info in this post is not true, Leopold and Pohl were the only significant recruits from the Woog era that helped win a National Championship. Riddle was going to CC and followed Lucia to MN and Ballard and Vanek were Lucia recruits. Not 100% sure where Jeff Taffe fit into all of that but he was another very good recruit that could have been considered a Woog recruit. Considering the shape the program was in when Lucia took over I don't think you can say Woog had a big hand in the success of Lucia, he did a small part by picking those guys up but when Lucia took over they were freshman and sophomores still learning the ropes.

Wow the more I post the more I am torn, I think we need a new coach or at least a couple of assistant coaches but half of me still defends Lucia because honestly considering what he has done he just can't be that bad.

[cbrooks]

Its tough to ignore what he accomplish. Someone mention that some of his credit goes to Guentzl(sp). I'm just puzzled at how Lucia could be soo good before and now he can't get his team to the Final Five. The finger points at Hill. He's the one change from Minnesota's successful years 02-03 to what they are now. Is Hill a better but kissing than couch? Its pretty sad Minnesota was on the verge of taking a few more NCAA banners.

Interesting what Scott said about Don switching up lines. I've heard people(UND fans) point out how Lucia always outcoach Hakstal in matching up lines. I never paid that close attention.

[scsavre]

I am surprised you guys never notice our line changes. He changes them up all the time. You will even see changes durring the game.

Sounds like lucia wanted guentzel to back off, guentzel was doing all the recuiting and most of the coaching. Lucia wanted control and new hill, who follows him everywhere would do it.

[Bear55]

I have always heard great things about Guentzel and would be very happy to have him as our head coach. Hill, not so much.

From what I recall Guentzel ran the defense and the power play, no surprise that both have gone down "hill" after he left.

I guess I am not seeing a crazy amount of line changes this year, maybe more then back in the day but I think Lucia did need to bench/motivate a few guys so the lower lines were changing a lot. As far as the top 6 you could say that the line changes the 2nd half of the season really sparked the team.

[solbes]

You do have to manage the lines to a certain point. Sandelin mixed up Duluth's lines quite a bit this year too. During the middle of the year Brown and Oleksuk got cold so he moved Fontaine down to 2. They got their mojo back and thankfully he was able to move Fontaine back up. When Schmiddy broke his hand from a teamates slash (nice move), he even moved David Grun from line 3/4 to the top line and that worked out okay.

But it sounded like Lucia was maybe just mis-managing the lines in certain situations?

[scsavre]

Lucias didn't really have any sense to it that I could think of. One day a kid would be on the first line the next day he was 4th. You would see the top 2 lines juggle players every game 2. I should post the lineups but I am way to lazy to do that. Its fine to juggle lines to get good combos going but why change the lines after scorring 7 goals on denver and why not have the same lineup after beating wisconsin.

[Shorelunch]

So . . . the Maroon and Gold "Pride on Ice" hockey program has been on a slide the past four years. So what does your brain wizard AD Maturi do? Signs Lucia to an extension for another year.

[scsavre]

Yah you beat me to it. Just heard it on KFAN. Maturi is currently drafting up an extension for Lucia. What the heck. that means Blais did not want the job..........Oh and Lucia said he will accept.

[cbrooks]

Holy balls. That just does not make any sense. I would be so pizz if I was a Gopher fan. Maturi needs to be shown the door.

I would think if Guentzl had an offer he would take it. This just isn't working. Hasn't work in some time. There should have been changes last year when they missed the FF. This year what happens, probably the low point of this hockey program and Lucia gets an extension. This guy has had three times the slack that Brad Childress had. Its time for change. UND needs its rival back. This is disappointing as a hockey fan.