Your 2011 NCAA Men's Hockey National Champions.The UMD BULLDOGS!

[RumRiverRat]

Absolutely fantastic game.

At least a team from MN is hoisting the trophy!

As a suffering Gophers fan the last 4 or 5 seasons, I am happy for the Bulldogs.

3:22 in OT!!! Kyle Schmidt is a Minnesota native.

[Steve Foss]

Great job Dogs! You guys rocked! And big congrats to UMD fans. Two national championships in one season!

[archerystud]

WCHA beats the Big Ten.

I Love it!!! Way to go Dogs!

[finnbay]

Congrats 'Dogs!

[cbrooks]

Congratulation to the Bulldogs and to there fans. They have a NCAA Championship banner to go with there new building.

[Scott M]

Congrats to UMD, what an amazing season. Quite an athletics program brewing up there.

[jwhjr]

Nice to see a team from the WCHA take it.

[Bran32]

Congrats Bulldogs, what a game and what a season!!

[Northlander]

Just got home and can barely type. It was a crazy night in canal park! The place was CRAZY! Grandmas Sports Garden was WILD when they scored that OT goal! The party was nuts and the little school that could won it all baby! A team with local talent playing a huge role. Goal by a 4th stringer from Duluth East and game winner by a kid from Hermantown? Are you kidding me?

A D-2 Championship in Football and a D-1 Championship in Hockey in 2011! WOW!

What a time to be a Bulldogs Fan.

I was shooting video of the Sports garden after the OT goal but due to my excitement and other fans excitement you can not hear nor see much so I cant post it. I will tel you this much the news writers and video people couldnt get enough!

Lets go BULLDOGS!!!!!

[walleyehunter80]

Can someone please buy me tomorrows news paper and save it for me till i come up fishing????? How many papers does Duluth have? Get me one of each please!!!! I need them for my wall

[cbrooks]

A D-2 Championship in Football and a D-2 Championship in Hockey in 2011! WOW!

Thats D-1 Championship Northlander. The Bulldogs are the top team in college hockey. I forgot about there D2 football championship. What a boost to the program is right.

[Jim Almquist]

Can someone please buy me tomorrows news paper and save it for me till i come up fishing????? How many papers does Duluth have? Get me one of each please!!!! I need them for my wall

Josh I will make sure to get you one. There is only the Duluth News Tribune.

[walleyehunter80]

Thank you Jim!!!

[cbrooks]

Today's Duluth Star Tribune

http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/event/group/Sports/

[10,000 Casts]

Congrats to the Bulldogs! Way to make MN proud!!!

[archerystud]

Surprised we haven't seen a post from Solbes yet. He must have celebrated LATE last night.

[PierBridge]

Congrats to UMD, what an amazing season. Quite an athletics program brewing up there.

That's what I was thinking ..... Way To Go DULUTHIANS!

[Northlander]

I will go buy some papers for those who want them. Just e-mail me and I can hang on to them for when your in town or mail them out to you.

CBrooks I just saw that D-1 error. I was a bit "Cloudy" last night when I typed that. All good now.

[solbes]

Wow, late into the night indeed! Never going to get a chance like that again at home, what a treat. It was a lot more fun than I was even expecting. Huge hats off to the players and staff. What a great job they did, especially considering some of their struggles in the 2nd half. They really got their act together when it mattered most.

I'm having a hard time describing the game because it was just so great, all of it. Couldn't have scripted it any better. Agree with Northlander, Max Tardy scoring on the power play, R U KIDDING ME? This guy hardly played this year, but what a moment for him forever. Jack hit a post in the 3rd. Kenny made some nice saves. JT Brown was great all weekend. Then the OT was just fantastic. I really thought Faulk was going to score, he calmly walked right around 2 or 3 Wolverines to get in front of the net. You could really tell the team was not going to be denied in OT, they were drawing on all of that OT experience this year.

The goal itself was fast and slow. I remember seeing the great feed from Oleksuk, but didn't see the quick shot from Duluth native Schmiddy. Saw the puck in the net, seemed like a second ticked by very slowly, saw the red light turn on, and then the place just ERUPTED!!! I can't even remember what I screaming to people for the next 2 or 3 minutes. I hugged and high fived so many people I didn't even know, many of them not Bulldog fans but people cheering for the Maroon and Gold. What an experience. I heard we were on ESPN for a few seconds from some friends texts, so that was fun.

This championship is so huge for the city of Duluth, I'm so happy for them. Guys like Watson on the staff, must be a sweet win after waiting 27 more years to get another shot. Sandy has a lifetime contract if he wants it. Most of our pics last night were kinda crappy, but here you go regardless:

RAISE THE BANNER, WE'RE NATIONAL CHAMPS! Smallest program since Lake Superior State to win it since 1994, yeah baby! I'm so proud of these guys.

[Northlander]

Solbes my throat is raw from all that screaming last night. My head is also a little sore from all the post game celebrating. Im glad I was alive to see UMD win their 1st ever D-1 Mens Hockey Championship! I cant wait to be there when they raise that banner up in the Amzoil Arena next season.

[solbes]

Here's the Sportcenter clip from the game if anyone missed it.

Also wanted to give a shout out to a North Dakota fan and his son. A Dad walked in with his son, who appeared to be 6 or 7 years old. Both were in Sioux green. I started talking to the kid about his sign, which read "Go Michigan". I asked him why he wanted to root for the Wolverines, and he replied "Go BLUE Go BLUE Go BLUE". I asked him if he could root for the Bulldogs since we were both in the WCHA. He replied "Your going DOWN!!!" I was rolling, he was so intense. Talked to him a little later and he was still sticking with the You're going DOWN man! Hakstol better give this kid an early look with recruiting, he BLEEDS Green for you guys.

Met a lot of cool people down at the X. Didn't see a single bad incident, even after the game at the block party. All very well behaved folks, hats off to you college hockey fans!

Northlander, although it was too expensive to bring the kids to the games, we told them we'd go to the banner raising game next year at AA. We'll be in town for sure for that, couldn't miss it. Also being in the Garden during and after the game would have been a TON of fun. Glad you were out to celebrate.

[solbes]

Sorry for all of these posts, just gonna get it all out there and then move on with my day. My wife and I had a good time watching all the people representing their team with jerseys, sweatshirts, etc. Here's the list of programs I saw represented at the X:

Bemidji State, BC, BU, Bowling Green, CC, Cornell, Dartmouth, Denver, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Maine, Mass, Merrimack, Miami, Michigan, Michigan State, Michigan Tech, Minnesota, Duluth, Minnesota State, UN Omaha, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Northeastern, Northern Michigan, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Princeton, Providence, Rensselaer, RIT, St Cloud State, Vermont, Western Michigan, Wisconsin, and Yale.

That's 37 out of 58 D1 programs, pretty cool.

[cbrooks]

Bemidji State, BC, BU, Bowling Green, CC, Cornell, Dartmouth, Denver, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Maine, Mass, Merrimack, Miami, Michigan, Michigan State, Michigan Tech, Minnesota, Duluth, Minnesota State, UN Omaha, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Northeastern, Northern Michigan, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Princeton, Providence, Rensselaer, RIT, St Cloud State, Vermont, Western Michigan, Wisconsin, and Yale.

That's 37 out of 58 D1 programs, pretty cool.

Pretty cool to hear people representing there schools at the frozen. Thanks for sharing all the pics at the Frozen Four Solbes. Glad you had a good time.

Who would brain wash there kid to root for a Big Ten hockey program?

[scsavre]

Brooks why the heck do you have a blackhawks logo with that terrific gopher signatue.

What a good time. What a good crowd. My whole body is tired from all day in stp. Especially my hackstols, only got them out a few times, but they were fully flexed for 20 to 30 seconds each time. Honestly what a great crowd. You werent kidding about all the diferent teams represented. Met tons of n.ice fans yesterday. I even met a sioux fan that ddnt drink. I thought that was impossible. By the way. Bought a few frozen 4 pucks. $2 a piece, that's cheaper then a normal puck. On my way to wild game now....hockey hockey

Solbes did that little sioux/mich fan throw some hackstols out.

[solbes]

Man, if I would have kept pressing he would have gotten right in there and shot off some double Hakstols. Seriously though, this kid was INTENSE. I was laughing, his Dad was laughing, the Michigan dudes were laughing, but this kid was all business. Good point Brooks, I forgot Blue went all Big 10 on us recently.

I didn't see any Sioux fans that didn't drink. That I'm immediately suspicious of right off the bat. Not that UMD fans were any different, we had some good times celebrating the newly acquired hardware.

Michigan fans were much less arrogant than I thought they'd be. Good traveling crowd for them too. I'd say their presence tripled after winning Thursday, but I guess the trip is expensive. Duluth's fans at least doubled from Thursday to Saturday.

There was a lady from Maine that had to leave when they showed highlights of the 2002 Gopher game. She came back early and had to be warned by the Gopher fans that it wasn't time to come back in yet. She seemed relieved for the fair warning.