Lack of Posting...

Bare with me here folks...

I'm in the middle of transitioning the blog to a website.  Although I am still going to keep the blog as a portion of the page, I thought a new face of Bulldog Country could be a fun summer project for myself, as I enjoy web design as a past time.

Feel free to comment ideas on what you'd like to see, or any other questions that pop up.  Until then, I'll be posting (hopefully) weekly from here on out, at least for a few weeks until I can find more time.

Thanks for the patience :)

Looking at UMD's "Pipelines"

I took some time to figure out where UMD has been getting their commitments from over the last 10 years and put my results into a couple different tables to get a better look.  The first table simply looks at the amount of players each junior league has given UMD.  The USHL, to no surprise, leads the way in this category.

I found some interesting facts when going through this as well, for example, did you know that UMD received goalie recuits Matt McNeely, Alex Stalock and Brady Hjelle from Cedar Rapids?  Our faith in the Rough Rider's goalie coach must be pretty high, aye?

Collegiate Recruited NHL Draft Prospects

Listed below are the players that are either committed to attend NCAA universities or uncommitted prospects that have potential to become recruited.  The list descends from each individual's final ranking  from NHL's Draft Prospect Rankings.

Waterloo Black Hawks - Ian McCoshen

Stats: The WCHA Until Now

Since the WCHA is entering a new era of hockey, I decided it's time take a look at the the past.  Broken down in a couple sortable graphs, we have game outcomes and team accomplishments.  Keep in mind these numbers only reflects games that were played by teams while members of the WCHA and the leagues that preceded it.

In 1951, The Midwest Collegiate Hockey League (MCHL) was created, thus being the very first nail that built the house that is the WCHA.  The Western Intercollegiate Hockey League (WIHL) formed for the 1953-54 season, and the WCHA finally played it's first season in1959-60 season.  These leagues are all included in the tables below.

Also, on a side note, the season leading up to the formation of WCHA (1958-59) was a year where teams of the WIHL withdrawal from league play due to the recruiting practices of North Dakota, Denver and Colorado College.

W/S - average wins per season

L/S - average losses per season

T/S - average ties per season

Game Outcomes:

Team	Seasons	Games	Wins	Losses	Ties	Win %	Loss %	Tie %	W/S	L/S	T/S
Alaska Anchorage	20	691	192	422	77	0.278	0.611	0.111	9.60	21.10	3.85
Bemidji State	3	112	38	58	16	0.339	0.518	0.143	12.67	19.33	5.33
Colorado College	62	2179	1016	1054	109	0.466	0.484	0.050	16.39	17.00	1.76
Denver	62	2288	1305	852	131	0.570	0.372	0.057	21.05	13.74	2.11
Michigan Tech	59	2100	916	1050	134	0.436	0.500	0.064	15.53	17.80	2.27
Minnesota	62	2337	1384	803	150	0.592	0.344	0.064	22.32	12.95	2.42
Minnesota Duluth	47	1835	816	891	128	0.445	0.486	0.070	17.36	18.96	2.72
Minnesota State	14	543	229	252	62	0.422	0.464	0.114	16.36	18.00	4.43
Nebraska Omaha	3	116	54	52	10	0.466	0.448	0.086	18.00	17.33	3.33
North Dakota	62	2301	1319	858	124	0.573	0.373	0.054	21.27	13.84	2.00
St. Cloud State	23	911	454	375	82	0.498	0.412	0.090	19.74	16.30	3.57
Wisconsin	44	1804	1040	644	120	0.576	0.357	0.067	23.64	14.64	2.73
Michigan	30	895	490	382	23	0.547	0.427	0.026	16.33	12.73	0.77
Michigan State	30	888	393	473	22	0.443	0.533	0.025	13.10	15.77	0.73
Northern Michigan	13	536	263	243	30	0.491	0.453	0.056	20.23	18.69	2.31
Notre Dame	10	373	166	190	17	0.445	0.509	0.046	16.60	19.00	1.70

HB - Hobey Baker Awards
RS - WCHA Regular Season Champions
TC - WCHA Tournament Champions
NCAA - NCAA Tournament Appearances
FF - Frozen Four Appearances


Accomplishments:

Team	HB	RS	TC	NCAA	FF	Champs
Alaska Anchorage	0	0	0	0	0	0
Bemidji State	0	0	0	0	0	0
Colorado College	2	9	1	15	5	1
Denver	1	13	15	23	14	7
Michigan Tech	0	6	9	10	10	3
Minnesota	4	14	14	34	20	5
Minnesota Duluth	5	3	3	8	4	1
Minnesota State	0	0	0	2	0	0
Nebraska Omaha	0	0	0	1	0	0
North Dakota	2	15	11	27	19	7
St. Cloud State	1	1	1	8	1	0
Wisconsin	0	3	12	15	9	6
Michigan	0	3	0	9	9	5
Michigan State	0	0	2	3	3	1
Northern Michigan	0	1	3	4	1	1
Notre Dame	0	0	0	0	0	0

Enjoy.

Questions?  Comments?  Ask Below!

UMD Names Seven Incoming Freshman

The University of Minnesota Duluth Men's hockey team announced who will be joining the team as freshman next year, earlier today.  You may remember Chris Casto's Early Departure caused the Bulldogs a little confusion about incoming recruits, but everything seems to be settled now.

Here's the freshman who will be pulling on a Bulldog sweater this fall:

Name	Pos	HT/WT	Birthdate	Hometown	Current Team	League
Dominic Toninato	F	6-1/170	3/9/94	Duluth, MN	Fargo	USHL
Kyle Osterberg	F	5-8/170	9/5/94	Lakeville, MN	Omaha	USHL
Alex Iafallo	F	5-11/165	12/21/93	Eden, NY	Fargo	USHL
Sammy Spurrell	F	5-11/180	10/5/92	Sherwood, ALB	Spruce Grove	AJHL
Name	Pos	HT/WT	Birthdate	Hometown	Current Team	League
Willie Raskob	D	5-9/190	3/14/95	Hastings, MN	Shattuck	PREP
Dan Molenaar	D	5-11/185	7/5/93	Eden Prairie, MN	Sioux City	USHL
Carson Saucy	D	6-4/195	7/14/94	Irma, ALB	Spruce Grove	AJHL

Hockey's Greatest Song

Just days after the bombs went off during the Boston Marathon, the Boston Bruins took to the ice for the first time since before the incident.  The Bruins' professional singer, Rene Rancourt, sang the National Anthem, and to be honest, if this doesn't give you goosebumps than I'm not sure what will.

UMaine Releases the Search Party

Roughly one week ago, the University of Maine fired their long-time head coach, Tim Whitehead.  The decision came after a dramatic downfall in performance from the previous year, as Maine went from making the NCAA tourney to only managing to win 11 games this year.

"This is about the future of our marquee program," UMaine Athletic Director Steve Abbott said.  "Since 2008, UMaine has experienced declining Hockey East success, season ticket sales and overall ticket revenues, and waning student engagement in men's ice hockey. The President and I are committed to ensuring that our Men's Hockey Program is financially sustainable, continues to focus on developing the student-athlete and is known nationally for excellence."