Ryan Morlok’s Blog

… if it was hockey.  While we’re on the topic of hockey, here are some great commercials from the late 90’s.  I think there was also a golf one, so if you know where I can get a link, please post it in the comments.

• Bowling
• Billiards

A while back, I had posted about being unable to find the Minnesota Wild’s state of hockey anthem on the website or anywhere else on the Internet.  Well, after some smart-ass remarks from goalie, I did some more looking and it seems they’ve posted some information about it on the Wild website here.  Unfortunately, they’re charging $5 for a cd for the song.  It seems like one of those things that maybe they should release to the community. I respect their copyright, but it would be nice if they would just give it back to the state.

Gophers won the WCHA tournament 3-2 in OT over North Dakota this evening.  They’ve now won the regular season and the tournament title.  Hopefully their success will continue to the NCAA tournament.

Last weekend wasn’t a shining star for the history books as the Gopher’s hockey team dropped two games to North Dakota (the first time that’s happened in Minneapolis since 1980).  The team just couldn’t seem to get it done, and the goaltending just wasn’t at the level it has been the rest of the season.  It’s unfortunate that it was one of these games that drove Gophers hockey to the front page of Digg videos for the first time I’ve ever seen.  This video is of a fluke goal that was scored by North Dakota from the far end of the rink, and not on an empty net.  Frazee couldn’t do much about it.  He might have come out a little further to cut of the angle, but the puck was bouncing weird.  Poor guy will have to deal with that one being in highlight videos for a while.

Last Saturday was the first (hopefully annual) Hockey Day Minnesota.  Although I was stuck in Illinois, I was able to partake in the festivities thanks to my satellite subscription to FSN North.  I watched the Lake of the Woods/St. Paul Johnson outdoor game, the Gophers and even the Wild.  Normally the Wild games are blocked out in our viewing area, but for some reason, this time it wasn’t.  Lake of the Woods won (though it didn’t really matter as I wasn’t rooting for any particular team), Gophers won, and Wild lost in an 8 round shootout.  Great day of hockey.  In honor of the event, here is the State of Hockey anthem.  I’d like to get an MP3 of this song, but I haven’t been able to find one.  If you know where I can get a copy, leave a message in the comments.

From the perfect temperature to the process of paining the lines, this article from How Stuff Works has all the info.

The Individuals’ season came to an unfortunate end last night with a 7-0 loss agains the Ice Dogs.  The Individuals hung with them early but by midway through the second period, the game was already decided.  The individuals finished the season 3-2.

The ice was of the worst quality that I’ve ever seen. The ice was being removed for the summer today, and we think they may have turned off the cooling system last night.  By the end of the third period the ice was rather slushy, and the puck wasn’t moving well.  Further supporting this no-cooling theory was the fact that after the Individuals’ game, when the Zambonied the rink for the next game, they didn’t even put down new water, but rather just scaped the ice and removed the slush.  They propably took off a good quarter inch that way.

In an exciting game late Wednesday night, the individuals were able to come away with a victory to advance to the championship game May 3rd against the Ice Dogs. Three periods were not enough to decide a victor, and the game remained tied through overtime. The Individuals were able to win 2-1 in the final shootout thanks to the outstanding play of their goalie Jeremy Danney.

Individuals jumped back into the winning column yesterday by defeating Med-Law 10-1. The conclusion to regular season left the individuals 2-1, 2nd place in the league. Thanks to extensive ESPN coverage of the game, video is available for those of you who weren’t able to make it out to the rink (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16). Next week: semi-final action.

Full coverage is available on our website here.

I have a lot of catching up to do. Individuals lost last week 10-1 against the Ice Dogs. They had one guy who could go around almost anyone on our team. They beat their previous opponent (the team we play next) 9-1, so hopefully that means we’re up for a pretty even game this coming Wednesday.