Hockey: Feeling a draft

What a draft for the Wisconsin hockey program. A total of seven Badgers or soon-to-be Badgers were selected in the NHL draft, including five of the first 51 picks.

They were: Jake Gardiner, Cody Golobef, Patrick Wiercioch, Justin Schultz, Derek Stepan, Patrick Johnson, and Nick Pryor. Gardiner, and incoming freshman defenseman, was the top pick of the group, going 17th overall to Anaheim.

In his State Journal blog Andy Baggot compares this draft haul to other collegiate classes. Pretty impressive.

The question is: will this lead to conference titles and postseason success? Last year's team featured a bunch of high draft picks and, while it finished one goal short of the Frozen Four, it finished with a losing record.

Kudos to Baggot and Todd Milewski for great work previewing this draft, reporting on it, and providing perspective.

Athletic Board dealings

Usually, when the State Journal and Cap Times sports staffs cover an athletic-related event, the accounts are pretty similar. Not so Saturday, when the papers published very different accounts of Friday's University of Wisconsin Athletic Board meeting.

Andy Baggot's State Journal story led with the news on coaching contract extensions, and focused on the fact that Barry Alvarez wanted a performance review in light of John Wiley's upcoming departure as chancellor. (Has it really been almost four years since Barry took over as AD?)

Jason McMahon's Cap Times story was more compelling, reporting that the board meeting got tense at times. Unlike Baggot, McMahon quoted history professor/board member Jeremi Suri, who seems like a squeaky wheel who was looking for an audience. Read the story - his big beefs seem to center on the Big Ten Network fiasco and the athletic department's tendency to operate separately from the rest of the university. Valid points, it would seem.

-Also have to give a plug to Polzin's column on Ike's fall from a charmed existence in 14 months. Jim gives some perspective on Ike's personality that as far as I know hasn't been revealed before.

A word on hockey

Good news on the hockey front: the Badgers went undefeated in their weekend series against Minnesota. The kicker: Minnesota isn't very good right now, at least not as good as they've been since I've been paying attention.

Both Todd Milewski and Andy Baggot did a good job in their Saturday gamers describing why these teams have fallen off a bit from their pace at the beginning of the century. The reason: the NHL's collective bargaining agreement has made it more logical for teams to sign their draftees, which keeps them out of the college game.

I'm not an expert on these things, but off the top of my head I can think of these guys who have left Madison prematurely in the last couple years: Robbie Earl, Joe Pavelski, Jack Skille. The Gophers have been hit just as hard, if not harder. It's even money that Kyle Turris, who Wayne Gretzky made the #3 pick in the last NHL draft for Phoenix, will leave after this season.

So why is this hitting the Badgers and Gophers harder than, say Colorado College, Denver, or North Dakota? I can't say for sure, but it's probably a parallel to college basketball programs that recruit Kevin Love, O.J. Mayo, and Michael Beasley types - you hope to get one great, transcendental year out of them a la Carmelo Anthony. Meanwhile, programs recruiting three- and four-year guys are just consistently solid, like Badger basketball.

It seems that the Badgers, for all their struggles this season, are still in good shape to make the tournament, where anything can happen. Here's hoping Turris gets to raise a championship banner in Madison before putting on a Coyotes jersey for good.

Wisconsin-Michigan halftime thoughts

Before getting into today's game, a reference to two good stories from madison.com

-Andy Baggot on Ron Dayne's contributions to the UW athletic department. Never thought of them in such sweeping terms, but it's compelling.
-Adam Mertz tells us why Ohio State fans are miserable human beings. Good call Mertzy.

At halftime:

-I feel strangely confident, not my usual cautious optimism, but outright confidence. Probably because Michigan doesn't look like it cares about this game - if it did Henne and Hart would be playing, no matter what their boo-boos. I'd feel more confident if that awful 50-50 rule didn't give Mathews the catch that led to Manningham's TD. Seriously, what a terrible rule.

-ESPN's production gives the impression that the crowd is 75% Michigan fans, when it looks like it's closer to 1%.

-Why were we passing every down in the early going? Michigan's run defense is suspect.

-What a terrific catch by Shane Carter. He has run support limitations, but we haven't seen ball skills in a DB like his since Jamar Fletcher.

-What an awful pas by Donovan before Crable bailed him out with the personal foul.

-Instead of berating the officials - he should have been penalized - Lloyd Carr should have benched Crable for two dirty plays. Ol' Lloyd will probably feel silly when he watches the tape and sees both were easy calls.

-Donovan's TD pass to Beckum was one of those "No, no, no ... yes!" calls, kind of like me shooting a 3-pointer.

-Ryan Mallett is going to be a star for Michigan, he's got all the tools and will no doubt have weapons at receiver.

-Nick Hayden is playing really well. It would have been crushing had he gone to Michigan. Matt Shaughnessy is also playing very well against All-Universe Jake Long. ;)

-Great to say Luke Swan walk out without crutches. Paul Hubbard said it would be inspirational if he did, and it was.

-Awesome TD run/dive by Donovan. Just as big was his evasive scrambling and pass to Beckum on the last field goal drive, really stemmed momentum that was going Michigan's way.

-Hope Lance Smith isn't hurt too bad, Zach Brown doesn't look ready for this - although he did have a nice run called back by an obvious hold on the last drive.

Listening to a recap of Dayne's career right now, giving me goosebumps. Those were some great years ...