Author: David Shama

Freshmen, including three players drafted in the first round of this year’s NHL Entry Draft, have helped fuel the Gopher hockey team’s rise to No. 1 in the country and speculation this may be the best team ever at the University.  Talk is the Gophers will not see all nine of the freshmen on the roster return next season. 

Coach Don Lucia doesn’t agree that it’s certain all his freshmen will not return including defenseman Erik Johnson, the No. 1 pick in the draft, and also first round picks Kyle Okposo and David Fischer.  “I don’ think it’s a foregone conclusion but we have to plan for it,” Lucia said.  “I think it’s just one of those things we do not know.  Some of these freshmen I think are going to be very good players, but I don’t think any of the freshmen should be leaving after this year, but again as a coach you have very little say over that.”

Ask Lucia about the talent level of his team and whether it could be the best ever and he hedges.  While acknowledging the collective abilities, he talks about the youth of the team and the improvement that will come next season if his freshmen and other underclassmen return.  He recalled that the 2002 team would not have won the national championship if Jordan Leopold and Johnny Pohl had left early to play professionally.  “It’s (about) keeping these kids long enough where you get the benefit of them being an elite All-American type player,” Lucia said. 

In conversation about the team’s playmakers, Lucia talked first about senior Tyler Hirsch, the Gophers’ leading scorer.  “Tyler Hirsch’s ability to pass the puck is second to none,” Lucia said.  “He can really move the puck.” 

Lucia has been pleased with the leadership contributions of another senior, captain Mike Vannelli.  “He’s taken this young team under his wing and said, ‘I am going to be the leader of this team,’” Lucia said.  

There’s a lot of hockey to be played between now and April when the Gophers hope to make their way to the national championship game.  Last season in a stunning loss, the Gophers were upset by Holy Cross in the NCAA playoffs.  “For whatever reason, some guys lost their confidence in the finals and we just didn’t have time to get it back,” Lucia said.

This fall the Star Tribune published a four part series detailing the life and death of Kirby Puckett after baseball.  It was another look into the good and bad of perhaps Minnesota’s most revered baseball player ever.  For all of his personal problems, memories of Puckett remain positive for many people including those who were fond of him for much more than his ball playing skills. 

Among those with such recollections is Gregg Wong, the former Pioneer Press sports writer.  I called Wong on Sunday, May 7 to pass along the news Puckett had suffered a stroke and was in grave condition.  Puckett died later that day.   

I recently asked Wong to write about his memories of Puckett.  Wong was a Twins beat writer from 1985-1987 and covered the team part time during other seasons.   Here’s what Wong wrote: 

“He was the most upbeat, most accessible athlete I’ve ever dealt with on a regular basis. He would light up whatever room he was in with his non-stop chatter, banter and energy. The noise level in the clubhouse always would go up once he walked in. 

“He always had something to say for the record. A lot of times it might just be a cliché, but he always was there to face the music. He never ran and hid, like many top athletes, even if he struck out with the winning run on base in the bottom of the ninth. He was a true professional in that regard; he knew you had a job to do, too. 

“Probably my favorite remembrance of him was when he made his first all-star team in 1986, where he was voted in as a starter. The paper did not send me to the game in Houston, but the boss wanted a Puckett sidebar after the game. I asked if he would call me as soon as the game got over so I could ask about his experience and he said he would, although I believed he would get caught up in the hype and hoopla and forget to call. 

“I watched the game on TV, made some notes and prayed that he’d call. Five minutes after the game was over, the phone rang. ‘What’s up, Wongie?’ he said. ‘How you doin’?’ Here he had just ended the biggest moment of his career up to that point and he remembered to call and asked how I was doing (just fine because he called)! Not many pro athletes would do anything like that today — and certainly none of the Vikings I covered in a half-dozen years.”

How do you like Pohlad Park or Wheaties Field as possible names for the new Twins baseball stadium? 

The University of Minnesota is campaigning to sell tickets for the Insight Bowl through its ticket allotments.  If Gopher fans buy tickets through University inventory then the school can document its fan following and potentially use this to diminish the reputation that Minnesota boosters don’t support the team at bowl games.  Fans interested in a travel package to the Insight Bowl in Tempe, Arizona can contact Creative Charters, 651-748-0080, www.creativecharter.com.  Ticket information is also available from the Gopher ticket office, 612-624-8080, or 800-U-Gopher. 

M Club president George Adzick is inviting University letter winners to play in the first annual “Bowl Cup” golf outing on Friday, December 29, the same day as the Insight Bowl.   If interested contact Adzick at 612-626-7305. 

Matt Boockmeier, a former all conference football guard for the University of St. Thomas, is a State Farm Insurance agent and offices in Edina.  His first career was as a pro football scout including with the Vikings, Packers and Saints.  In1994 he started his pro football career as a training camp intern with the Vikings, earning $5 per hour.  He then “begged” for an internship in pro personnel scouting with the Vikings and was hired at $300 per month.  The NFL later hired him as a regional college scout where he “lived out of my trunk,” spending about 220 days per year on the road.  Scouting assignments with the Packers and Saints followed before Boockmeier got married and decided to give up the nomadic life of scouting in 2001.

The Fanball.com Fall Poker Classic, Canterbury Park’s signature poker event, recently paid out a record $1,448,736 in total prize money. There were a record 4,303 entries, from 22 states and three countries. 

Local tennis pro Greg Wicklund, who writes a newsy column for Tennis Life magazine, reports in the December issue that former Gopher coach David Geatz is “now in corporate real estate with the Staubach Corporation in Minneapolis.” 

Recently retired tennis legend Andre Agassi won his first professional tennis tournament at the Minikahda Tennis Invitational at the Minikahda Club in Minneapolis in 1987.