Preps – Page 79 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Number of State Hoopsters Surprises

Posted on March 24, 2017March 24, 2017 by David Shama

A Creative Charters fan bus had taken Gene Lindahl and others to Milwaukee for the Gophers opening NCAA Tournament game against Middle Tennessee State earlier this month. On the ride home a passenger near Lindahl wondered out loud what states all the basketball players from the NCAA Tournament teams come from.

“…Nobody took him seriously that anybody would actually be dumb enough to sit and do that (calculate the answer),” Lindahl said with amusement. “I got home and started thinking about it.”

“Hell, I can do that,” Lindahl told himself. “You just go to all the teams’ websites, and copy and paste (names and hometowns).”

Lindahl lives near Faribault and is a retired high school basketball coach. It required eight to 10 hours to come up with the origins of players from not only the 68 teams in the NCAA Tournament, but also the 32 NIT teams. He researched 1,319 players.

Any surprises? “I was surprised that (the state of) Minnesota had as many (players) as they did,” Lindahl said.

There were 31 Minnesotans on various teams, and Minnesota’s total ranked behind only 12 other states. Minnesota finished ahead of neighboring Wisconsin (No. 29 with 14 players) and Iowa (No. 30, 13 players). Minnesota also had more players than more populous states like No. 15 New Jersey (30 players), No. 16 Pennsylvania (29 players) and No. 27 Washington (16 players). At No. 13, Minnesota trailed these states and their totals of players:

1. California, 119

2. Texas, 111

3. Illinois, 86

4. Florida, 75

5. North Carolina, 70

6. Ohio, 69

7. Georgia, 68

8. Indiana, 60

9. New York, 53

10. Virginia, 52

11. Maryland, 46

12. Michigan, 38

The Gophers’ roster has six Minnesotans, including starters Amir Coffey and Reggie Lynch. Jarvis Johnson is a scholarship player from the state who didn’t play last season, but could be counted as a seventh Minnesotan.

North Dakota’s roster has five Minnesotans including starting guards Geno Crandall and Quinton Hooker. They played prominent roles for their team as did some other Minnesotans including guard/forward Sanjay Lumpkin at Northwestern and guard J.P. Macura with Xavier.

After searching over 150 team websites, Lindahl also compiled a breakdown of countries. In addition to the United States, 56 other nations were represented by 178 players on the 100 teams. Only four of those countries had double-digit totals of players—Canada, 29; Australia, 23; Nigeria, 13; and Senegal, 10.

Lindahl shared his findings with Creative Charters who distributed the information via email to those who made the trip to watch the Gophers. The research and email came as a surprise but was appreciated.

“Nobody would expect somebody to be as stupid as I am,” Lindahl repeated.

Worth Noting

Collegead.com reported on Monday the current “NCAA Tournament is the most-watched in 24 years through the first Sunday (March 19), with an average of 9,325,000 million viewers, up 10% from 2016 (8,513,000).”

Horse racing enthusiast Steve Erban emailed that Malagacy, a top 10 contender for this year’s Kentucky Derby, has a sister who is a Minnesota bred racehorse. Classy Shackles sold for $26,500 in a Minnesota thoroughbred yearling sale last year, Erban wrote.

Erban’s Creative Charters, based in Stillwater, annually offers a trip to the Kentucky Derby. He said this year’s trip to the May 6 Derby in Louisville is sold out.

The Star Tribune named its All-Metro boys basketball teams this week and the first team included Maple Grove guard Brad Davison and Lakeville North forward Nathan Reuvers. Both will play for Wisconsin next season and are high potential college players. The Gophers could be second-guessed about their recruiting if the next few seasons are successful for Davison, Reuvers and the Badgers. Wisconsin, a program that hasn’t finished below fourth in the Big Ten standings since 2001, has a history of using Minnesota-raised talent in its starting lineup.

Jerry Krause, the legendary general manager who shaped the rosters of the Chicago Bulls NBA title teams in the 1990s, died this week at age 77. I met Krause at Met Center when he brought the Bulls to Minnesota for an exhibition game I helped arrange. He was all business and demanded the Bulls’ fee before tipoff—or the team wasn’t taking the court.

Jacob Isaia, a highly regarded offensive lineman from Bishop Gorman High School in Nevada, has offers from the Gophers and many other colleges including Michigan State, UCLA and Utah, according to a Tuesday online story from the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Isaia is originally from Hawaii and is the grandson of Bob Apisa, the starting fullback on the 1966 national champion Michigan State team. A senior in high school next fall, Isaia has 13 college offers and is being nationally recruited, according to the Review-Journal story.

Cordarrelle Patterson (photo courtesy of Minnesota Vikings)

With Cordarrelle Patterson leaving the Vikings via free agency to the Raiders, Laquon Treadwell has more opportunity to figure in Minnesota’s plans for its wide receivers. Treadwell, the team’s first round draft choice in 2016, wasn’t ready to play last season and caught only one pass for 15 yards. Former Vikings wide receivers coach George Stewart told Sports Headliners this week that Treadwell can become a “fine player.” Treadwell doesn’t turn 22 until June 14.

The Gopher hockey team will try to win the Northeast Regional this weekend, and advance to the Frozen Four and compete for the NCAA title. Minnesota has a NCAA-best 37 national tournament appearances, but what frustrates many fans is the Gophers have won just two national championships since 1980. The Gophers were NCAA champions in 1974, 1976, 1979, 2002 and 2003.

Jason Shaver, the Apple Valley High School alum and son of Gophers radio play-by-play man Wally Shaver, is the TV voice of the American Hockey League’s Chicago Wolves. Jason’s grandfather is the legendary radio voice of the North Stars, 89-year-old Al Shaver who is retired and living on Vancouver Island.

White Bear Lake’s Phil Bonin, a well-known hockey name, passed away from cancer on Monday. Phil was a youth hockey supporter and father of Brian Bonin, the former Gopher hockey player and 1996 Hobey Baker Award winner. Condolences to family and friends.

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U Roster Offers Frozen Four Talent

Posted on March 22, 2017March 22, 2017 by David Shama

Wally Shaver has been the radio play-by-play voice of Gophers hockey for 16 years. He thinks the Minnesota team that is only two wins away from earning its way into the Frozen Four could win a national title. “I think this team is talented enough to get it done,” he told Sports Headliners Monday.

The Gophers won national championships in 2002 and 2003 under coach Don Lucia. Three years ago Lucia’s team lost in the Frozen Four finals to Union. Shaver believes the 2017 Gophers compare favorably to past Minnesota teams.

Minnesota has seven players with 10 or more goals. No other major college team can match that. “They’re a very balanced team and deep in scoring,” Shaver said.

Minnesota, as usual, has exceptional players like sophomore forward Tyler Sheehy, who is the 2017 Big Ten Player of the Year and a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award given to college hockey’s best player. Senior Jake Bischoff is the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year, while sophomore goalie Eric Schierhorn is the conference’s goalie of the year for a second consecutive season. Joining those three on the All-Big Ten first team is senior forward Justin Kloos. That collective talent is backed up by other productive players and means opponents can’t concentrate much on controlling just one or two players, or lines.

A hot goalie in college hockey’s playoffs always determines much of a team’s fate. Shaver said Schierhorn had his “ups and downs” during the long season but he suggested the Alaska native “hit the reset button” during Christmas time. Schierhorn has a .935 save percentage in his last nine games. “There is no question he is peaking at the right time,” Shaver said.

Last Saturday Schierhorn stopped 59 of 63 shots in a double overtime loss to Penn State in the Big Ten Tournament. “He was the best player on the ice,” Shaver said.

In that game a penalty set up a winning power play goal for PSU. Shaver cautions that if the Gophers are to advance this weekend and beyond, they must keep penalties to a minimum.

Minnesota, the regular season Big Ten champion, will play Notre Dame on Saturday in one of two games in Manchester, New Hampshire as part of the Northeast Region. Cornell plays UMass-Lowell in the other game, with Saturday’s winners meeting on Sunday in Manchester to determine who advances to the April 6 Frozen Four in Chicago against champions from three other regions.

The Gophers, 21-11-3, are the Northeast Region’s No. 1 seed and the favorite to win two games in Manchester, but Notre Dame, 21-11-5, impresses Shaver, too. He said the Fighting Irish has only one senior and if underclassmen don’t leave the program Notre Dame could be the “odds-on” favorite to win the Big Ten Conference title next season.

“It’s a very good regional and a great matchup for us to start with against Notre Dame,” Lucia said. “We know them, and they know us. We’re excited to get back into the tournament and compete for a national championship.”

The Gophers and Irish didn’t play against each other as nonconference opponents this season but have been frequent foes with Minnesota having a 27-15-3 record in the rivalry. Notre Dame plays its first Big Ten season in 2017-2018, increasing league membership to seven teams. The goal is to become an eight-team hockey league but there is no indication the Big Ten is even close to determining another member.

Worth Noting

Minnesota boys’ high school basketball fan Ken Lien has seen thousands of games over the years, and he was asked by Sports Headliners to name the teams he believes will win state tournament titles this week. His predicted champs are: Class 4A Champlin Park; Class 3A DeLaSalle; Class 2A Minnehaha Academy; and Class 1A Minneapolis North. His runner-ups, starting with Class 4A, are Apple Valley, Marshall, Crosby-Ironton and Goodhue.

A grand opening ribbon-cutting ceremony and celebration is scheduled today at MSP International Airport to introduce the new Minnesota Twins sports bar and restaurant. Twins Grill is located in Concourse C of Terminal 1, and displays memorabilia and graphics recognizing the franchise’s past and present. The 220-seat restaurant offers traditional ballpark food and local craft beers.

Commissioner Bill Robertson and other leaders of the Edina-based WCHA were elated last Saturday when the league’s championship playoff game between Bowling Green and Michigan Tech drew a capacity crowd of 4,466 in Houghton, Michigan. Tech won the game in an electric atmosphere that represented a stark contrast to past years when the WCHA’s playoff title game was hosted in large venues like the Xcel Energy Center in front of meager crowds.

“I have watched a lot of professional, college and high school games, but that environment was one of the best I have ever seen,” said Robertson, who celebrated his 56th birthday yesterday.

George Stewart, the former Vikings wide receivers coach, now is special teams coordinator and assistant head coach with the Chargers. After about 34 years as an assistant coach in college and the NFL, Stewart still thinks about becoming a head coach. “I have a burning desire to do that at some point,” he told Sports Headliners Monday.

Stewart is 58 and head coaches are usually younger, but he mentioned Mike Zimmer was the same age when the Vikings hired him in 2014 as their football boss. Stewart said he wants an NFL head position, and the only head job in college that interested him was at his alma mater, Arkansas.

Stewart worked 10 seasons for the Vikings before deciding earlier this year to move on. When Stewart was a young coach with the 49ers, the legendary Bill Walsh told him 10 years was often long enough for an assistant to stay with one organization. An assistant coach’s instructions can become stale in talking with players after a long period, Stewart said, while explaining why he left the Vikings.

It doesn’t look like Chad Greenway, the newly retired Viking linebacker, is in any rush to decide what’s next in his life. Another former Vikings linebacker, Scott Studwell, told Sports Headliners he would advise Greenway to take six months to consider his future.

Condolences to Greenway and his family after the death last week of grandfather Michael Schoenfelder from Mount Vernon, South Dakota.

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Glen Taylor Unsure about Signing “Big 3”

Posted on March 10, 2017March 10, 2017 by David Shama

The Timberwolves, led by a roster of players 27 years old and younger, could make the playoffs for the first time since 2004. Even casual NBA fans recognize the talent on the roster and the possibility of the team contending for championships within a few years. Part of the uncertainty, though, is whether owner Glen Taylor can keep the best players on the roster long term by signing them to richer contracts in the coming years.

Among the team’s starting players only power forward Gorgui Dieng, 27, is contractually committed to the Wolves beyond the 2018-2019 season, according to figures from Basketballreference.com. Dieng’s deal, agreed to last fall, goes through the 2020-2021 season when he is paid $17,287,640, per the website. Point guard Ricky Rubio, 26, is an unrestricted free agent after the 2019 season when he will earn $14,800,000.

The often referred to “Big 3” of the Wolves are small forward Andrew Wiggins, 22, center Karl-Anthony Towns, 21, and shooting guard Zach LaVine who turns 22 today and is sidelined after ACL surgery last month. All are working for rookie contracts and will be in line for much bigger compensation in coming years. Wiggins and LaVine are reportedly restricted free agents after next season. Towns reaches that status in 2019.

Taylor is hopeful he will be able to keep the “Big 3,” while knowing he will also have salary obligations to another dozen or so players. “I am not sure,” he told Sports Headliners earlier this week. “Is it a concern I have? It is. Do we have a full answer? No. Are we laying out some scenarios? Yes.

“But we’ve signed ‘G’ (Dieng) and we’ve signed Ricky (new deal in 2014). We need some other good guys to come off the bench. In the end, you have to figure out what’s your priority.”

Dieng and Rubio are the top paid players on the roster with $65,148,783 and $42,600,000 multiyear deals, according to Basketballreference.com. Neither of those players is considered a superstar but Wiggins, Towns and LaVine have potential to earn that description.

Glen Taylor (photo courtesy of Minnesota Timberwolves).

Taylor has asked the Wolves’ front office to crunch numbers to provide various options in shaping future payrolls. Part of the consideration will be the size of the salary cap allowed by the NBA for its teams, and what Taylor is willing to expend, including a possible willingness to pay a penalty (“luxury tax”) for exceeding the league’s cap.

Taylor has often lost money operating the team but said the large number of rookie contracts on his payroll (including first and second season guards Kris Dunn and Tyus Jones) will allow the franchise to turn a profit of a few million dollars this season, regardless of whether the Wolves make the playoffs.

As of today, the Wolves have 19 games remaining during the regular schedule. Their record right now isn’t good enough to qualify for the playoffs and Taylor said it will be “very difficult” to earn one of the eight postseason spots in the Western Conference. Minnesota is 2.5 games back of the eighth place Nuggets.

“I want the guys to work towards it,” Taylor said. “I don’t want them to give up at all because I just think that’s part of the learning lesson here, that we’re going to play some tough teams this week and we gotta come out and battle every one and try to win…some of these upsets.

“It’s difficult (to accept) when you can see how close we are (in the standings), and it’s difficult when you see how we lost so many of those games early in the season that we could of and should have won.”

Taylor likes the performance of first-year coach Tom Thibodeau. The two speak frequently, usually by phone. “We talk a lot about basketball. I am impressed that whatever (past) play I talk about during the game, he really knows exactly what play I am talking about.”

Taylor said Thibodeau has a five-year contract that includes incentives for the team making the playoffs.

Worth Noting

The Wolves drafted LaVine and Towns but made a 2014 trade for Wiggins who was acquired for power forward Kevin Love—Minnesota’s most popular player when he played in Minneapolis. Love, an NBA All-Star, helped the Cavs win the NBA title last June. Wiggins has scored 20 points or more in 42 games this season and ranks with the NBA’s high potential players. Would Taylor trade Wiggins today to reacquire the 28-year-old Love?

“No, I would not because I just think he (Wiggins) has even a lot more upside (than he has shown),” Taylor said. “I think Wiggins has a lot to learn yet. Just from experience, he will improve and become even better.

“Then I think he is (also) an end of the game type of guy if he can learn from experiences how to use his (skills to help) everybody on the team.”

The late Flip Saunders, who three years ago was the Wolves’ basketball boss, scouted and liked Wiggins before acquiring him. “He just saw in him kind of what we are actually seeing,” Taylor said. “A person with all kinds of talent, he could just do things that a lot of other people won’t be able to do. …“

Taylor said Thibodeau has talked to him about Wiggins. “Thibs really likes him. He wants him to play better defense. If he is going to be critical of Wiggs it’s generally in the area of defense.

“He’s saying that he’s got a lot to learn. Yes, he makes mistakes but…it isn’t because he is selfish. He (Wiggins) doesn’t anticipate certain things developing soon enough. He (Thibodeau) says experienced guys anticipate. They see movement by the opposition and they sort of know where their players are…”

Rubio will meet the public at the Twin Cities Auto Show on Sunday from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. at the Lexus display in the Minneapolis Convention Center. The St. Paul Saints will provide giveaways to the first 1,000 auto show guests that day.

Vikings defensive end Everson Griffen will be at the Hyundai display March 15 from 6 to 7 p.m., and Vikings wide receiver Laquon Treadwell will appear at the same location March 18 from 6 to 7 p.m. Wild head coach Bruce Boudreau and assistant Scott Stevens will be at the Toyota display from 4 to 6 p.m. March 17.

NBC televises the Wild and Blackhawks as its game of the week on Sunday from Chicago. Minnesota and Chicago have the two best records in the NHL’s Western Conference. One point separates the Stanley Cup contenders, with the NHL regular season schedule ending early next month. The Wild has won its last four games in Chicago but the Blackhawks have a two-game winning streak in the season series that ends Sunday.

Wild goalie Devan Dubnyk leads the NHL in wins and save percentage. Chicago wing Patrick Kane is tied for second with four other players for most points in the league.

The Star Tribune announced Eden Prairie High School forward and Gopher recruit Casey Mittelstadt as its prep hockey Player of the Year on Tuesday. Since 1985 only two players from the Minneapolis and St. Paul public schools have won the award—Southwest’s Tom Chorske in 1985 and Johnson’s Tom Pogreba in 1996.

Minnesota natives Mitch McLain and Michael Bitzer are first team All-WCHA selections as announced by the Edina-based league office yesterday. Bowling Green’s McLain, a forward from Baxter, Minnesota, is joined on the team by Bemidji State goalie Bitzer who is from Moorhead, Minnesota, and is a Hobey Baker candidate.

High school football coaches have until Monday to submit information to the Minnesota Football Coaches Association regarding their class of 2018 college prospects. The MFCA is sponsoring a recruiting combine for prep players to gather data about them on April 29 at the Braemar Dome in Edina, and the organization is also coordinating a recruiting fair May 1 at the DoubleTree Hotel in St. Louis Park where high school coaches can meet with college coaches to discuss prospects. For details click the MFCA ad on this page and visit the organization’s website.

An online Monday article from the Las Vegas Journal-Review reported Nevada sports books lost $8.25 million in January, according to figures from the state’s gaming control board. Much of the revenue was lost on football including the college national championship game won by underdog Clemson over Alabama, and NFL playoff games where the public beat the spread. The loss was historically unusual and the newspaper noted: “The house doesn’t always win on football.”

Gregg Wong, the former Pioneer Press sportswriter, will again work as an official scorer for the Twins, sharing the scorer responsibilities this season with Minnesota sports author Stew Thornley and Rochester-based physician Kyle Traynor.

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