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THURSDAY
APRIL 4, 2002
8A.
Meet
Tables are
turned as
Wolverines
leave Yost
By J. Brady McCoIlough
Daily Sports Writer
It's been a long, seven-year odyssey
for the Minnesota hockey team and its
fans.
The program, which owns the all-
time record for wins in college hockey,
is finally back where it feels it belongs
me
in
St.
- in the
N C A A
Frozen Four,
competing
for its fourth
national
charmpi -
o n s h i p
tonight at
7:30 p.m.
against
Michigan at
the Xcel
T. rAUL, NMINN.
Who: Michigan (2810-5)
vs. Minnesota (30.84)
When: 7:30 p.m.
Where: Xcel Energy Center
Latest: In their second
straight Frozen Four; the
Wolverines will take on the
home team in the Golden
Gophers.
TOM FELDKAMP/Daily
If Michigan is to defeat Minnesota tonight, there is little doubt that junior center
Mike Cammalleri will play a large role.
Paul
Minnesota
gets nod as
West's best
By J. Brady McCollough
Daily Sports Writer
A lot can happen in four and a
half months.
Just ask the Michigan hockey
team, which went from being in the
middle of the CCHA standings to
conference regular season and tour-
nament champions during that span.
Minnesota coach 'Don Lucia
knows that the Wolverines are a
much-improved team since his
Golden Gophers dismantled them,
5-2, on Nov. 23 at Yost Ice Arena.
Michigan is confident, talented,
young and enthusiastic and could be
the hottest team in college hockey
after beating Michigan State, St.
Cloud and then-No. 1 Denver in its
last three games.
MICHIGAN OFFENSE VS. MINNESOTA
DEFENSE: Minnesota defenseman
Jordan Leopold - a Hobey Baker
Award finalist - will be matched
up all night long with Michigan's
top trio of Mike Cammalleri, Jed
Ortmeyer and Eric Nystrom.
Leopold, who Michigan coach Red
Berenson deemed the top defensive
defenseman in the WCHA, will have
his hands full with the Wolverines'
first line, which has been clicking
on all cylinders since Cammalleri's
-return from mono.
Cammalleri gives Michigan the
ability to light the lamp at any
moment, and he is complemented by
the grinding, physical style of Nys-
trom and Ortmeyer. Even if he does-
n't score a goal, Cammalleri's
presence on the ice automatically
elevates his teammates to a new
level. With Leopold matched up
against Michigan's top line, the key
to Michigan's offensive success will
be its ability to get productive shifts
from lines two, three and four.
Look for the Wolverines' third
line - Milan Gajic, Michael Wood-
ford and Dwight Helminen - to
continue its emergence as a threat.
The trio scored two of Michigan's
goals in its win over St. Cloud, and
their skill should give Michigan the
edge in its offensive attack against
an average Minnesota defense, which
See MATCHUPS, Page 10A
Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn.
The Golden Gophers made their last
trip to the Frozen Four in 1995, and a
return trip has not been easy to come
by. Hit hard by many of its star players
leaving early for the NHL, Minnesota
could not get over the hump in the next
four seasons. Doug Woog, the Golden
Gophers' coach for more than a decade,
paid the price in 1999, when he was
fired in favor of current coach Don
Lucia, who came over from Colorado
College.
"They've lost a lot of great players
that each year would have been their
leaders," Michigan coach Red Berenson
said. "They never quite got to where
everybody thought they should."
Lucia took over a team that needed
direction and a new attitude, and in his
first season, the Golden Gophers fin-
ished just one game above .500.
"We had to become a team again,"
Lucia said. "I saw pockets of people
(who were) worried about themselves
and not the team. I've never been a part
of a team who didn't care about each
other and get along."
But three years after taking the job at
Minnesota, Lucia - with the help of a
strong senior class - has his team in
position to win its first national title
since 1979.
"(Our chemistry) changed last year,"
said Lucia, whose team fell in the first
round of the NCAA Tournament last
season. "There was much more sense of
a team."
While the Golden Gophers spent
DAVID
HORN
Van Gundy's possible
move isn't a surprise
seven years trying to find a way to get
back to the top, the Wolverines accom-
plished that feat twice, winning the
national championship in 1996 and
1998. Watching its Big Ten foe succeed
year in and year out has helped Min-
nesota see what it takes to get back to
that level.
"I look at Michigan as kind of a
measuring stick," Lucia said. "If you
want to compete for a national champi-
onship, you have to be better than
Michigan. Over the last 10 years,
(Michigan) has been the most dominant
program in college hockey. They know
what it takes to get the job done at this
time of year." .
If Minnesota's measuring stick is
comparing itself to Michigan, it grew
by leaps and bounds on Nov. 23 at Yost
Ice Arena in the annual College Hockey
Showcase. The then-No. 1 ranked Gold-
en Gophers smacked around the
Wolverines like a schoolyard bully,
jumping out to a 3-0 lead in the first
seven minutes and cruising to a 5-2 vic-
tory. Lucia said that he has not focused
on that game in preparation for tonight's
national semifinal, as Michigan has
improved dramatically in many ways
since the teams' initial matchup.
But Berenson remembers the prob-
lems that his team had with the Golden
Gophers very vividly, as his Wolverines
were forced onto their heels before they
could even find a rhythm.
"This is going to be a skating game,"
Berenson said. "We're going to have to
be able to keep up with these guys.
They skate like the wind, and we can't
be a step hesitant."
Fear of attacking early has been
absent in Michigan's game in its current
six-game winning streak, as the Wolver-
ines have scored the first goal in each of
those victories.
Coming out strong and playing with
desperation in the early part of the
game will be crucial to Michigan's
chances in tonight's contest because of
the home-ice advantage that Minnesota
will hold. The Wolverines will take a
dose of the medicine that propelled
them to the Frozen Four, as the Xcel
Energy Center will be packed with
thousands of screaming Minnesota
fans who are desperate for the school's
fourth national title.
The Golden Gophers have played in
the Xcel Energy Center numerous
times, and Lucia is convinced that hav-
ing his players in familiar surroundings
will help calm the nerves that will
inevitably come.
"We're the only team in the Frozen
Four where no players have been there
before," Lucia said. "We have played in
that facility, and it will take tension
away from our guys."
"It's their tournament to lose," Beren-
son said. "They're playing at home, and
they may as well be the No. 1 seed as
far as we're concerned. They've got all
these All-Americans and all-stars. We're
going in as a huge underdog."
ere is so much to say this week
in the world of sports. Baseball
opened, and our very own
Wolverines are in Minneapolis tonight
trying to prolong the magic. But I just
have to say something about the Jeff
Van Gundy situation. A report in the
Orlando Sun Sentinel on Tuesday
claimed that the former coach of the
New York Knicks has decided to head
south - not in terms of talent, although
perhaps in that too. The story said that
Van Gundy intends to take his coaching
talents to Washington to coach the Mys-
tics of the WNBA. That's Women's
National Basketball Association.
Yesterday a spokesperson for the
Mystics denied that the team had been
in contact with Van Gundy, and that the
report in the Sentinel was false. Let's
pretend that it was not.
It would be easy to be misogynistic
and vulgar here,sand make a remark that
is derogatory to women and their bas-
ketball abilities. My friend made the
comment earlier this week that it is
probably much less likely that Van
Gundy will get trampled by Alonzo
Mourning, but there is a greater likeli-
hood that he will get bitch-slapped.
I'm going to be above making com-
ments like that, and speak beyond my
natural tendencies as a season ticket-
holding, American beer-drinking,
cheese on top of cheese on top of
cheese on top of cheese on top of
nachos-eating, blue collar, armchair
quarterback sports fan. There's nothing
wrong with Jeff Van Gundy going to
coach in the WNBA, and if you think
there is, you've allowed yourself to
become seduced by the "I Love This
Game" campaign. Take a look at the
NBA: In my expert opinion as a sports
fan, it sucks. And Van Gundy is right to
have left it to search for a better gig.
Van Gundy, who compiled a 248-172
record as coach of the Knicks, left
behind a team (and I use that word
loosely) of overpaid, overrated and over-
grown glory mongers, who would not
allow themselves to be coached.
According to an NBA source quoted in
the Sentinel, Van Gundy was frustrated
by not being listened to and frustrated by
his team's inability to play anything
resembling good basketball. I imagine
he hopes to find players in the WNBA
who still do "Love This Game" and still
aspire to achieve excellence on the court
- as athletes, as professionals and as
teammates. He hopes to find players
who aren't doing it for the money.
Which is why coaching on the col-
lege level was really not an option.
Let me apologize now. The comment
before about coaching lesser talent was
for cheap laughs (criticize me for being
a poor columnist - not a chauvinist).
Yeah, they can't dunk and the game
isn't as fast, but who cares? What good
do those subjective measures of athleti-
cism do you in the NBA? I was at the
airport last Sunday, stranded as I waited
for a friend to pick me up. I had an hour
to kill. I decided I.would sit down at the
bar, drink a beer, and watch some NBA
basketball; it had been a while. I was
treated to the third quarter of a Wizards-
Mavs game, which ended up being
more painful to watch than the cavity
search the guy ahead of me in line at
security had gotten. If you want good,
smart basketball played by athletes who
have trained harder and longer for fewer
dividends than their male counterparts,
check out the WNBA.
Van Gundy sounds like a guy who
realized what everyone with their lips
not on David Stern's ass realized
about three years ago: That the NBA
in the post-Jordan era (it's weird, isn't
it? You see that guy wearing No. 23 in
D.C., but it's still somehow the post-
Jordan era) is probably the worst
product in the sports industry. He
sounds like a guy who really loves to
coach basketball, and thinks he found
a place where he can coach and have
that sort of fun that one is supposed to
have when he or she is involved with
sports. I salute him for that, and I
hope he finds in Washington what has
been missing from Madison Square
Garden - and the entire NBA - for
years: Good, fun basketball.
David Horn can be reached at
hornd@umich.edu.
Michigan vs. Minnesota: Martin vs. Ventura
Michigan Minnesota
We have They have Edge
Not Yanni Yanni Michigan
"American Pie" "Fargo" Minnesota
Ed Martin Jan Gangelhoff , Push
Little Brown Jug A bronze pig Michigan
A fat governor A fat, wrestling governor Minnesota
Marty Mornhinweg George O'Leary Da Bears
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* An excellent opportunity for hands-on participation for extensive
Gynasts confident
heading into regional
By Josh Holman
Daily Sports Writer
against Nebraska yet this year, they
finished .925 ahead of the third-place
Hawkeyes two weeks ago en route to
winning their fourth-straight Big Ten
Championship. This victory came
despite stumbles from a number of
4
To say that the Michigan women's
gymnastics team is confident may be
an understatement as it
State College this Satur-
day for the NCAA
Regional Champi-
onships.
In fact, the Wolver-
ines are so confident
about advancing this
weekend that they've
already begun moving
from their old practice
facility in the Sports
Coliseum into their new
one which will be ready
heads into
4
STATE COLLEGE
What: Michigan will be at
the NCAA Regionals.
When: 6 p.m.
Latest: Michigan standouts
Calli Ryals and Elise Ray
hope to rebound from her
sub-par performances at
Big Tens last month in
Columbus where Ray was
the only top five performer.
gymnasts, including
Michigan's top two gym-
nasts in Ryals and sopho-
more Elise Ray. Only Ray
managed to finish in the
top five of the all-around
competition.
"I'm even more pre-
pared now because it's
like a little wake-up call,"
Ryals said. "I was getting
too confident in my rou-
tines and a little ahead of
next week, just in time for the team
to begin preparing for the NCAA
Championships.
"This meet is kind of anti-climac-
tic, but we can't get ahead of our-
selves because it is the national
qualifier," sophomore Calli Ryals
said.
Michigan does have reason to be
optimistic though. Michigan's tough-
est competition for one of the two
qualifying spots comes from No. 8
Nebraska and No. 16 Iowa. While the
Wolverines- have not competed
myself."
After addressing the mistakes it
made at Big Tens, Michigan can now
concentrate on winning its fourth
straight NCAA regional, and they'll
get to do it at Penn State, a venue in
which they've historically done well.
Two years ago the Wolverines
cruised into nationals after posting
scores of 197.850 and 196.550 at
the Big Ten Championships and
NCAA Regionals, both hosted by
Penn State.
See REGIONALS, Page 9A
4
'Rout the Titans':
An
epic tale starring M'
I
I