FB: Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[sjusection105]

Looks like Caruso is already making an impact at UST.  From the Strib today: Tommies to be give pause to Gagliardi.

"Maybe I'll retire before he plays for the Tommies," Gagliardi groaned.

I do think that Caruso does bring a different twist to the MIAC landscape. Kids who may have gone to Bethel, Olaf or SJU are now also taking notice of the Tom Cats.....the next couple of years could tell the story.....

[AO]

I would say the real model that the Johnnies ought to be following is not the Tommies, but the Royals who are able to recruit character guys like flannery and win championships with them.  ...in other words, St. Thomas might have a little leg up on some guys like Morse from Como Park, but there's still going to be 200 guys reporting to camp in the fall for gags with plenty of talent to go around.

don't look now, football season is approaching--The super bowl bound Vikes report to training camp in 3 weeks.

[finsleft]

I would say the real model that the Johnnies ought to be following is not the Tommies, but the Royals who are able to recruit character guys like flannery and win championships with them.  ...in other words, St. Thomas might have a little leg up on some guys like Morse from Como Park, but there's still going to be 200 guys reporting to camp in the fall for gags with plenty of talent to go around.

don't look now, football season is approaching--The super bowl bound Vikes report to training camp in 3 weeks.

Just what in the hell are you smoking, AO? That'd be the day when SJU has to think about who they should emulate, the Tommies or Bethel?!?
Double good grief.

[retagent]

I want to publicly thank OZ, flash and Klop for having my back and helping to be the pea under the WIAC mattress. It was fun again.

I also heard the hickory daquiri doc punchline with a slightly different setup. It's almost like the kid's game of telephone.

[GoldandBlueBU]

A doctor  had been stoppin in at the same bar every wednesday night for a few years, where he would always order an almond daiquiri and have a conversation with the bartender, Dick.  One wednesday evening when the doctor had just walked in, Dick realized that he was out out of the ingredients for an almond daiquiri.  Dick instead made a hickory daiquiri thinking that the doctor probably wouldn't notice.  After taking a sip, the doctor asked "Is this an almond daiquiri Dick?". The bartender replied "No. It's a hickory daiquiri Doc."

[johnnie_esq]

I would say the real model that the Johnnies ought to be following is not the Tommies, but the Royals who are able to recruit character guys like flannery and win championships with them.  ...in other words, St. Thomas might have a little leg up on some guys like Morse from Como Park, but there's still going to be 200 guys reporting to camp in the fall for gags with plenty of talent to go around.

don't look now, football season is approaching--The super bowl bound Vikes report to training camp in 3 weeks.

Character guys?  Championships? 

SJU has plenty of both.  BU still lacks the latter on the big stage, and though they did have a nice run last year, they were shown the door pretty loudly by Mount Union, wouldn't you say?

I think SJU's problem is that they seem to be moving away from their own model of success.  The 2000 team consisted of a good number of kids from the cities public and private mixed with those from Central Minnesota and one or two transfers.  Same goes with the 2003 team.  But the more recent teams have been short on the Twin Cities publics and long on the transfers and Central Minnesotans.  I don't care where they come from if we win, but when we don't...questions are allowed.

[AO]

being one of those kids from central minnesota, i'd hate to argue that the Johnnies had too many melrosians and albanians on the roster, but if they could have recruited some fergus fallsians (jared bangs and the carr brothers) and maybe a holdingford husker (bernstetter), they might have won the outright MIAC championship the last couple years. 

I don't see any finger pointing at Gagliardi for not recruiting, which is a nice change of pace from the rest of the american sporting world who fires the coach after a couple of years if the recruits aren't coming in. 

Do the Johnnies really not recruit out of state?  Maybe there is enough talent in-state, but it made a lot of sense to me when my alma mater's coach goes out to colorado and washington and has players flying in from florida for visits.  With the history of a program like St. John's, you'd think sending a few letters and emails couldn't hurt.

[retagent]

That's the way I heard it GoldandBlue.

[OzJohnnie]

I think SJU's problem is that they seem to be moving away from their own model of success.  The 2000 team consisted of a good number of kids from the cities public and private mixed with those from Central Minnesota and one or two transfers.  Same goes with the 2003 team.  But the more recent teams have been short on the Twin Cities publics and long on the transfers and Central Minnesotans.  I don't care where they come from if we win, but when we don't...questions are allowed.

Is the trend you highlight a deliberate move by SJU or just the way the wind has blown in terms of who has said 'yes' the last couple years?

And to say we haven't won...  That's a bit strong, no?  It's more like we're going through a stretch similar to the mid/late 90's.  Only disappointing by Johnnie standards, but still pretty darn good.

[Klopenhiemer]

If anyone is interested in a discussion re: Johnnie football (I know it's a bit of pain because who the hell cares during the summer anyway), I've got a topic I wouldn't mind getting a little air.

I had a short discussion with another fella about the fact that St. John's recruiting methods may hit a dry patch with the demographics of central Minn changing a bit and USTD making a big push into the Catholic schools for recruits (coupled with their... uh... aggressive... financing offers) which may impact our ability to pull top talent with the low-key methods we use.

Rather than discuss what method is better, etc, I was wondering what the impact on the culture of the Johnnie program would be with a recruiting change.  If we change our recruiting from a "we target these schools and these geographies and let the best from elsewhere find us" to a, for example, "we'll go out and grab specific guys we want, be they from non-Catholic leagues or even Florida", will that change the culture of the guys we have playing?  And change the culture to the detriment of the program?

It seems to me that a real benefit of the Johnnie program is that the players tend to be more mature and independent than the typical sports standout.  Only players that want to play football enough to pursue St John's end up at St. John's.  And only the players that work hard and well enough on the optional extras usually make the playing surface.  If we start chasing around for the "superstars" and then give them this big list of "No's", will those superstars have the maturity to maximize their potential in the "No's" program?

The real question is: Is it better for SJU to recruit character or talent?

I spent the first season of my college career at an NISC school.  They recruited talent over charecter every day of the week.  This was something that one could not see while on official visits, but found out quickly during the first week of training camp. 

I have stood on this since that experience and will stand on this forever.  Id rather have a bunch of kids who played hard with a ton of charecter, over a ton a talented kids who were charecters.  It created so many problems one could not being to start to flesh them out.  I will say that it created some interesting cultural misunderstanding when you mixed half the team from Florida and half the team from the midwest.  We never saw eye to eye and that amounted to few wins and coach who was hall of famer at the school being done after 4 seasons at the helm. 

My advice to SJU...Keep the charecter and let the wins fall where they may. 

[Klopenhiemer]

I want to publicly thank OZ, flash and Klop for having my back and helping to be the pea under the WIAC mattress. It was fun again.

I also heard the hickory daquiri doc punchline with a slightly different setup. It's almost like the kid's game of telephone.

+k

[Mr. Ypsi]

I'd highly recommend retreating to the den around 7:10 for the Twins/Kittens game.

Be careful what you wish for.  My kittens are sharpening their claws lately!

That makes 18-4 since they bottomed out.

[tmerton]

If anyone is interested in a discussion re: Johnnie football (I know it's a bit of pain because who the hell cares during the summer anyway), I've got a topic I wouldn't mind getting a little air.

I had a short discussion with another fella about the fact that St. John's recruiting methods may hit a dry patch with the demographics of central Minn changing a bit and USTD making a big push into the Catholic schools for recruits (coupled with their... uh... aggressive... financing offers) which may impact our ability to pull top talent with the low-key methods we use.

Rather than discuss what method is better, etc, I was wondering what the impact on the culture of the Johnnie program would be with a recruiting change.  If we change our recruiting from a "we target these schools and these geographies and let the best from elsewhere find us" to a, for example, "we'll go out and grab specific guys we want, be they from non-Catholic leagues or even Florida", will that change the culture of the guys we have playing?  And change the culture to the detriment of the program?

It seems to me that a real benefit of the Johnnie program is that the players tend to be more mature and independent than the typical sports standout.  Only players that want to play football enough to pursue St John's end up at St. John's.  And only the players that work hard and well enough on the optional extras usually make the playing surface.  If we start chasing around for the "superstars" and then give them this big list of "No's", will those superstars have the maturity to maximize their potential in the "No's" program?

The real question is: Is it better for SJU to recruit character or talent?

Isn't the obvious answer to recruit character and talent?  I have no clue what SJU recruiting is like, since we were in the "we found them" camp (the Johnnies definitely don't recruit out of state, although John still knows how to review film, er. video, wherever it comes from).  But if they're not already pretty aggressive in scouting and going after the players they want, I suspect they'll need to pick up the pace on that.  That wouldn't have to change who they go after, though.

[OzJohnnie]

Isn't the obvious answer to recruit character and talent?

Yes, it was presented as a false dichotomy, and I thought so at the time but figured it didn't matter.  Obviously, they should pursue more talent with great character.  Can that be done without breaking the "special Johnnie magic"?

[Touchdown Tommy]

Face it fellas...

The Tommies are a bunch of big biches!!!