Season 3 Episode 22 of the Chasing MacNaughton Podcast from Tech Hockey Guide; Mom’s Spaghetti. This week, Tim Braun, Dustin Lindstrom, Rob Gilreath and Matt Cavender were joined by Harrison Watt, the play by play voice of the Ferris State Bulldogs. In this episode they discussed last weekends series between Ferris State and Lake Superior State, talked about Blake Pietilla, previewed the upcoming series between Michigan Tech and Ferris State, discussed Joe Shawhan Hour, and picked the next round of Fantasy Challenge.

Listener question

There was one listener question this week, and Tim started the podcast off by reading it. Tech Hockey Guide’s own Old Dog, Mike Anleitner, asked if Harrison could shed any light on LSSU sweeping Ferris State and added that it seemed like a surprise to him. Harrison talked about the fact that Ferris State “lost the bye week” and had 13 of their skaters get the flu, which affected their energy level, especially in the Saturday game. Harrison also talked about a couple of “puzzling” officiating calls in both games which put Ferris State into difficult situations.

Blake Pietila versus Dryden McKay

Harrison then talked about Tech’s last game against Ferris State and made the comment that Blake Pietila is the best goaltender in the CCHA. Tim asked why Harrison thought he was better than Minnesota State’s Dryden McKay, to which Harrison said that Pietila has more shot data to look at. Harrison thought that McKay seems to struggle when he faces more shots and that Pietila doesn’t get enough credit. The guys then talked about some of the Tech goaltender records that Pietila now owns or ties and Rob commented how nice it is to have consistent goaltending compared to years past.

Ferris State series preview

Before diving into the series preview, the guys talked about the playoff status for Ferris State. At this point in the season, Ferris State cannot get home ice in the CCHA playoffs. This was followed by a discussion about each of the guys favorite GIFs. After which, the guys then took a look at the upcoming series between Tech and Ferris State. Harrison talked about what Tech should see out of Ferris State, which was largely that they are a team with nothing to lose and will come out playing loose. Harrison also said that if Ferris State is going to beat Tech it will be because Tech makes mistakes. Matt was fearful of the break that Tech has leading up to the series and hoped that the pressure wouldn’t build too much on the players. Dustin then talked about Ferris State not being a bad team and Harrison added the CCHA as a whole has gotten better.

Ferris State series predictions

This week, Matt predicted a split and added that it will piss people off. He thought that the first night would be a dominant Tech win and the second night would be a slip up for Tech. Rob thought that the players know what’s at stake and they would come out and take care of business and get the sweep. Dustin agreed with Matt on a split and added that he thinks that Tech will be sweating out the Pairwise situation come the end of the season. Tim thought that Joe had the players in a spot where they can perform and predicted a Tech sweep. Harrison thought that Ferris would steal a point one night and take Tech to overtime.

Before Harrison had to leave he made sure to bring up the Super Bowl halftime show, which he thought was amazing. Those of the guys who watched it agreed and Tim talked about a video he saw online where someone put A Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton overtop of the video of Dr. Dre and Snoop Dog during the performance.

The Joe Shawhan Hour

Tim and Rob had a chance to listen to the Joe Show this week and thought there were a couple of interesting tidbits. Rob found it crazy that Joe still wears his skates from when he coached junior hockey, which are likely older than Matt. The longest conversation about the Joe show revolved around Joe’s explanation of why he didn’t pull Blake Pietilla during the Winter Carnival series against Bowling Green. Things got very heated between Tim and Matt who had very different thoughts on whether Joe’s decision was the correct one or not. All of the guys agreed that, for right or for wrong, they liked hearing that Joe had a thought process as to why he made the decision he did.

Fantasy Challenge

The Ghost won last week by scoring six points. Rob came in second with five and the other three each scored one point. Matt is now behind The Ghost by three points. This week’s edition of the challenge didn’t really have a theme name, but the teams involved were Tech and the two teams on either side of them in the Pairwise: St. Cloud State, the University of Massachusetts, the University of North Dakota and Ohio State. The leading scorer from each team made the pool of players for the guys to pick from.

There was one tangent during the Fantasy Challenge in which the guys discussed the possibility of Brian Halonen making the Hobey Baker hattrick. Tim thought he should be there, but didn’t know if he’d win and Matt thought it was nuts that Tech has a legitimate hattrick contender.

Cut for time

This week’s cut time for Patrons is approximately 62 minutes long. Harrison shared a story about his adventure of getting a flat tire in the Upper Peninsula. The guys talked about the big lake in the way of getting to Ferris State and Matt talked about his upcoming trip to the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia housed at Ferris State. The guys discussed some equipment that the Misfits may still need and their issues with keeping their equipment secure. There was a conversation about whether or not Tech plays down to their opponents and their expected goal numbers. The longest segment was the guys watching the Olympic curling and providing a little bit of RPI/PWR talk during the commercials. They dug into the opponents opponents scenarios after the curling finished.

Learn More

For additional information and more episode liner notes, check out our episode overview on Tech Hockey Guide. To make sure we can afford all our fancy equipment we purchased for the podcast and the THG website in general, please check out our Patreon page and consider joining. Patrons at our Black Level or above receive an authentic MTU jersey patch and access to extra podcast content including extended versions of our other episodes. This week’s extended version is about 138 minutes.

Mitch’s Misfits Amazon wishlist is still having items added as we figure it out, but you can take a look by clicking here and a reminder, if you rate the Podcast 5-stars, we’ll read your review on the podcast. Thanks again to our newest sponsor, Fiebke Dental in downtown Rhinelander.

Follow us on twitter at ChasingMacPod. You can submit questions through our email address, ChasingMac@techhockeyguide.com. Don’t forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Please rate and review to help us reach more people, and tell your friends. Please check out Jonathan Zamaites’ series previews every Friday and Mike Anleitner’s Old Dog in Texas column every Wednesday (you should definitely read this week’s column). Also, keep an eye out for new recruiting articles on Tuesdays. As always, special thanks to our patron saint Doc McResin for his generous donation to get this thing running, we hope you enjoy. Also, thanks to The Thank You Notes for all the bumpers in today’s episode. If you like what you hear, check them out at thethankyounotes.bandcamp.com

Nick Holmes
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