The Old Dog has recently risen from his slumber, as old dogs are wont to do. “Slumber” however, should not be confused with “slobber” which, thankfully this Old Dog hasn’t yet started to do. At least not when I’m awake.
Seriously, I’ve been quite busy for some time, doing free-lance engineering and consulting work around the world. That’s left little time to write about the Huskies. Nevertheless, through the abracadabra of the internet, I’ve been able to watch most of Tech’s on-ice adventures this season, even if I’ve had to watch in the middle of the night, depending on which time zone I might be in.
The Story So Far
At this mid-point in the 2024-25 season, it’s time to take a look at this edition of Husky hockey. There are more and more advanced statistics about college hockey available these days, and Tech Hockey Guide has been able to provide this information to our readers and the Discord Dogs, those uber-faithful fans who make every streamed game seem like you’re in Bill’s B&B with a hundred of your closest friends and zealous fans eating pickled eggs.
Statistics though, are not interpretations and unless they are manipulated, they aren’t opinions. And the Old Dog always has opinions about Them Dogs. So let’s get started.
The first thing that strikes you about this team is that it is truly multi-national. Six Finns, seven Canadians, 11 Americans, 3 Swedes and one Russian is quite a mix. And, unlike most of Coach Joe Shawhan’s teams, the array of talent is tilted a bit more to the offensive side.
It’s also a team that has performed better in the first half of the season than Shawhan’s teams usually do. They are 9-5-2 overall and 7-3-2 in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association, good for second place behind perennial power Minnesota State.
Certainly, Shawhan inherited an offensively-oriented roster from Mel Pearson, and he had the powerful quintet of Halonen, Broetzman, Bliss, Parrottino, and Logan Pietila for several seasons, but this team is a bit different. They are still finding out how to play with each other, and, although it’s been spotty at times, there are periods in most games where that offensive talent really seems to mesh.
Despite that talent, the Huskies have played almost nothing but close-checking, defensively-oriented games. They are averaging just 2.7 goals per game, but giving up only 2.3 per game, including more than a couple of empty netters.
They blasted a hapless Northern Michigan team twice and won a game at Bowling Green with a 3-0 shutout. Still, in most of their other games, even if the final margin was greater, the Huskies were either tied or just one goal separated from their foe at some point in the third period.
Except for last weekend up in the frozen tundra of Bemidji. The Friday game was an as-usual close checking 2-2 tie (Tech scored with the goalie pulled to get there) and the Beavers eked out an extra point in a shootout.
After that game, The Old Dog had a near-meltdown on THG’s game night Discord, lamenting how the Huskies will just never get where all of their rabid fans want them to go. I unleashed my inner Lewis Black (sans several F-bombs) and posted this heart-felt rant:
I’m tired, very tired of watching boring hockey and knowing with dead certainty that even when we make the NCAA Tournament we have absolutely no real chance to win even one game. I’m going to die before that changes unless our style of play changes. And top offensive talent will never want to come to Houghton (or stay very long) if you get more ice time by auditioning for the Selke Trophy.
The Saturday game didn’t start well as Tech fell behind 2-0 after a truly lackluster first period, as BSU scored a pair of greasy goals, something they seem to do against the Huskies with regularity. The Old Dog had a second Two Hearted Ale and was resigned to yet one more disappointing outcome. Then, in the second period, Tech seemed to eat their spinach or something, and despite a bit of seesawing on the score sheet, eventually put home nine goals for a 9-5 blowout win.
I felt vindicated but still frustrated. By playing with much more offensive aggression, they crushed the Beaver’s usually stout defensive system. Why didn’t we see that earlier in the season?
As the Huskies roll forward from their current break into the tournament season and the intense second half of the CCHA schedule, what identity will we see?
I fully understand the situation. If you feel you are outgunned by the other guys, play it close to the vest, slow things down a bit, look for a couple of breaks and hope for a hot goaltender. But that’s a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Top junior players want to light up the scoreboard, and they aren’t going to clamor to go north of the 45th parallel and come to the frigid, snowy Keweenaw and take really hard classes in order to play defensive hockey. That means you are always outgunned and have to play the keep-it-close-and-try-to-win-by-a-goal-tactics. And so it goes on, season after season.
Onward And Upward (We All Hope)
If we look at the schedule, the next stop is the Great Lakes Invitational in Grand Rapids. MTU starts with Western Michigan, and there’s no way Tech will beat the shoot-em-up Broncos 2-1 or 3-2. That’s not realistic. Then, if they do win, they are all but certain to face #1 nationally ranked Michigan State the next night. Even with the Spartans losing a couple of their best players to the World Junior Championship, a repeat of last year’s 3-3 Husky shootout win isn’t the most likely outcome.
Next, they head to Palm Springs in California where they will tackle UMass-Lowell, currently ranked tenth in the national polls and eighth in the Pairwise ratings, carrying a 10-4-2 record, in the first game.
After these tournaments, it’s all CCHA-all-the-time until the regular season wraps on March 1. The Huskies have an outside chance to climb in the Pairwise all the way to an at-large berth in the NCAA tournament, but the holiday tournament games are critical and they can’t afford to loose more than a couple of games in the rest of the regular season to do that.
Failing that, which is a tall order, Tech needs to again win the CCHA playoffs and keep the Mason Cup in Houghton. From my perspective, I don’t see them winning most of those contests by 2-1 and 3-2 margins.
Let the games begin. The GLI should be a fun start to the rest of the season. I, for one, would rather watch a 5-4 loss amidst more 6-3 and 5-2 wins. Maybe I’ll even start to slobber when I’m awake if that happens on a weekly basis.
Mike Anleitner is a 1972 Michigan Tech grad, and he was in the first class of what has become the Scientific & Technical Communications program. He also has an engineering degree from Wayne State and an MBA from Michigan-Ross. He spent forty seven years in various manufacturing and engineering positions, and is currently a semi-retired freelance engineer. He lives during the fall and winter with his wife of 50 plus years–Carol–also a ’72 Tech grad–in Addison, TX, a Dallas suburb with more restaurants per capita than any other municipality in the US. During the summer, Mike and Carol reside in Elmira, MI and avoid the Texas heat.
