It’s the end of the month, and in keeping with a new feature started this season, we are once again taking questions for a monthly mailbag post. Submit any questions you may have – from player analysis to an inside look at the team to our projections going forward to anything about college hockey in general – and we’ll answer them in a post next week.
You may leave your questions here in the comments section or send us an email with Men’s Hockey Mailbag in the subject line to sports@dailyfreepress.com. Questions can be anonymous and you may submit more than one question. We will be taking any and all questions until Saturday night at midnight (after the final BC game), so start sending them in now!
I’m curious about everyone’s favorite topic – Adam Clendening. I feel like he was really catching on at the end of last year which was really good for us. But this year he’s kind of back to his old ways, like first semester last year. So do you think last semester was a fluke or does he actually have it in him to be a consistent and solid player on this team? Or will he forever be too concerned with goal scoring to be a defenseman?
Can you get something going on which school HE should try to get for the 12th team once Notre Dame comes in. Suggestion, RPI. Long on tradition. They bring good fans to Boston. Not a long trip. UConn – NEVER! Holy Cross, OK but no real hockey tradition.
I’m also interested in who you think should be the 12th team, or if there should even be a 12th team. My other question would be this: what do you think is the most surprising storyline in Hockey East this season? Whether it’s a team, player, whatever.
I’m interested in the emergence of the 4th line as a “go to” for BU. They bring some jump, energy and hard hitting action. Bernie said during the broadcast of the MSG game that they were BU’s best line. How’s about some coverage and love for those guys?
I’m interested in the goalie situation. Millan is getting more consistent recently, and Grant Rollheiser played very well in his last few games and he got better as the games proceeded. I believe Rollie deserves more credits and time in the net. How likely do you think Rollie will get the start in future games?
I’d love to hear specifics about the recruiting process regarding how BU finds their players. For example, I would assume that Parker is coaching nearly every day during the hockey season. And I’m assuming Powers Bavis and Gera are at BU games and practices for most of the time during the college hockey season. When do they find time to see the players?(particularly ones far away?) I’m assuming you need to see a player numerous times before making an offer to him? Are there other coaches that we don’t know about that see these players during the recruiting process?
Will Alexx Privitera ever see any playing time this year? To be completely honest i think he is about 10x better then that traffic cone Ryan Ruikka.
For BU player strength and conditioning work, how many days a week and hours are players expected/required to spend performing weight and cardio training? Do the players perform their strength training on an individual basis or does the entire team perform the work together at designated times? Finally, when the players are in the gym performing their training work, does Mike Boyle oversee every training session or does he just work with the players every other session or at some other cadence?
In your opinion, who will be the captain/asst captains on the team next year?
I wonder if Coach Parker has ever considered playing Ben Rosen at the point on the power play. When Rosen played defense, he seemed quite comfortable at the offensive end, and did a nice job of seeing the ice and distributing the puck.
What players do you think will leave early this year?
I just watched the team get beaten up by BC. Why does the coach keep playing line that appear to be struggling. He should be playing the bash brothers 4th line more. They were the only ones not to allow a goal Saturday night.
Do you think Parker shows too much unconditional love towards certain players? It seems to me that some of the “stars” get massive amounts of ice time and are pretty much allowed to behave anyway they choose on the ice with no repercussions while other hard working guys are healthy scratches or get minimal ice time. Is he afraid that these guys will be early departures if he takes a stand and benches them?
In the Beanpot:
Why not have the women’s team play in that 5:00 game on the second night. The audience gets two championship games, the women get to ‘feel’ the garden and show off their game, and two teams don’t play a meaningless game in front of 200 fans.