How To Win A National Championship

in ten easy steps

Hear ye! Hear ye! The UMD Bulldogs are officially out of the basement!

That's the Good News.

The Bad News: we need the Non-Evil Huskies to prevent the Gophers from winning the league, or else we'll be travelling to that big trailer park out west to face the Evil Huskies. And we don't want that, for a multitude of reasons.

We need to keep it together in the next few weeks, because March hockey is the most important hockey of all. (Yes, I realize April is when the Frozen Four is, but you can't have April hockey without March hockey.)

Here's the plan.

I. Kick Wisconsin while they're down. They were just swept by Tech, and they're vulnerable. Go for the jugular!

IIa. Draw St. Cloud in the play-offs. Roll in, silence Kronick, and knock them out of the Final Five. We're overdue for a win against them. I like our chances in a best-of-three.
IIb. Draw the Gophers in the play-offs. Swoop down on the John and continue the Gophers' playoff woes. We played them hard back in November, and they had to cheat to win. They don't have Crazy anymore, and if they were to end up in second, they would be a demoralized team.

III. Dominate whoever we face in the play-in game. Take no prisoners.

IV. Friday night, kill the #1 seed. We'll have already knocked off either St. Cloud or UMTC, so we'll just knock the other one off.

V. Become the first winner of the play-in game to win the Final Five.

VI. With out auto-bid, win the regional semi-final (preferrably with a shut-out, like we did in 2004.)

VII. Win regional final.

VIII. Hold 3-goal lead in Frozen Four semis this time around.

IX. Hoist our first National Championship banner.

X. Riot. (Optional.)

Next year: repeat steps IV-IX.

9 more wins, baby! (Though 11 would be nice...)