Luke Strand

$7 million, I think he said, was put into renovations there.

We see the coaches now, really, really good coaches everywhere, from Brett Riley at Ferris State to Luke Strand at Minnesota State and everything in between.

You look at that, you look at the non-conference schedules that these teams have put together.

What do they have to do, Paul, to let people around the country know that this is really good hockey being played here and it's not just...

now.

And a coach in that situation, okay, is very likely to be a coach to get picked off.

Well, let me give you a player perspective of that because Luke Strand has told me this privately and publicly today.

They went after Mason Craft before he was Mason Craft, Mr. Hockey Minnesota two years ago.

But they have a lot of talent, okay? They have a lot of talent.

But you're talking about at Minnesota State, Luke Strand, ever since he's got there, has had – um the regular season championship trophy the playoff trophy two years in a row last year they wanted to take it away from him so they shipped it away and after he won it he had to go to the airport and pick it up and he said he would gladly do that again but he thinks this year he just would like to keep it and apparently nobody thinks nobody thinks his roster is that good but uh and i go through it if you guys have looked through it uh try to find a weakness for me because i i haven't found one and i'm gonna go down and see the mavericks on a thursday night when they do the little three on three uh scrimmage for the fans and and i just i'm just shocked i really am but and that's not to take away anything from michigan deck I think they're going to be very good.

I think Bowling Green is going to be good.

I think Augustana will be good.

I don't think I can even count them on one finger because there aren't any.

Exactly.

So getting back, getting back to the CCHA, what does Luke Strand and the Minnesota state Mavericks have to do? They won the regular season.

They won the playoff trophy.

So as this all comes together right now, what are you hearing, Paul, or what are you – scene out there that you know because i'll tell you let me start it off you and i were talking about uh the ccha ballot that i had to submit right for the ccha teams and the pre-season um what do you call them all all ccha team uh and most valuable player and all that and when i started looking closer at one particular team you know i'm pretty close to them uh at minnesota state And I was going like, man, I could pick their entire roster, and that's nothing against the rest of the CCHA.

I'm just telling you that I believe Luke Strand, and I'll see his team do a little three-on-three scrimmaging on Thursday night, but I believe his roster might be the best he's had, at least since he got there.

You know, Minnesota State's had good teams when Mike Hastings was there, but this might be the very best that Luke has.

and i i just i just see them as about as good a team as there is not only in the ccha but maybe anywhere

You know, they're a solid team.

They're going to be good – you know, they're going to be coached well.

And, you know, and obviously Minnesota State's going to be coached well because we know that – what Luke Strand is going to do.

There's no question that he'll have the team ready.

You know, I was really fortunate to work with a coach when I was in Sioux City.

His name was Luke Strand.

And he always would say, like, the person makes the player.

And it just, it's always stuck with me for every team that I've coached.