Internet Rumor Hasn't Been Confirmed Or Denied
Jason Gregoire Articles From LetsGoDUAt this point its nothing but an internet rumor that hasn't been confirmed or denied by anyone associated with DU's hockey program, but there's a chance that Jason Gregoire's verbal commitment to DU might be in jeopardy.
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Gregoire is considered to be one of the best college hockey prospects in the USHL and verbally committed to the University of Denver back in January.
On Friday afternoon an anonymous comment left at LetsGoDU sparked immediate concern amoung Pioneer hockey fans.
"Here's a bombshell that you can take to the bank as fact. Jason Gregoire re nigged on his verbal and instead because of a pushy father has signed with North Dakota since it is closer to home. This from a reliable source is true as you will see in the comming days..."
Obviously this could all be a hoax, but there are several factors while not proving the story, certainly don't discredit it.
Timing: With Jonathan Towes signing with the Blackhawks last week certainly opens a roster spot on the Sioux next season. That might explain why the story is coming to light now.
Letter Of Intent: DU never announced Gregoire signing a Letter of Intent. In fact, a Lincoln newspaper story last month implied that Gregorie was still making up his mind on whether or not he was going going to play in Lincoln next season. "Gregoire said that a roster spot was available for him next season at the University of Denver, but its staff was open to him returning to Lincoln for another season." DU was supporting the decision and would welcome him in 2007 or 2008. Perhaps the Gregoire's were holding off signing the Letter of Intent with DU while his family reconsidered UND.
Distance: Certainly Grand Forks is only 150 miles from Winnipeg so its more than possible that playing in front of his family at UND is a factor in reconsidering his decision.
Hoax: Could the rumor be a hoax? Certainly the rumor could be false, but the poster had to know key details of Gregoire's recruiting process. This rumor was not started by another WCHA school.
Repercussions For DU: If true, losing Gregoire is a major blow for DU recruiting. Gregoire was considered by Heisenberg's Site to be one of the top college prospects in the USHL. While DU might not have expected Gregoire until the 2008, losing a prospect of Gregoire's stature is a major blow. However when a prospect makes a Verbal Commitment, the school eases off recruiting other athletes, who in turn sign with other schools. Obviously you can't go back and sign your second choice after you've told him to look elsewhere.
Conclusion: With each passing day, and no denial from anyone at DU, this rumor starts to get legs. While still a rumor, I'm inclined to believe it. If true, its certainly bad news for DU hockey fans.
40 comments:
I doubt DU will comment on this as they do not make any official announcements about recruits until LOIs have been signed. Verbals are typically reported from a recruit's junior/HS team not from the college. As far as anyone knows Gregoire has not signed an LOI anywhere and his junior team did report that he verballed to DU. Anything beyond that is rumor.
If he's already signed a LOI with North Dakota as reported they'll probably make an announcement soon.
I used to blame Blais when he was at UND for over-recruiting and jerking his players around but obviously Haks was a part of that since the same sort of crap is going on there since Blais left.
They've got an ugly track record. Apparently they're pushing ANOTHER goalie (Grieco) out and have booted transfer Shea Hamilton (probably to make room for Gregoire). No wonder the USHL player of the year couldn't cut it there. Thank god Beaverson told them to fuck off.
Are all the head games a result of the unceasing wind?
And oh yeah ... Heisenberg's list is just that. A list. It isn't any sort of ranking.
dggoddard said...
Donald,
Heisenberg's List may not be a ranking, but it sure ain't alphabetical either. Funny how in past years Stastny & Carle were on or near the top of the list.
Interesting backstories on UND.
Very frustrating situation for us.
DG:
Many recruits can be placed higher or lower on Heisenberg's list based on some obvious things and Chris does so. But implying that he ranks the players is misleading to those readers who aren't as aware of such things (i.e... RUBES).
We'll see how things shake out closer to the beginning of the season. But I've got a sticky now on my desktop for a post on my blog examining some of the (shall we say) less than savory situations over the last decade with regard to UND recruiting. I've got at least three other players (in addition to the ones I mentioned above) in mind and will have to do a bit of research but my perceptions leave me with the initial judgement that they just don't deal with some kids forthrightly.
Well, I haven't heard anything here in Lincoln, NE about Gregoire going to ND. Usually the local paper is good about announcing stuff like that about Lincoln Stars players. Being the greedy fan I am, I hope Jason comes back for another year with the Stars. He's such a well rounded player. If I hear anything here in Lincoln, I'll let you guys know.
ok donald? what do you have on und? cant wait for this blog article.im not even a sioux fan but some of your findings are plain ass crap..uaa may make a ncaa tourney in your lifetime...
Grieco is not being pushed out by UND, and Shea Hamilton is still on the team and will be playing this season at forward.
Tim,
Total speculation on my part but the "Returning to Lincoln" story may have just been a ruse to delay signing a Letter Of Intent with DU.
Perhaps he needed more time to make up his mind or perhaps UND needed more time to free up a scholarship (Towes going pro)...
Why the hell would UND kick Greico off the team? So Aaron Walski could be the backup goalie? That makes alot of sense.
I thank God Beaverson told UND to fuck off too. He sucked.
First of all, it is true that hamilton is no longer on the team. I have a good source on that. Unless the source(s) were lying, it is true. And I don't think they would lie about this.
As for the Grieco situation, he will in fact be coming back to the Sioux. From what I understand, the coaches just suggested that a year in juniors may be helpful, but that could be misinformation. The latest report though is that he will stay at UND and try to develop that way.
And yes I have good sources, so please believe me, especially on the Hamilton situation. The Grieco one is a little more cloudy.
UND goalies and/or goalie prospects screwed by Blais/Haks:
Marc Ranfranz
Aaron Vikar
Aaron Schweitzer
Layne Sedevie
Josh Sembida
Marc Ranfranz was a walk-on. There is no way he got screwed.
Aaron Schweitzer won a NC as a freshman, then got injured early in his sophomore season. Due to this Karl Goehring was given a chance to play and did pretty well. Goehring was now considered UND's #1 goalie. Schweitzer didn't like this an left the team. I'm not sure how this means he was screwed.
Josh Siembida simply went down the crapper and ended up being the backup at Quinnipiac.
there is probably no comment on this situation because north dakota as per team policy " is handling internally" hahaha
The following comment was left on Gregoire's wall on Facebook on May 19th:
"good luck up in denver. i got a couple cousin's who go there, ill tell em to watch out for ya"
I'm assuming his friends know what's going on...
Donald said...
No wonder the USHL player of the year couldn't cut it there.
:D :D
And how did that USHL player of the year do at UAA? :)
I can't believe that someone just brought a Facebook comment into the argument. ;)
Schlossman posted a comment on the Sioux hockey blog in reference to the Gregoire situation:
"Stay tuned on that."
Brian:
He did quite well scoring 14 goals and 18 assists on one of the better lines in the league leading the team to both it's first WCHA Final Five appearance and victory. He played up to the potential that he'd shown the year before (in Lincoln scoring 26g-57a) he mistakenly showed up in Grand Forks to and suffered through Blais's/Hak's mindgames to score 4g-9a.
Do you really believe that laziness or a bad attitude would account for such disappointing numbers in his nightmare year playing for Blais? If that was the case then do you really think he'd go to UAA for a year and practice with the team knowing he couldn't play until his junior season? Of course, I'm assuming those would be the reasons you'd give in an attempt to malign Fournier's skills.
Don't make the mistake of thinking that I ever say anything on these internets that I'm not prepared to answer. The kid proved he was an elite level player in the WCHA. If he hadn't been mind fucked at UND he might have proven it in a Sioux sweater ... I was glad he proved it in a Seawolf sweater.
Now ... shall we examine the shitty tactics of Haks/Blais with regard to Beaverson or should we move onto how Brian Canady was never given a chance to prove himself after he was lured away from his verbal to UAA? Sembida is always a fun one to talk about? Or how about the school renegging on Sedevie? Now they're interferring with Gregoire?
Really ... don't bother ... k?
Now queue some twisted panty UND undergrads with some comment about how UAA sucks since rebutting anything I've say is impossible for their wind-addled peabrains
DG:
Having fun yet? :D
I stopped using Facebook as my primary sourse of recruiting info after Riley Nash went to Cornell. :-)
The interesting thing about this saga is that no one is talking. And really its such a delicate situation no one has incentive to talk.
I'm sure the fact that Fournier was two years older had nothing to do with his increase in points. I mean that never happens with players. You never see a player have a rather lackluster freshman season and then have a breakout sophomore season. Heck, Fournier had an extra year to develop in order to have a good season.
But I'm sure that has nothing to do with anything. Fournier would've won the Hobey his senior year had Blais not ruined his life. Or was it Ryan Hale who ruined Chris' life by telling him to shape up over the summer?
Brian Canady played 117 games for UND. He played 36 both his freshman and senior seasons. You're right though, he was never given a chance to prove himself because he played with Bochenski or Bayda or Parise.
Wow I don't know how this post got from Jason all the way back to players that were in college years ago. Let's just wait until jason, DU or UND makes an announcement on which school he will attend.
Wait for an official announcement?
Breakup the Purse Fight between UAA and UND?
Not on my watch...
do we need to pull out the 7<0
Donald-
Are you going to login here and delete all your comments like you did on GPL?
Sticking up for Fournier... Come on.
"Chris was ineligible after the spring semester," head coach John Hill said. "He needed to take care of some things over the summer and didn't do them. I don't think school was a priority for him.
I hope Donald doesn't delete his posts. He's a gold mine for producing internet traffic.
I may have to put him on the payroll with his own column each week. :-)
DTP is fun. He irritates people pretty well. He knows he's wrong, but says stuff anyways just to tick people off. Good for him. :)
Geeezzz move on already! Are we going back to the fake $20 bills and Brandon B topic next???
Sagard:
I deleted the extensive and excellent information about UAA that I provided for the lazy rubes on GPL as a "response in kind" to having a joke about the Sioux deleted. I'm glad I did so just before being banned which proved exactly what sort of closed-minded sissies are in control of that joint (the exact same sort that are Gopher coaches).
Geez,
How many message boards are you banned from?
GPL has joined CCHockey.net as the Nazi Censorship leaders of the WCHA. Thank God I have my own blog and can't technically ban myself.
I don't think we have to worry about Brandon or Chris, both seem to be doing very well. Brandon is making "real" money now and Chris married into money so both are laughing all the way to the bank
now.
DG:
Only USCHO and GPL. They love me at tPB and even as riduclously sensitive as they are at SiouxSports they didn't delete the identical joke that I made at GPL when I posted it there. I don't know if I'm banned on the CC Black Bears board but I couldn't fathom a need to post anything there. They love me at DaHuskies too ... ok ok ... well maybe just one person there loves me ... five or six have convulsions every time I post.
Banned by CC Hockey.net
http://letsgodu.blogspot.com/2006/01/ban
ned-by-cc-tiger-hockey-board-left-i.html
It's Official He's a Sioux Recruit http://www.grandforksherald.com/articles/index.cfm?id=38666§ion=News
Don't make crap up Donald. You made the "AA" series a decent read on GPL and I've always enjoyed reading your stuff for YEARS. Then on GPL apparently you got your feelings hurt, deleted your posts and didn't even have the stones to explain your actions to GPL admin. At that point the "AA" thread was lacking due to your blanks and you received another set of walking papers.
I hope UAA gets Talafous back when their current coach bolts.
Sagard:
Gee I guess I should have CC'd you on the emails and private messages I exchanged with GPL personnel and other Gopher readers? When I got booted from USCHO I published the exact circumstances and emails on my blog (which should be some sort of testament to my openness) but didn't see the GPL situation as any big thing so I didn't bother to bring it up on my blog ...
But since you inquired here (or rather imply dishonesty on my part) is the text of one email which was I provided to one interested party (my GPL private messages included much of the same text but aren't accessible to provide in answer to your assertion that I made something up) ...
I made a comment on the Toews/Oshie thread that sarcastically accused Lucia Nanne and Sonmor of orchestrating it all. It was promptly removed. I
then made a comment exhibiting my surprise that the moderator would do such a thing. It was promptly removed also. I scratched my head briefly, laughed incredulously and determined that if my words weren't good enough for the board then the board wasn't good enough for my words. So I removed all my words. It was perhaps a bit reactionary and spiteful but then again in the grand scheme of things its minor.
This season I visited tPB board and had a good
experience. I visited St. Bob's board and interacted positively with "most" of the fans without having any words edited even though I engaged in some harsh exchanges with a couple of their biggest dolts. I visited SS.com with reasonable results and had a number of positive interactions and a couple of negative ones ... again none of my words were edited at those places. I swapped Blogs with DU's blog author for a week. All of these things I did in order to interact with fans of other teams. This past week I even somewhat neglected my blog (usually I post
there at leat 4 times a week and have only made two posts this week) in order to spend time at GPL. I even tip-toed around a bit to avoid some obvious
sensibilities among the gopher faithful.
I appreciate that besides you there are more than a few others that also enjoyed the interaction.
Unfortunately, while one bad apple doesn't necessarily spoil the whole barrel, I happened to bite into the bad one. Not really a big loss. There's PLENTY of gopher fans that will be pleased to never see me on their board again. I guess most of them take it a bit too seriously and don't realize that sometimes youhave to take the bad with the good. Although, I'd reiterate that sarcasm about the percieved "gopher conspiracy" was a dig that was more directed at Siouxfans than Gopher fans certainly wasn't that "bad". But no doubt some Sioux-trolls have colored their perceptions. In any case, I've got some catching up to do on my blog to keep my readers there satiated.
I don't need to "make up" things in some sort of vain attempt to color peoples perceptions about me ... know why? Cause I don't give a rats ass about what someone "thinks" about me.
As to your Talafous comment ... he had a better record at UAA than that pussy assistant coach behind the Gopher bench.
Donald,
You deserve your own Mastercard ad because this stuff is priceless.
As for the neo-Nazis at GPL...
Donald just sounds mad because obviously a top notch player would rather come to UND and not be guaranteed any playing time then go to UAA and get all the playing time he wants. How do you know UND even offered Hamilton anything significant? Remember he is the only one who can make the final decision, not the UND coaching staff.
Donald is just pissed off cuz DU sucks and cant make it to the frozen four in their own state
donald is just pissed off because DU blows and can't make it to the frozen four when its in their home state
DU fuckin blows
@ Dirty = Josh siembida did get screwed, he went 5-6-1 in his first season,played well though, but went an impressive 12-4 in his second season, thats called improvement, I remember hearing about this, and why it happened. Siembida was finally in a place where he had a team in front of him and he wasn't facing 50 + shots a game playing spectacular while loosing. Siembida got screwed.
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