Finns To The Left....Finns To The Right

(above) Freshman Juho Olkinuora recorded his second career shutout
Not sure if Jimmy Buffett was talking about the University of Denver's Finnish goaltender Juho Olkinuora, but Jusssi does have big white teeth and he's always circling around the goal mouth.  On Saturday night in Omaha, The Land Shark was stellar between the pipes and the Pioneers walked away with a 3-0 victory over UNO.

Shawn Ostrow, Jason Zucker and Drew Shore scored for DU. Scott Mayfield added two assists.

The Good News: With the victory the Pioneers clinched third place in the WCHA.

The Bad News: They fell a spot in the Pairwise to 13th.

20 comments:

du78 said...

DU stayed at 13 in PWR. UNO dropped out as TUC and BSU stays in it with its win over UAA. If BSU and Minnesota win tonight, Wisconsin comes to DU in first round; otherwise,BSU comes to DU.

dusince59 said...

The Finn must be considered for the MVP of the team. Where would they be without him?

Anonymous said...

That's a great pic DG! Great win!

Anonymous said...

DU played for 60 minutes as a team last night -good gap control, active sticks, feet moving. Great road hockey - came out,built a lead, demoralized the opponent in their own barn.

Dropping a spot in the pairwise should keep DU motivated tonight.

Finish them, boys. Or maybe it's Finnish them.

dggoddard said...

Congrats to Gwozdecky and our coaches on DU's 11th straight season with 20+ victories. I'm not so sure that this hasn't been their most challenging season of the eleven.

Juggling the injuries of some of our best players has been gravity defying.

How incredible has it been to roll the dice on the season with a Freshman last-minute goaltender recruit multiple times?

miller said...

Props to Steve Miller, he always seems to find some great recruits. Great goaltending will certainly help on the journey to Tampa.

GO PIODS

Anonymous said...

Is it true that Michigan is the only school with more consecutive 20 win seasons now? I thought I read/heard that somewhere.

dggoddard said...

Michigan has 25 straight 20+ seasons.

Aluuum said...

D.G.--any way to watch the game tonight?

vizoroo said...

Have to share this comment froma Michigan Tech fan. It is just too good.bigblue_dl said, "They're CC fans, they never had credibility. How can anyone have respect for DU's pathetic lap dog?"

Anonymous said...

You can watch the fame on America One

old pio said...

I commented quite a bit last night (you? seriously?) about the NBC announcers who persist in pronouncing JZ's name "zooker." They've done it all season. And there's evidently no feedback. Really second rate. Maybe next time we're on their air, Eric can let these cliche-a-second clowns know how to pronounce the name of one of US hockey's elite players.

A terrific, 60 minute effort last night. DU made UNO look much worse than they really are, IMO.

Anonymous said...

Far be for me to complain about watching DU in multiple camera HD on an NBC TV network that reaches 75 American million homes - we've come a long way from the days of Norm Jones and three cameras on Mile-High Cable.

DU played a complete game last night - solid in all zones and special teams. Let's hope that they can perform at that level the rest of the way. If they can, we'll go deep into the post-season.

Jordan said...

A question for anyone who might actually understand PWR-

If we end up playing Bemidji, swept them, and if beating them twice somehow ends up dropping them out of TUC, could DU end up "winning" its way out of the tournament?

I know that wins that negatively affect your RPI are discounted, but what about wins that drop you Pairwise comparisons?

old pio said...

So you don't care that these idiots can't/won't pronounce the name of one of our star players correctly? Let me just say, getting names right is job one for play by play guys. Absolutely imperative. And the number of cameras, or butts on the couch is certainly important. But doing the basics is also important. Last night those guys were poorly prepared, used cliches more than necessary, and constantly worked hard to keep UNO in the game. Let me give you just one example (among many): DU finally goes on the power play for the first time and those two idiots informed us of UNO's lethal PK and how many shorties they'd scored. This came first. Followed by the acknowledgment that oops, DU has one of the country's best power plays.

It may be of little concern to you but with all the resources of NBC and their multiple camera angles and HD and all the rest, it doesn't strike me as unreasonable in the slightest to expect them to get the pronunciations right. Especially since "Zucker" isn't exactly the hardest name those idiots are ever going to have. And frankly, I'd expect a DU fan to be at least a little unhappy that they haven't gotten the kid's name right now, for three freaking games!

Anonymous said...

Apparently Zucker asked for his name to be pronounced rhyming with "booker" during the WJC's, instead of rhyming with "trucker." So it's not a black and white situation, in fairness.

DU did also change the media pronunciation of LaLeggia to La-LEDGE-ee-uh which is clearer, IMO.

They did say a bunch of names about 8 different ways that weren't one of the correct possibilities, though. Definitely the backup NBCS crew. Back in the studio, watching Kerry Fraser try and get through saying "Juho Olkinuora" was entertaining and painful at the same time. Just say "yussi!"

old pio said...

Well, if that's true then it reminds me of Tony Dorsett. After being pronounced "DOR' sett" for his Heisman winning college career at Pitt, he became "dor SETT" with the Cowboys. So assuming that's correct, I'll take back some, but not all of my criticism. After leading the University of Houston to three straight final 4's, Akeem Olajuwon announced his name was "Hakeem" Olajuwon. It's curious, the customized wrought iron gates of his mansion in Houston have "AO" not "HO" initials on them. Oh, well.

As you point out, JZ's is not the only name at issue here. I've lost track, was it NBC that gave us four or five versions of how to pronounce Gwoz' name?

Anonymous said...

A nationally televised game and we get two hayseeds who cannot pronounce names, use mind numbing catch phrases, and ramble on about meaningless topics? Give me the ROOT announcers any time.

Anonymous said...

http://www.denverpost.com/dontmiss/ci_16623872

This article from Chambers is from November 2010. Unless Zucker has changed his mind since then, his name is pronounced exactly how it's spelled. The rest of his family goes by zook-er.

Also, the media guide for DU doesn't provide a pronounciation for it so that would indicate that you pronounce it exactly how it's spelled.

This sounds like a question for the Bacher blog.

anonevermore said...

Old Pio: your rant about the pronunciation of Zucker is funny. My dad (from Europe) always used to correct the announcers when they DIDN'T pronounce it "Zooker."

I didn't think that the announcers on Friday night were that bad. I've heard worse (see Wisconsin broadcasters).