Malosky makes decision to leave on his own terms
Ever since UMD’s football season ended, the questions about coach Jim Malosky’s future had continued.
After taking an interim year off to recover from the after-effects of a mild stroke that he suffered last May, the 70-year-old Malosky had seemed driven to return to the sidelines full-time, following a year in which the Bulldogs were guided by the co-coaching tandem of Jim Malosky Jr., his son, and Vince Repesh.
Would Malosky return? Was he sufficiently recovered to resume full-time coaching? Was he being forced out by the administration? If this is a good time for the transition, why was there such a long wait to come up with the answers?
Malosky himself answered all the questions Wednesday afternoon at the UMD physical education building:
No, he won’t be back, after all.
Yes, he is pretty nearly 100 percent recovered from the effects of the stroke, probably enough to resume coaching.
No, he felt nothing but full support from the administration and athletic director Bob Corran, and he made the decision entirely by himself and his family.
And UMD waited this long for the decision because, out of respect for Malosky, he was given as much time as he needed to make a final decision, and then still more time to be sure it was the right one.
“This was entirely my decision,” said Malosky. “I could have come back for another year, but what would I be going to prove? That I’m a stubborn jackass?”
Then he cracked that familiar old Malosky grin and added, “I think I’ve already proven that; I don’t need to prove that anymore.”
After guiding the Bulldogs for 40 years, and with a 255-125-13 overall record that includes the most victories of any NCAA Division II coach, and MIAC championships in 1960, ’61 and ’73, and Northern Sun championships in 1979, ’80, ’85, ’90, ’95 and ’96, Malosky will resign as of July 1.
Malosky, who is from Crosby, Minn., and graduated in 1951 from the University of Minnesota, started coaching as only the third UMD coach in 1958. Forty years later, he and his wife, Lila ?????????????????????????????????????? made the decision before the two went on a recent Caribbean cruise.
“I made the decision two or three weeks ago,” said Malosky. “My family was comfortable with it.
“I feel fine. Generally speaking, I’d say I’ve just about made a full recovery from the stroke except for my left hand. I can use it and everything, but if I pick something up and hold it for a couple of minutes, I might drop it and not feel it. But I feel fine, I just get tired. And I’ve never been tired in my life.
“I’m not in as good shape as I’d like, but I’m back to going 25 or 30 minutes on an exercise bike. Although I only went 15 minutes this time because I had to get ready for this,” he said, meaning his farewell press conference.
Last fall, Malosky was close to the team, starting in the press box but then using a cane to hobble around on the sidelines. He had been planning on having knee replacement surgery when he suffered the stroke, and he had to delay it during his recovery.
“Last fall, I wanted to be around but I’d lose my concentration during the games sometimes. I’m a hands-on coach, and the worst thing was being around and not running things. The best part was that I didn’t have to be there for the preparation; I could just go there and ride around on my golf cart.
“My knee? That feels fine. That’s the best part of me, now,” Malosky laughed about his new knee.
Athletic director Bob Corran said he was willing to wait until Malosky made his decision, no matter how long it took.
“We talked about what was needed, and about progress of the program,” Corran said. “We put everything on the table, and he took his time with it. He told me his decision just before he went on his trip. I told him to make sure he wouldn’t second-guess himself that we’d wait until he came back from the trip. He came back to town Sunday, and I asked him how he felt. He said he still felt the same.
“This doesn’t make it the best time for us to be starting a search for a new coach, but we wanted to give Jim all the time he needed,” Corran added. “We’ll have a job search as quickly as possible. We’d like to conduct the search by mid-April, and have a coach here by May 1, ideally. But we’re not going into it with any preconceived ideas about an established veteran coach or a young coach.”
Malosky said, “Typically, we haven’t made too many plans, except we’re going on a trip to Norway.”
And as summer starts to fade, will Malosky have some second thoughts?
“I’ve been at it for so damn long, I don’t know how it’ll be,” Malosky said. “But I can relax at the end of August, and there’ll be no meetings. I’m looking forward to that part of it.”
Greenway, East rise to puck peak
There were some dramatic games in the Up North region last week. For one, how about Duluth East reaffirming its focus after a couple of wayward weeks with a rousing 7-1 rout at Cloquet? Or, how about Greenway of Coleraine skating onto the Hippodrome ice and whipping Eveleth-Gilbert 5-0?
Meanwhile, at the DECC, games can’t get much more intense than the 2-2 tie between Marshall and Silver Bay.
The most dramatic moment of the whole season in Section 7 might be the seeding meeting, when representatives of all the teams gather to vote on how to seed the sectional hockey tournament.
It appears Elk River, which shouldn’t be in Section 7AA geographically, will be top seed. The Elks beat Duluth East early, and that’s the only game they’ve had against Section 7 teams. The Elks did, however, knock off Hill-Murray and have reaffirmed their No. 1 station in the Up North state ratings with a 17-1 record.
The question is, who is No. 2 in 7AA? Duluth East, which beat Greenway, but lost to Hibbing; Greenway, which lost to East and split with Hibbing; and Hibbing, which beat East and split with Greenway but faced a major hurdle at Eveleth Tuesday, all had a right to claim the No. 2 slot.
East lost to Hibbing, Hastings and Hermantown in a four-game stretch that could mean the ‘Hounds should avoid schools with names beginning with an “H,” but they came back a little in a 4-3 victory over Grand Rapids, when coach Mike Randolph switched Ross Carlson and Nick Licari to defense. After the shakeup, Randolph put Licari and Carlson back up front, and the ‘Hounds played one of their best games of the season to throttle Cloquet 7-1. It could have been worse; Mike Marshall and Zach Burns scored twice each and East led 7-0 before Cloquet scored during the running-time conclusion.
“Before we lost to Hermantown, our last loss in the Lake Superior Conference had been in the ’94-’95 season to Denfeld,” said Randolph. “I had heard enough glass at practice to realize our guys were shooting for the corners so much they were missing the net. So we concentrated on shooting for the middle of the net.”
A bigger question was who would win the Iron Range Conference. Greenway, by winning an extremely impressive 5-0 game in the jam-packed Hippodrome on Saturday night, improved to 7-1 in the IRC, reaffirmed its grip on No. 1 in the Up North Regional ratings, and climbed to No. 3 in the Up North State ratings. Eveleth dropped to 9-2 in its bid to repeat as IRC champ. Hibbing took an 8-1 record into Tuesday’s showdown at Eveleth, having beaten the Golden Bears by a goal in their previous meeting. Eveleth is 18-3 overall, but slipped to 9-2 in the IRC.
“I really have no clue about what it takes to win the IRC,” said Greenway coach Pat Guyer. “We’ve got this thing with 2-point games and 4-point games, but then somehow we play one less IRC game than Hibbing. We’re told that if Hibbing beats Eveleth (Tuesday), we could still get the most points, but we wouldn’t be IRC champ. I think if we don’t win the IRC, I’ll make up a trophy myself and present it to the team.”
The Raiders outshot Eveleth 29-14, including an 11-2 edge in the second period when Greenway had to kill a couple of power plays. Freshman Gino Guyer scored the first goal, Mike Forconi the second, and Josh Miskovich — a senior with no college offers yet — scored the last three.
The Raiders got Eveleth off-balance at the start, put them away with three second-period goals, and made it appear that playing a tougher schedule against AA teams might have been worthwhile.
In Class A, the Silver Bay-Marshall game had all the intensity of a game with seeding as a reward, but it appears Eveleth-Gilbert will be No. 1 seed in the north of 7A, while Silver Bay will be No. 1 in the south and Marshall No. 2.
“We’re locked in as South 2,” said Marshall coach Brendan Flaherty. “Silver Bay will be South 1, and we’ll be South 2.”
That was because Marshall lost by a goal at Silver Bay, when the Toppers were without ace defenseman Tony Tomaino and forward Eric Mendel. In Thursday’s rematch, Mendell’s opening goal gave Marshall a 1-0 lead, but Silver Bay defenseman John Conboy scored the tying goal on a power play midway through the second period, and assisted on Andy Martinson’s goal in the last minute of the middle session. After each team had had a turn with the lead, Jon Blomqvist tied the game for good with 58 seconds left in regulation time.
For good measure, Marshall also defeated a very good Hayward, Wis., team in a 1-0 battle last week.
UP NORTH BOYS HOCKEY RATINGS
STATE
1. Elk River, 17-1
2. Roseau, 19-1
3. Greenway of Coleraine, 16-4
4. Eagan, 18-1
5. Hastings, 16-4
6. Duluth East, 16-5
7. Hibbing, 16-4
8. Eveleth-Gilbert, 18-3
9. Roseville, 17-3.
10. Hill-Murray, 15-3-1
REGIONAL
1. Greenway of Coleraine, 16-4
2. Duluth East, 16-5
3. Hibbing, 16-4
4. Eveleth-Gilbert 18-3
5. Hermantown, 16-3-1
6. Marshall, 12-5-2
7. Silver Bay, 14-5-2
8. Hayward (Wis.), 15-2-1
9. Proctor, 9-11-2
10. Grand Rapids, 7-13
Roseville 5, Burnsville 0
[Please fix the overall tournament lead to have Duluth playing ROSEVILLE in tonight’s 9:15 semifinal…And use this as a folo.]
ROSEVILLE 5,
BURNSVILLE 0
In the opening day finale, the Curtin sisters put on a show as Roseville avenged the only mark on its otherwise-perfect season by beating Burnsville 5-0.
The Raiders scored three goals in a 1:16 span late in the third period to break open a tight, 2-0 game. Ronda Curtin scored two of those three to complete a hat trick in the game, while sister Renee settled for just one goal, and Jodi Winters made 18 saves for the shutout.
Burnsville had tied the Raiders in the South St. Paul holiday tournament, and, after a scoreless sudden-death period, beat Roseville in a shootout. By high school rules, the game counts as a tie, so the Raiders are now 25-0-1 for the season to Burnsville’s 17-5-4.
Curtin sisters escaped from determined containment attempts by Burnsville to set the tone. Senior Ronda Curtin, the favorite to be named Ms. Hockey on Sunday, scored the only goal of the first period, at 14:12, wnen she faked goaltender Andrea Smith down at the right post, then zipped around behind the net to score on the wraparound at the left post.
Sophomore Renee Curtin made it 2-0 in the first minute of the second period. Stationed 5 feet to the left of the crease, the younger Curtin sister watched the puck come in from Leah Peyer to Erika Mortensen, and the sophomore sent the puck across the goal-mouth. Renee Curtin stepped in and, with a flick of her wrists, snapped a backhander almost straight up, bulging the netting in the roof of the goal at 0:59.
With 4:21 left in the third period, Ronda Curtin moved in on the left side and rifled a power-play shot into the left edge. Forty seconds later, Ronda circled in center ice and broke in on the right, scoring from the circle. And 35 seconds later, Alyson Sundberg completed the scoring.
Bulldogs shut out Seawolves…and tie
The good news was that UMD goaltender Tony Gasparini shut out the Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves on Saturday night.
The bad news is that the Bulldogs, likewise, failed to score.
The result was yet another weird chapter in this season of frustration by the hard-working Bulldogs, who had lost the Friday opener 5-3 under more curious circumstances.
“We got a point without scoring a goal Saturday night,” said UMD coach Mike Sertich, whose team has only 10 points in 22 WCHA games this season. “We played pretty well Saturday night.”
The Bulldogs were outshot 36-31 in the scoreless game, which was the fourth 0-0 tie in WCHA history, with three of those involving Alaska-Anchorage.
“They were pretty aggressive, but we didn’t have the kind of individual breakdowns that killed us Friday night.”
If individual breakdowns in decision-making or defensive coverage hurt the Bulldogs, so did another in a series of strange goal calls that have conspired to foul up the ‘Dogs all season. Twice this season goals that were clearly in the goal were declared nongoals, when UMD had apparently scored. Saturday night, there was a different twist on the scenario, but again it was UMD that paid the price.
After leading 1-0 and 2-1, the Bulldogs were victimized by three goals in a five-minute span that vaulted the Seawolves to a 4-2 lead and an eventual 5-3 victory. But the fourth goal came after a scramble, when bodies piled up near the crease, Gasparini was down, and play stopped.
Referee Buzz Christensen discussed the situation, then talked to the goal judge, then declared a goal for the Seawolves.
“That one still hasn’t gone in,” said Sertich. “So they get a goal that wasn’t in…I guess that’s just another part of this year.”
Often, the weather in Anchorage is milder than in Minnesota, because of ocean wind currents. Last weekend, it was frigid, below zero, in Anchorage. The Bulldogs left at 2 a.m. Sunday morning, after the game, and flew to Seattle, then to Minneapolis, where they boarded a bus for the ride home. The trek finished in Duluth at around 4:30 p.m.
Back home in the DECC this weekend, the Bulldogs will face Michigan Tech Friday and Saturday, in a battle of the WCHA’s eighth and ninth teams. The Bulldogs are 3-15-4 in ninth place, while Tech is 7-15 in eighth.
If UMD has any hope of rising from the cellar, this weekend is pivotal, because the ‘Dogs trail Tech by four points and have only six games remaining. After Tech, UMD has a weekend off, then entertains Minnesota before going to Colorado College to end the regular season.
The Bulldogs claimed their first two WCHA victories by sweeping Tech 5-2 and 6-2 in Houghton back in early December. The Huskies are fresh from being swept by first-place North Dakota, after being swept at Minnesota two weeks ago.
COLLEGE PUCK NOTES/Duluth’s Dave Spehar made the trip to Colorado College with Minnesota last week, but coach Doug Woog didn’t have him dress for the Friday game. Spehar has eight goals, but none at even strength, despite generating several scoring chances for himself each game. Woog said on the game’s broadcast that the staff decided which players to dress to give the Gophers the best chance to win. Apparently, the staff decided it didn’t need goal-scorers. At any rate, after the Gophers offered little resistance in losing 5-1, the coaches decided to dress Spehar for the second game, although they did not decide to bench the 19 players who failed to score Friday. The Gophers lost 2-1 Saturday, and stand in seventh place at 7-10-3 for 17 points.
Harvard’s women’s hockey team is ranked No. 1 in the nation, but had never beaten New Hampshire until Saturday night, when the Crimson beat UNH 4-2 amid a flurry of significant performances. Goaltender Alison Kuusisto, a freshman from Duluth, got her third start and won the game; Angie Francisco of Duluth scored the goal that lifted Harvard into a 2-2 tie; and A. J. Mleczko scored her 18th goal and added her 41st and 42nd assists for 60 points, breaking the school single-season record of 57 points, set last year by Francisco.
Sanya Sandahl
SANYA SANDAHL/ATHLETE OF THE WEEK
School: Duluth Central.
Team: Duluth Dynamite
Sport: Girls hockey
Quick stats: The Dynamite reached the state tournament with their first Section 8 girls hockey championship in a 4-3 victory over Hibbing. While compiling a 20-4-1 season, Duluth was outshot quite often, but the goaltending of Sandahl rendered it meaningless. Hibbing outshot Duluth 31-18 in the section final, but Sandahl’s 28 saves secured the victory.
For the season, the senior — and the only Central participant on the Dynamite team that also includes East and Denfeld girls — has a 1.30 goals-against average and a save percentage of 94. She never played hockey until eighth grade, but now has hopes to study, and play goal, at an eastern college, maybe Princeton or Cornell.
Coach’s quote:
“Sometimes we don’t play our best unless we’re facing a top team, but Sanya is always consistent. It seems like our players get overlooked when it comes to post season awards, so it’s great to see Sanya as a finalist for the top senior goaltender award.”
—Jack Shearer, Dynamite coach.
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
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