"That will probably be as big a weekend up there as they've had" in a long while, Gophers coach Don Lucia said on radio recently, referring to his team's series at St. Cloud State this weekend. "They have a very good team this year. Getting [Drew] LeBlanc back, who is one of their top players. He broke a leg, missed the majority of the year, used his red-shirt to come back."
LeBlanc, a senior co-captain from Hermantown, leads the nation with 30 assists.
"He is certainly one of the elite players," Lucia said. "They have an outstanding goalie, a very veteran D-corps. There is nothing they don't have. I picked St. Cloud to be in the top three in the league in my vote, in the beginning of the year because I liked who they had returning. And some of their freshmen have come in and scored well for them.
"I look at these next four games as critical. [The Gophers play at Wisconsin next weekend.] We are either going to be in it or out of it as far as the league as to what we do on the road the next two weeks.
"In some ways it is amazing we are sitting where we are having only swept one weekend in the league. But we have a lot of three-point weekends and we have only lost four games overall."
THE DON SAYS
* He likes playing 11 forwards and seven defensemen with the present roster: "It has worked pretty well for us now." Sophomore defenseman Justin Holl has been playing forward in recent games. "He is getting better and better up there," Lucia said. "Next year we will move him back to defense, his natural position. We have already told him that. He is continuing to get stronger. That is the biggest thing for Justin. When he came in here, physically he had a long ways to go coming directly out of high school."
Arguably, Lucia said, Holl might have been the Gophers best forward against Minnesota State Mankato two weekends ago. The Gophers were off last weekend.
