The Don on early signings, favorable schedule

"Gophers coach Don Lucia covered a wide range of topics on Wednesday, speaking at the University of Minnesota stage at the State Fair. Men's hockey was one of 10 sports teams previewed this day.

The Polish Eagle, Dick Jonkowski, was the emcee. Jonkowski, the longtime PA man for Gophers' baseball, asked questions and took questions from the crowd.

Here is The Don ...

On players leaving early to sign pro contracts:

"The key for us, as always, is for those teams [in the NHL] to leave our guys alone and just let them take their time. And when they are ready, they are ready and hopefully not take them out of our program too soon."

Earlier on KFAN, Lucia said there has been a lot of bleeding, not only at Minnesota but at other programs, too. One positive for the U, though, was that senior forward Mike Hoeffel and junior defenseman Aaron Ness both could have signed pro contracts in the offseason but didn't.

"We have a chance to make some noise. That's what are goal is," Lucia said.

* The Gophers only play four series this season outside the state of Minnesota. They play at CC Oct. 29-30, at Michigan Tech Nov. 19-20, at North Dakota Jan. 14-15 and at Wisconsin Feb. 18-19.

All six non-conference games are at Mariucci Arena as well as an exhibition game on Jan. 7 against the under-18 U.S. national development team.

Lucia joking around: "We go to Grand Forks, that's in another country. ... We don't have a real heavy travel schedule. All of our non-conference games are at home. So we have a real good schedule this year. It's hard to believe that basically in a month and a day or two we will be starting hockey season."

The Gophers' first official practice is Saturday, Oct. 2.

Of Minnesota's 34 regular-season games, 20 are at home. The Gophers also play two exhibition games at home, the first on Oct. 3 against British Columbia.

"You can't [beat it]. We have great fans who are very passionate. We have 10,000 people at every game. The games are on TV. It is a great place to certainly come in and play. It is a great place to coach and I know it is always a special thrill for our guys to step out on the ice and represent the University of Minnesota in front of all the fans."

On coaching staff:

"It's going to be the same as last year. John Hill has been doing this a long time. He's been the constant over the years. Grant Potulny will be in his second year. I thought he did a great job last year. He was a little bit green. He took to recruiting end right away. But he can really relate to the players because of his age. He has just turned 30 years old and obviously scored the game-winning goal when we won a national title.

"He can speak to somebody who is not from our state. He came from Grand Forks. He was one of the first recruits in a long time from outside the state of Minnesota to put on the 'M' and he certainly represented it the way we expected him to be.

"Justin Johnson is going to be here again for the second year working with our goalies as our volunteer coach. He puts a lot of time in. And he is one of those guys who is very passionate. As a volunteer coach you don't get paid, you do it for a labor of love. So we are fortunate to have him working with our team."

"My son [Tony] who graduated this spring said he wished he could play 10 more years of college hockey. It's a great honor to play at the University of Minnesota. I know all these guys feel that way.