Lucia Out, Motzko In as New Era of Gopher Hockey Begins

Don Lucia is out as head coach of the University of Minnesota hockey team.

Lucia steps down as the program's all-time winningest coach, having amassed 457 wins over his 19-year career as bench boss for the Gophers.  Lucia's teams won two national championships, eight regular-season titles (four in the WCHA and four in the Big Ten), and four playoff tournament titles (3 WCHA, 1 B1G).  The team made the Frozen Four five times throughout Lucia's tenure, in 2002, 2003, 2005, 2012 and 2014.

Although Lucia's track record is almost unmatched in college hockey history (prior to retirement, he was the second-winningest active coach in NCAA D1 behind BC's Jerry York), his recent resume was marred by underachieving teams and missed opportunities.  The Gophers returned nearly all their key players from their 2014 runner up finish, but inconsistent effort resulted in a disappointing seed and first-round exit from the NCAA tourney in 2015.  The team missed out on the NCAAs entirely two of the last three seasons, and five of the last ten.  This most recent season, the Gophers returned All-American Tyler Sheehy and added all-world freshman Casey Mittelstadt but were unable to make the NCAA tournament after a string of four-straight losses to Penn State to end their season.

Lucia's teams were never bad - only one of his 19 seasons behind the bench (2009-2010) resulted in a losing record - but the Gophers only reached the 30 win plateau twice during his tenure (01-02 and 06-07).  In fact, as I mentioned in my previous post, the Gophers have only made it out of the first round of the NCAA tournament twice in the last 11 years, and during that time the team has been a fairly pedestrian 237-152-44 overall (.598) as compared to Lucia's first 8 years at the helm when he accumulated a 220-96-29 (.680) overall record.

University of Minnesota Athletic Director Mark Coyle wasted little time in hiring former Lucia assistant and current St. Cloud State head coach Bob Motzko as the 15th head coach in Gopher Hockey history.

Motzko was an assistant under Lucia from 2002-2005, when the Gophers won two national championships and advanced to three Frozen Fours.

Motzko's recent resume includes leading St. Cloud State to the NCAA tournament 5 of the last 6 seasons, capturing the regular season title in three of those years (once WCHA / two NCHC), and guiding the Huskies to their first ever Frozen Four appearance in 12-13.  Motzko's teams generally play fast and aggressive, with speed and skill and a potent power play.  I have no doubt Motzko will be a great coach for this Gopher team and am excited to see him take the reins of the program.

The one disappointment here is the treatment of Mike Guentzel, longtime assistant coach for the Gophers who has been waiting in the wings to take over the top job forever, only to be passed over at the final hour in favor of his former colleague Motzko.  Guentzel had been instrumental in Minnesota's turnaround following the 'dark times' of 2008-2011; he resigned his assistant coaching duties at the end of the 07-08 season following a rift between he and Lucia / John Hill but returned to help guide the Gophers to the Frozen Four in 2011-2012.

The man is as passionate about Gopher hockey as anyone alive, and while I am excited about Motzko, I am disappointed that Guentzel will likely now never have his chance to head up the program.  Had the Gophers' been a better team this year, or had Lucia resigned on top following the team's runner-up finish in 2014, Guentzel's stock may have been higher and he likely would have gotten the job.

Motzko is still deciding on who his assistant coaches will be, and it's still up in the air as to whether or not Guentzel and first-year Gopher assistant Scott Bell will be offered a chance to return.  Motzko is meeting with Guentzel this week (and presumably will be meeting with Bell soon).  I, for one, am hopeful that Gunetzel can put aside his disappointment and still be a part of this Gopher coaching team going forward.

Motzko has big shoes to fill, and he has a roster to try and fill, too.  Sophomore defenseman Ryan Lindgren and the aforementioned Mittelstadt both signed NHL contracts, so a roster already short on goal-scoring and blue-line skill got decidedly less so in the last few weeks.

Don Lucia's first year on the job was pedestrian, but he followed it up by winning 200 games over his next seven seasons including two national titles.  If Motzko can be anywhere close to that level of performance, history will name him among the all-time great Gopher coaches.

Here's hoping it does.