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BIG TEN CONFERENCE MEDIA DAYSeptember 19, 2013Red BerensonCHICAGO, ILLINOIS THE MODERATOR: Next up is Michigan head coach, Red Berenson. In his 30 years at the helm of the Wolverines, Berenson has led Michigan to 22 NCAA Tournament berths, 11 Frozen Four appearances, and two National Championships. The Wolverines return 18 letter winners this season. Coach, if you'd like to start with an opening statement, then we'll open the floor for questions. RED BERENSON: I'm glad to see all the hockey people coming out of the wood work this time of year. At Michigan, we're excited about the new conference. I mean, we're a Big Ten school. All our sports are in Big Ten competition except hockey. I know our fans will really welcome this. I remember playing at Michigan in the late '50s, and I thought what is the big deal with the Big Ten schools? We've played in the WCHA and Minnesota had a strong program then, but Wisconsin never had a program at that point, Ohio State never had a program, and obviously Penn State didn't. But whenever we played Minnesota you could tell just from the fans it was like a Stanley Cup game, and I'm hoping that's what we get back into this conference. I think we will. Our students expect it, our fans expect it, and our players will learn to expect it. Q. I would imagine decades ago when you went to your first NHL training camp, they might have laughed at you for being a U.S. college hockey player. Did you see this day coming and how big this could get? RED BERENSON: Well, as a player, I always wanted to be a hockey player and play in the NHL. I had a lot of naysayers along the way saying that‑‑ and I'm talking about NHL general managers saying that you'll never be a pro if you go to college or you'll never play in the NHL if you go to college, or you'll never make a living in hockey if you go to college. I remember that. That's over 50, 60 years ago. But I just had something in my mind. It was important for me to go to school and have something to fall back on. If I was going to make it, I would make it. That's kind of where I am today. If you're going to make it, you're going to make it, but you're going to have something to fall back on. I've always felt that‑‑ I never knew that we'd have buildings like we have now in college hockey. Look at some of the great buildings we play in or the coaches, and certainly the growth of college hockey is amazing. So I'm not surprised that every year there are more and more college hockey players making it to the NHL. It's nice to see a lot of those kids have their degrees. Some of them will be coming back for their degrees. But, nevertheless, they've made it and they've gotten started on their education, and that's what I'm trying to represent. Q. Can you tell us a little bit about what you have in your locker room, the roster that you have, and what you're hoping to piece together this season? RED BERENSON: Well, we're coming off a not‑so‑good year. As you know, we didn't make the tournament for the first time in a long time, and we didn't deserve to. Although the second half of the year we got to be good and had a lot of momentum and nearly made it, nevertheless, there was a question of goal keeping last year and I hope we've answered that. Steve Racine finished up really strong. He was a freshman last year, and he will be our starting goalie. We did lose arguably two of our best defensemen last year as underclassmen to the pros, and we have to replace those guys with upcoming seniors. And Mac Bennett and Kevin Clare will hopefully carry that load, but also the incoming freshmen. We've got four incoming freshmen defensemen that will have to eat up a lot of ice time and hopefully grow fast into the season which promises to be one of the tougher schedules that on we've had at Michigan for some time. I think we'll be deep, and we'll be good in forward. I believe we only have one returning over ten goal scorer. As I look around college hockey, it's hard to find teams that have more than two or three returning players that have scored more than ten goals. It's hard to find teams that have players of more than one or two that have scored 20 goals. I remember in our best year in '97, we had seven 20‑goal scorers. You don't see that anymore. Maybe it's because of talent or parity, or because of goal keeping, defense, video, coaching, so on and so forth. But nevertheless, that's how I look at our team. I think we'll have some good, young players. JT Compher promises to be an outstanding freshman forward coming in. But after that, I think there is a lot of parity, and we should have pretty good depth up front. Q. How much do you think the reach of the Big Ten Network that people get coast to coast, how much do you think the reach can affect the growth of college hockey, particularly in areas that maybe don't know much about college hockey? RED BERENSON: Well, I think that's yet to be determined. But I'm very optimistic that the Big Ten Network is going to really help college hockey grow. The game will do justice if it gets the exposure. I think we'll have more games, obviously, better competition. I know the Big Ten Network is on doing a great job thus far and it should get better. I'm really excited about the potential of the Big Ten Network. Q. You've recruited a couple of years knowing that the Big Ten Conference now would be a reality. Has the conference name had an impact on recruiting? RED BERENSON: I think it has and it hasn't. There are certainly players that are up to speed now with what's happening in the Big Ten Conference or what will happen or should happen. Then there are other players that have no idea. But we've seen a lot of players that say they can't wait to play in the Big Ten Conference. So they've done their homework and good for them. I think it's going to be a plus for all those schools in the conference. Q. Perhaps the biggest reason Wisconsin was picked to win this league is given its group of upperclassmen. Is it really that big a deal? Is it that important to have that concentration of experience or is that being overstated? RED BERENSON: I've always said, Andy, you're as good as your senior class. I think that answers your question. If your seniors are the leaders and the dominant players on your team, then you have a chance to have a good season. That will bring your younger players up a lot quicker and bring them into plays, and it will set the example for them. I agree with Wisconsin being picked coming in. I mean, they looked really good on paper. They have a good returning group. Q. You guys have a history of Minnesota and Wisconsin in the College Hockey Showcase. How exciting is it to renew that rivalry that's been shut down the past couple of seasons? RED BERENSON: I think that's great.  That is the one good thing we've kept alive, and I give Joel Maturi a lot of credit for that. Because Joel is the Associate AD in Wisconsin, when he called me about renewing our‑‑ renewing Wisconsin on our schedule. I told him, I'd like to get Minnesota and Wisconsin on our schedule. From that, we've formed that Big Ten College Hockey Classic every year at Thanksgiving. So at least we continued that. I think that started 12, 14 years ago. So we've had some pretty good competition with those schools. But not home‑at‑home type that we're going to have now. So our fans didn't see Minnesota or Wisconsin in our building very often. I know I'm looking forward to it and our fans are looking forward to it as well. Q. You've coached in outdoor games. I'm guessing you've probably played in a few too way back. But what do you think about the Geno line this year, and the format of that and the way that's going to all take place? RED BERENSON: We've been really fortunate at Michigan to fall into these outdoor games. I'm a big proponent of them. I grew up playing outdoor hockey. Even one year when we toured Europe with the Canadian National Team, we played all the games outdoors. It was amazing playing in Sweden when it was snowing with 18,000 people yelling and so on. And over all of Europe was a great experience. So, nevertheless, when Ron Mason asked me if we'd play Michigan State in 2001 in what they called the Cold War, the timing wasn't great for that name. But, nevertheless, I was excited about it. I was just worried about whether or not they could put up a good rink that would be safe for the players and ice conditions that would be competitive and so on. Then I ran into Wayne Gretzky one day at Joe Louis, and I asked him about their outdoor game. Because they'd had an outdoor game in Las Vegas, remember, when he was with the L.A. Kings, and he said it was good, except they had so many bugs that were sticking on the ice, the pucks wouldn't slide. While we weren't worried about bugs in October in Michigan, but that game was a classic. That game turned out to be a terrific outdoor experience. 75,000 people, the players loved it. We had ten freshmen that year. Eric Nystrom was a freshman. That was his first college hockey game playing in the Cold War, so he'll never forget that. Nevertheless, that was the start of them. Then we got to play in Wisconsin, and we played the Big Chill at Michigan, and it was terrific. It can't get any better than that. We played in Cleveland against Ohio State, and the players just loved these games. I'm sure the coaches do. It gets a little cool, but it's good. Playing in Comerica Park will be a different twist because you've got the upcoming Winter Classic a few days later in Ann Arbor. Nevertheless, we'll put on a good show in Detroit. There will be pro hockey, college hockey, junior hockey, high school hockey, and you name it going on at Comerica Park. Our players will look forward to it, and we'll embrace it. Q. You've had so much experience at this game as a player and as a coach. Is this sport, in your opinion on the upswing with what we're seeing with the Big Ten Hockey Conference, the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, and is there still more out there for this sport? RED BERENSON: Absolutely. One of the reasons is the areas that players are coming from now. When we all started in this years ago, all the players came from Canada or northern Minnesota or northern Massachusetts. But that was about it. Now it's not unusual to see players on lineups, these are good players, from California, Arizona, Texas, and they're starting to come out of Florida and so on. We run a hockey school in the summer. There are kids from Atlanta, West Virginia. I mean, these are good players and serious players. I think that's helping grow the game, certainly the college game, because 90% of these U.S. kids want to go to college and play college hockey. Good for them, and good for college hockey. So I think we're really going in the right direction. I know the Big Ten Network will do a great job of keeping this moving. I know all the schools involved are excited about it. It's going to be great. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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