Janne Kivihalme Out at Lakeville South

[xy]

Judging from football and the size of the geographic net they cast for players there, Eigner would seem to fit the St. Thomas model to a T.

[Redarmy19]

Maybe you should put as much effort into closing open enrollment in the Lakeville School District. As long as it remains an legal and viable option, your “community hockey” program is and will always be a very large community. Don’t like it, elect new school board members and close open enrollment or play Junior Gold.

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[Hockeyxyz]

I agree keepyourheadup. South has never been dirty until 2 years ago when 9 kids open enrolled-2 making Varsity as freshman that year the rest on Bantam AA and 7 last year as sophmores. More than half the Varsity roster never growing up playing in Lakeville. I'm sure when Janne was hired by South 3 years he wasn't told by the AD "Don't take many Lakeville kids, we want every kid from around the area to open enroll here because we don't care about the Lakeville Youth Players dreams to play on their high school team, the parents commitment to the program for years and the importance of community based hockey and BTW you can give private lessons to players year round to make some extra cash". Come on people what did you think the school and the South parents were going to do, sit by idly and allow this to happen. Posts on here saying it was a few parents raising the red flags, I heard it was many from the Lakeville community (North and South) as well as neighboring communities complaining. Clearly the "South Hockey Underground" got too comfortable with their antics and went way too far and somehow got the coach to buy in. A coach with that much experience should have seen the handwriting on the wall and should have put a stop to it. Let the kids play, stop thinking HS hockey will be your kids road to D1. If they ARE that good they will be found no matter what school or program they are at.

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[InThePipes]

I agree keepyourheadup. South has never been dirty until 2 years ago when 9 kids open enrolled-2 making Varsity as freshman that year the rest on Bantam AA and 7 last year as sophmores. More than half the Varsity roster never growing up playing in Lakeville. I'm sure when Janne was hired by South 3 years he wasn't told by the AD "Don't take many Lakeville kids, we want every kid from around the area to open enroll here because we don't care about the Lakeville Youth Players dreams to play on their high school team, the parents commitment to the program for years and the importance of community based hockey and BTW you can give private lessons to players year round to make some extra cash". Come on people what did you think the school and the South parents were going to do, sit by idly and allow this to happen. Posts on here saying it was a few parents raising the red flags, I heard it was many from the Lakeville community (North and South) as well as neighboring communities complaining. Clearly the "South Hockey Underground" got too comfortable with their antics and went way too far and somehow got the coach to buy in. A coach with that much experience should have seen the handwriting on the wall and should have put a stop to it. Let the kids play, stop thinking HS hockey will be your kids road to D1. If they ARE that good they will be found no matter what school or program they are at.

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Regarding the underlined part of the statement, if that was occurring, he should have known better.

I'm sure when Janne was hired by South 3 years he wasn't told by the AD "Don't take many Lakeville kids, we want every kid from around the area to open enroll here because we don't care about the Lakeville Youth Players dreams to play on their high school team, the parents commitment to the program for years and the importance of community based hockey and BTW you can give private lessons to players year round to make some extra cash".

[Hockeyxyz]

Wow, that's a surprise.

The reason?

Junior parents

The “junior parents” are NOT the reason Janne is out. Everyone knows who was recruiting at South, and there was more going on than just that alone. If Janne didn’t put a stop to any of the bs, it’s his own fault. And to anyone who is recruiting, coaches, parents, etc, you are back stabbers. I have no sympathy for you if your coach is out and you have to start all over.

[Hockeyxyz]

Twitter is full of idiots. There was absolutely no recruiting by Coach Janne or his staff and any accusation to the fact is a lie. This is 100% because of disgruntled parents who were able to bully a coward AD into forcing an outstanding honorable man to give up a position with a program and kids he loved!

As a coach, if you don’t address the known problems within your program, you are complicit. This was absolutely not because of “disgruntled parents”, some back-stabbing parents maybe, but not disgruntled parents. The recruiter(s) know who they are, and so does everyone else. They selfishly did it to benefit their own kids only, and have no one to blame but themselves. A lesson learned.

[lakershockeycoach]

Don’t have a horse in the race but I have moved from one association to another to better my kids (not recruited) and it resulted in two players that played D1 hockey. I know Janne and he did not recruit.

Why were half of his players open enrolled, and arguably no better or worse than the local talent he already had? And why were those players all allegedly paying the coach for extra training, while other players weren’t? Recruiting by at least one parent was allegedly going on for years and Janne should not have allowed it. It is against MSHSL bylaws. Kudos to the parents who finally stood up for what is right.

Of the 9 open enrolled players (who are better than the local talent, FYI) came from:

Farmington (4): who have had *checks notes* 4 head coaches in 6 years; I’d leave too.
Burnsville (1): where Janne came from.
Lakeville North (2): one who was at Gentry, one who came over from North the same time his older brother did.
Northfield (1): came as a freshman like MSHSL bylaws allow.
St. Louis (1): family moved, which MSHSL bylaws allow.

Pretty sure the 9 above plus the many currently lining up at the Open Enrollment Center in Lakeville came because the local talent was good and they wanted a taste of that. I've been watching that group for years at various tournaments (including 2 state tournaments) as well as at the HP camps and AAA that followed the seasons and they looked like a bunch of grinders that played their hearts out. Doesn't seem right that the south hockey twitter page is calling them quitters, something else is up. Probably hard for those kids to read that stuff on the school site after playing there for years. Attack the parents all you want but not the kids. Something has gone terribly wrong with that South Booster Club and the Lakeville South HS to allow those tweets to go out. Question we've been pondering on the lake was why was it just the juniors that got slayed by the dragons. Seems to me the coaching staff got caught up in what we call in my profession "The Shiny Penny Syndrome". Maybe it's time for South to back up and reflect on what I'm assuming has been very destructive to many families. Stop pointing fingers at the community but look deep within the program itself.

[goldy313]

This has been a decade+ problem in Lakeville. North did the exact same things.....if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em.....it isn’t just a hockey problem either. This is a district that runs out coaches like no other in the state.

I have said this before and I think it bears repeating.......I really have sympathy for the tax payers in the districts that whose kids get replaced by open enrollment kids benefiting off of what tax payers in another district are paying for. It happens everywhere though, not just Lakeville.

FWIW.....my eyes rolled when Randolph mentioned the situation at South. He could have picked some more relevant former coaches at the Lakeville schools than the one he referenced.

[mghockey18]

Janne is an incredible coach and even better at player development. Most of the people on this board don’t know this, but before he was involved with Burnsville/Lakeville he coached the 1995 Icemen from the ground up (Mites-Highschool). Few players of note that spent most of the years with the team:
Tyler Sheehy ( U of M - AHL)
Jordan Gross ( Notre Dame - NHL)
Mason Bergh (CC - AHL)
Johnny Wiitala (Ohio State - ECHL)
Clint Lewis (Mankato - ECHL)
Teemu Kivihalme (CC - AHL)
Garrett Reibling (SJU)
Connor Thie (SJU/UST)
Tyler Nelson (SJU)
Dylan Adler (NAHL)

There are another dozen Division 1/pro players sprinkled in there throughout the years (Fasching, Snuggerud). Any player in Minnesota would be lucky to have this man as their head coach.

[BP]

Janne is an incredible coach and even better at player development. Most of the people on this board don’t know this, but before he was involved with Burnsville/Lakeville he coached the 1995 Icemen from the ground up (Mites-Highschool). Few players of note that spent most of the years with the team:
Tyler Sheehy ( U of M - AHL)
Jordan Gross ( Notre Dame - NHL)
Mason Bergh (CC - AHL)
Johnny Wiitala (Ohio State - ECHL)
Clint Lewis (Mankato - ECHL)
Teemu Kivihalme (CC - AHL)
Garrett Reibling (SJU)
Connor Thie (SJU/UST)
Tyler Nelson (SJU)
Dylan Adler (NAHL)

There are another dozen Division 1/pro players sprinkled in there throughout the years (Fasching, Snuggerud). Any player in Minnesota would be lucky to have this man as their head coach.

He is an incredible coach. He actually should be a head coach of an NAHL or USHL team. If Stu makes a move to the USHL or college hockey this coming year as rumored - The Magicians should be all over Janne for the head job. Would be perfect with his business and making more money coaching in the winter.

[keepyourheadup]

This has been a decade+ problem in Lakeville. North did the exact same things.....if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em.....it isn’t just a hockey problem either. This is a district that runs out coaches like no other in the state.

I have said this before and I think it bears repeating.......I really have sympathy for the tax payers in the districts that whose kids get replaced by open enrollment kids benefiting off of what tax payers in another district are paying for. It happens everywhere though, not just Lakeville.

FWIW.....my eyes rolled when Randolph mentioned the situation at South. He could have picked some more relevant former coaches at the Lakeville schools than the one he referenced.


While I can agree that what’s going on at South isn’t good for high school hockey it simply hasn’t been going on in Lakeville for 10+ years. The south program lost far more than it gained 10 years ago. Example……in 2011 both Kyle Osterberg and Clint Lewis left the program. Both were division 1 players, from 2010-13 I can recall just one player open enrolling and his choice had more to do with a a conflict with the coach at his designated school. The whole mess started when North replaced their coach in 2012 and Eigner took over. Weber was run out of South a few years later and the process repeated itself at there.