I got an e-mail early this morning congratulating me on correctly picking seven of the 10 Hobey Baker finalists, more than any other media commentator. While I’m grateful for the attention and kind words, it’s still a bit odd to be congratulated for that sort of thing. I can tell you that when I brought home a quiz on which I’d gotten seven out of ten, I definitely didn’t hear anything congratulatory. I guess I’m still trying to get back to where I was with the 2007 Hobey, when I got nine of the 10 finalists.

Oh well, let’s see where I went wrong.

Wrong Pick: Ben Scrivens, G, Cornell
Right Pick: David McIntyre, F, Colgate

I kind of started to have a feeling that I was wrong about Scrivens when my friend and colleague Brad Elliott Schlossman of the Grand Forks Herald, and he doubted my pick of four goaltenders to make the top 10. I really didn’t see Scrivens falling out of the top 10 after being a fixture in the Hobey race during the season, but the truth is that once he fell from the Ryan Miller territory where he spent much of the season, he became just another Cornell goaltender with strong numbers, benefitting from a system that’s built to make him look good. McIntyre, meanwhile, is almost the opposite. He had a great year – including a plus/minus rating of +19 – on a Colgate team that, to put it kindly, wasn’t very good.

Wrong Pick: Ryan Stoa, F, Minnesota
Right Pick: Jamie McBain, D, Wisconsin

You’ll have to excuse me for not including a defenseman with a -9 rating on my list of picks. I thought Stoa was the much more likely representative of the WCHA, but I guess McBain’s high-scoring ways from the blueline were more impressive to the coaches. Either that, or there’s a whole lot of college hockey coaches who like The Simpsons. Oh, and for what it’s worth, Stoa is a +17 for the Gophers this season, to go with his 46 points. What might have hurt Stoa is that so much more of the buzz around the Gophers this season centered on freshman sensation Jordan Schroeder. Fair? Probably not, but right now, both Stoa and Schroeder are more concerned with the Gophers’ hopes of getting into the NCAA tournament.

Wrong Pick: Erik Condra, F, Notre Dame
Right Pick: Viktor Stalberg, F, Vermont

Condra was a risky pick on my part, with an even point-per-game scoring average and just 13 goals on the season, but I thought his leadership on that team along with his academics and other intangibles would make a nice package…and it probably will, for the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award, which I wrote a column about this week on the award’s site. That said, it’s hard to argue against Stalberg, who’s had a heck of a season for the Catamounts as they prepare to make a return to the NCAA tournament. Besides, he even has his own Hobey promotional site: PickVik.com.

OK, now that I’ve got that out of the way, let’s take a look at who’s left and whothe real contenders are for the award.

I’ve said before that for some of the finalists, getting to this point is a win in and of itself. They’re not winning this thing, no one thinks they are, and this honor is plenty for them.

McIntyre is clearly in this group, having shut it down for the season and getting next to no buzz for most of the season. If he’s back in the mix for the Raiders next season, though – and he probably will be, since the Devils don’t rush their prospects out of school – he’ll have an easier time putting a Hobey campaign together next season.

I’d also suggest that Stalberg’s campaign comes to an end here. It’s hard to see him getting into the Hobey Hat Trick over the other candidates from Hockey East…and let’s face it, you could put together a very solid Hobey Hat Trick consisting of Gilroy, Wilson and Thiessen.

That leaves eight players remaining, all of whom have something left to play for where the Hobey is concerned. That doesn’t mean that eight guys can win, but it does mean that spots in the Hat Trick (and invitations to the ceremony) are still up for grabs.

In the past, I’ve discussed the likely inclusion of a player from the west in the Hat Trick, and that’s the spot that Caporusso, Johnson, and McBain are playing for. They all have issues that work against them in terms of winning the Hobey – McBain’s plus/minus, Caporusso’s youth, and Johnson’s obscurity at Alaska, for starters – but I think there’s a very good chance you’ll see one of them sitting there on April 10. The way I see it, Caporusso is the leader in the clubhouse right now, but these next two weekends will be decisive.

Kalemba doesn’t strike me as a likely winner – although the fact that he plays at Hobey’s alma mater could work in his favor – but if Princeton winds up going to the Frozen Four, he’ll be hard to deny a spot in the Hat Trick. That’s probably the only way it happens, though; I don’t think that an ECAC title is enough to get him in there.

That leaves four finalists, and these are the four I think have a shot to win: Brad Thiessen, Matt Gilroy, Colin Wilson, and Jacques Lamoureux.

- Thiessen needs to win. As good as he’s been this year, and as well as Northeastern has done, there are still a lot of people who are ready to say “Same old Huskies” when they can’t get the job done (think back to the Beanpot, for example). That may not be fair, but that’s how it is, and Northeastern needs a Hockey East title or a Frozen Four berth for Thiessen to have a shot.

- Lamoureux needs an NCAA appearance. Having had the chance to talk to him for an article on NYDailyNews.com, I think Jacques is a truly remarkable young man and someone who embodies the criteria for the award as much as anyone I’ve seen come down the pike in some time. He also has the numbers with his national goals lead, but he needs an opportunity to show a national audience what he can do, and the way that happens is for Air Force to get it done in Rochester this weekend and get to the NCAA tournament.

- Wilson needs goals. The attention that Wilson has commanded on the ice for BU has certainly been a big part of his ability to set up his teammates, but when it comes to winning the Hobey, he needs probably needs a few more goals. If he can get three more goals before the Frozen Four, he should be in a good spot for a chance to win.

- Gilroy needs a trip to the Frozen Four. Gilroy’s candidacy isn’t about numbers so much as it’s about what he does to help BU win. So, his candidacy is best served by BU winning, and shaking off the lack of postseason success they’ve had for most of this decade.

 Of course, all of these guys can get what they need at the same time, which will make the final voting very, very interesting. But we have a ways to go before we get there, and as any Hobey candidate worth his salt will tell you, there’s no time for thinking about individual honors right now.

Except, of course, for me, because I blog about it.

So, here we are, a little more than a day away from knowing who the 10 finalists are for the Hobey Baker Award.

To me, this is the fun part. After all, picking the Hobey winner can be very easy sometimes, as it was last year, when Kevin Porter had it locked up early. Picking 10 finalists, on the other hand, is a bit harder.

Now, there’s been some confusion about how the process works, so I put in a call Wednesday and got the lowdown on who votes when and for whom. The 10 names that will be announced Thursday are selected by vote among the nation’s 58 head coaches. Those are the finalists who will be considered by the 25-member voting panel – which includes one coach from each conference – to get the Hobey Hat Trick, which will be announced after the regionals, and the winner, who will be announced on April 10.

(So, for those of you who were wondering how Richard Bachman could be the WCHA Player of the Year and not a Hobey finalist, the media members who gave Bachman the WCHA honor were nowhere near the process that snubbed Bachman. Makes sense now, right?)

So, let’s get started, shall we?

Louis Caporusso, So., F, Michigan
Erik Condra, Sr., F, Notre Dame
Matt Gilroy, Sr., D, Boston University
Chad Johnson, Sr., G, Alaska
Zane Kalemba, Jr., G, Princeton
Jacques Lamoureux, So., F, Air Force
Ben Scrivens, Jr., G, Cornell
Ryan Stoa, Jr., F, Minnesota
Brad Thiessen, Jr., G, Northeastern
Colin Wilson, So., F, Boston University

Breaking my list down, I have five forwards, one defenseman, and four goaltenders. I also have three players each from the CCHA and Hockey East, two from ECAC Hockey, and one each from the WCHA and Atlantic Hockey.

Now, I know there are a few things that various folks may not like about my picks, so I should probably respond to them.

THESE AREN’T THE REAL FINALISTS; THEY DON’T REALLY MATTER

Sorry, had to get that out of the way. Now, addressing the various issues:

- Only one WCHA finalist. Now, there are a couple of other players who could find themselves in the top 10, particularly St. Cloud’s Garrett Roe and the 2007 winner, Ryan Duncan of North Dakota. Roe’s been among the nation’s top scorers all season, and Duncan was the glue on a North Dakota team that did what North Dakota teams do. However, St. Cloud’s lack of success this year will probably hold Roe back, and as much as I like Duncan, I don’t see a forward averaging less than a point per game being a Hobey finalist. There’s also a couple of defensemen worth talking about, but that leads into my next point. For now, I’ll just add that as the WCHA gets more and more blue-chip talent that doesn’t stay in school for very long, the number of Hobey finalists and winners the conference produces will continue to drop.

- Matt Gilroy as the only defenseman on the list when 10 other blueliners have a higher scoring average. For starters, there’s the obvious fact that being a defenseman is as much about what you do in your end as what you do on offense, if not more so, and that’s a big part of why Gilroy is the only two-time All-American playing college hockey right now. You also have the fact that he’s the co-captain and unquestioned leader of the No. 1 team in the country, to the point where head coach Jack Parker said that Gilroy’s return for his senior year would have been worth it for his leadership alone, even if the Long Island native never played a game. There are 10 d-men who score more, but: Gregg Flynn takes a backseat to his team’s main Hobey candidate, Jacques Lamoureux;  Patrick Weircoch will likely suffer from Hobey’s anti-freshman bias; Jamie McBain will be held back by Wisconsin’s precarious NCAA Tournament status; and so on.

- The nation’s leading scorer, Bryan Leitch, nowhere to be found. Honestly, I doubt too many people outside the 203 area code will be up in arms over this one. First of all, there’s a disproportionate amount of assists among his 59 points, and it’s hard to see a forward contending for the Hobey. Second, he was voted to the All-ECAC Hockey Second Team. Leitch is going to have a hard time convincing people he’s one of the top 10 players in the country if he’s not one of the top three forwards in his own conference. Makes sense, right?

Of course, I’m not guaranteeing I’m going to be right – last year, I only got six of the 10, after picking nine the year before – but I’ve got a good feelign about these 10.

I guess we’ll find out.

I realized something earlier in the week, as I was doing my weekly call-in segment on Hockey On Campus on ESPN 890 in Boston with Bernie Corbett and Paul McNamara.

As wide open as this Hobey race is, it seems like we’ve been discussing a lot of candidates from the eastern conferences, particularly the guys from Hockey East like Brad Thiessen, Matt Gilroy, Brock Bradford, and Colin Wilson, but also Jacques Lamoureux from Air Force out of Atlantic Hockey or Ben Scrivens from Cornell in ECAC Hockey. Every now and then, we’ll get to Ryan Stoa from Minnesota or Aaron Palushaj or Louie Caporusso from Michigan, or a defenseman like Jamie McBain from Wisconsin or Chay Genoway from North Dakota, but it seems like this year’s race for the Hobey has developed into an Eastern affair for the most part.

(Cue the screams of “East Coast Bias!!”)

Now, that’s all well and good – or not – but it makes the Hobey Hat Trick very hard to figure out.

You see, I’ve been thinking lately about the first year I ran the Hobey Watch over at CSTV, particularly the last week, when we projected our Hobey Hat Trick. This was the 2005-06 season, and we came up with a final three of Ryan Potulny, Matt Carle, and Brian Elliott, with Potulny winning the award.

Of course, Potulny was nowhere near the Hobey the night it was presented, partly because his Golden Gophers had been beaten by Holy Cross, but also because he didn’t make the Hobey Hat Trick. Chris Collins did. In explaining where our voting panel had gone wrong, I pointed out that this is a national panel that votes on the award, and when there’s a qualified candidate in the East, it’d be awful hard to get a Hobey Hat Trick comprised entirely of Western players. Collins was clearly qualified, and as such, was sitting right there when Carle collected the award.

Fast forward to this year, and you can understand why the concept of, say, Matt Gilroy, Colin Wilson and Brad Thiessen in the Hobey Hat Trick doesn’t quite work in my head. It should, in theory, be just as hard to get an all-Eastern Hobey Hat Trick as an all-Western Hobey Hat Trick.

But in practice, will it be?

(Pause for more shouts of “East Coast Bias!!”)

I’m not sure, but if I’m picking a player from the CCHA or the WCHA to sit in the Hobey Hat Trick, there are several options.

The obvious place to start would be with Stoa, who’s been as consistent a presence in the Hobey conversation as any player in the west. He has more goals than any other WCHA player, and the forwards who win the Hobey do tend to be formidable goal-scorers (as opposed to forwards who are primarily set-up men). He’s come back from a season-ending injury last season to lead the way for the Gophers. Unfortunately, leading the way is less impressive if your team isn’t going anywhere special, and with Minnesota fighting for its NCAA tournament life, I’m wondering how Stoa’s chances will be affected by a disappointing season in Gopherland.

Then, there’s the Michigan duo of Louie Caporusso and Aaron Palushaj. Of the two, Caporusso appears the stronger candidate, as he’s the CCHA’s leading goal-scorer, while Palushaj is more the setup man. The thing that gives me a bit of pause is the way he’s struggled to light the lamp in 2009, with just five goals in the last two months. To his credit, though, he did average a point and a half per game in February, finding ways to be effective even when he wasn’t putting the puck in the net himself. Palushaj has a higher points-per-game average, so that may count for something, but I think Caporusso may be the best Hobey candidate in the West, and I’m wondering why he doesn’t have a snazzy website like Thiessen39.com or PickVik.com. Is KingLouie.com available?

Garrett Roe from St. Cloud State is the leading point scorer among the western conferences, but he suffers from two problems. First, like Palushaj, his goal total is a little underwhelming for the hat trick, and second, like Stoa, Roe is not likely to see the NCAA tournament, and a lack of team success may hurt (and yes, I know it didn’t hurt Matt Carle in 2006 – more on that later – but St. Cloud hasn’t won a game in the NCAA tournament, let alone back-to-back titles). 

McBain, as an upperclassmen and one of the top scoring defensemen in the country, has been another of the more steady presences in the Hobey conversation this season, but I’m wondering if his thunder has been stolen by Denver’s Patrick Weircoch. Now, Hobey doesn’t seem to like freshmen all that much – see the unconscionable snub of WCHA Player/Rookie of the Year Richard Bachman last season – but Weircoch has 16 points in 15 games since the start of 2009, at a point in the season when freshmen can be expected to “hit the wall,” and has tied McBain for the WCHA lead in defenseman scoring (not to mention the lead among the “big four” conferences). If not for Hobey’s skepticism about freshmen, Weircoch would be the West’s best hope for a Hat Trick spot (and for all I know, he may still be).

Notre Dame’s Erik Condra is another name we’ve heard a bit more in recent weeks, and while his scoring average is on the low end of this conversation, there are a few things working in his favor. First, he’s a senior and his team’s captain, and the Irish are one of the top contenders for the national championship. Second, he’s been one of the key figures in Notre Dame’s emergence on the national scene over the last few years. Third, he’s put himself in the picture with 20 points in 16 games in 2009, picking up his game over the later weeks of the regular season. The points may say otherwise, but don’t sleep on Condra as the West’s representative in the Hobey Hat Trick.

But of course, this may not be the only way to look at it. There are two other possibilities I want to float, which would certainly be a bit unorthodox. The thing is, a year like this might lend itself to unorthodox thinking.

The first possibility is that Air Force’s Jacques Lamoureux could fill in as a representative from the West. Even though Lamoureux plays in Atlantic Hockey, he also plays in Colorado, which could satisfy the geographic tendencies of the Hat Trick. I think that given the lack of a true dominating candidate, Lamoureux – with the national lead in goals (and power-play goals and game-winning goals), the intangibles that come with being an Air Force cadet, and a nomination for the Hockey Humanitarian Award to boot - is a very likely candidate for the Hat Trick, and coming out of Colorado Springs, could be the man from the West in this year’s Hobey Hat Trick.

The other possibility that creeped into my head is a little off the wall. He’s not going to sniff the NCAA tournament this year. His team is having an awful season. But at the same time, when you think about what the Hobey Baker is supposed to represent, he may be one of the best candidates for the award in years.

I’m referring to Michigan State goalie Jeff Lerg.

Yes, the Spartans are having a year that must be described as awful, bordering on embarrassing. But Lerg is hardly the culprit. After all, he’s No. 9 in the nation in save percentage, having faced more shots than any other goalie in the country (Brad Thiessen and UConn’s Beau Erickson are the only ones who are even remotely close). He also does all that while overcoming his small stature -which leaves him much less room for error than, say, Thiessen (6′ even), Chad Johnson (6′2″), or Ben Scrivens (6′2″) – and his severe asthma. He’s also an excellent student and a finalist for the Hockey Humanitarian Award. And while his season will end long before that of just about anyone else in the Hobey race, he does have that 2007 NCAA title on his résumé, and I have a sneaking suspicion that helped Matt Carle a little bit in 2006, when Denver missed the NCAA tournament. Will it happen? Probably not, but who knows?

I could be completely wrong about this, and we could find ourselves looking at Scrivens, Wilson and Thiessen; Gilroy, Lamoureux and Zane Kalemba; or some other all-Eastern combination. However, my gut feeling is that that won’t happen, and that someone in the CCHA or WCHA should make sure he has a nice suit for April 10. Maybe it’s Louie Caporusso. Maybe it’s Patrick Weircoch. Maybe it’s Erik Condra.

Maybe it’s Jeff Lerg.

I’ve got to admit, I didn’t pay all that much attention to the Oscars on Sunday night – for one thing, I was watching the Rangers’ last game under Tom Renney, featuring a three-assist performance by Dartmouth’s own Lee Stempniak for the Maple Leafs - but one thing you tend to hear around Oscar time is that for certain nominees, the nomination is a win in and of itself.

Maybe that’s why I pay so much attention to the finalists for the Hobey Baker, as much as I follow the race for the award itself. It’s certainly true that for a number of Hobey Baker finalists, just making it to the top ten, let alone the Hobey Hat Trick is an achievement in and of itself. Some names that come to mind from recent years include RIT’s Simon Lambert, Quinnipiac’s Reid Cashman, Dartmouth’s David Jones, Princeton’s Lee Jubinville, and of course, Air Force’s Eric Ehn, all of whom were the first Hobey finalists from their respective institutions. A guy like St. Lawrence’s Drew Bagnall, who could have been expected to fly under the radar with an exceedingly solid game that’s short on flair (and numbers), is another example.

So, in keeping with my general interest in Hobey finalists, I’m wondering how many goalies we’ll see in this years field.

My first year covering college hockey professionally was the 2004-05 season, when David McKee of Cornell, Dov Grumet-Morris of Harvard, Jordan Sigalet of Bowling Green and Tuomas Tarkki of Northern Michigan were all finalists. This, to me, seems to be shaping up to be another year like that, where we can see four (or more) goalies among the 10 finalists, not only because there’s a shortage of eye-popping numbers among their skaters, but because there are some truly noteworthy goaltending performances this season.

Of course, we’ve spent plenty of time on Cornell’s Ben Scrivens and Northeastern’s Brad Thiessen, but here’s a few more you might want to consider.

Zane Kalemba of Princeton may be on the verge of stealing Scrivens’ thunder. His goals-against average is now lower than his Ivy League rival’s, and Scrivens has a .001 advantage in save percentage. He also has the added bonus of an image of Hobey Baker on his helmet. Not that he’s campaigning, mind you – his Princeton-themed helmet also includes pictures of Nassau Hall and Albert Einstein – but it’s certainly fun to have a Hobey finalist from Hobey’s alma mater, as we saw last year when Lee Jubinville became the first Princeton player to be named a finalist.

At the other end of the country, there’s Guy Gadowsky’s old program at Alaska, where Chad Johnson is third in the country in save percentage and fourth in goals-against average for a Nanook team on the verge of its first-ever first rounnd playoff bye in the CCHA. He’s had an excellent year, and with so few skaters out there with overwhelming numbers, it would hardly be a surprise to see Johnson make the top ten.

I think we could see a repeat of 2005, and put four goalies in the top ten. Could we see five or six? Much less likely…Hobey doesn’t like goalies that much. Still, there are a couple of other goalies who could be considered.

Andrew Volkening at Air Force is among the top ten in the country in goals-against average, and brings certain intangibles as an Air Force cadet. Still, while the Hobey voters have recognized skaters out of Atlantic Hockey, I don’t think that the league as a whole gets enough respect that a goalie facing Atlantic Hockey forwards night in and night out can get a Hobey finalist nod. Besides, it’s fairly obvious that Jacques Lamoureux is the Falcons’ real Hobey contender.

It also might be worth keeping an eye on Jeff Lerg at Michigan State. As bad as the Spartans have been this season, Lerg is No. 11 in the country in save percentage – which isn’t bad when you get hung out to dry on a regular basis – and his personal story (which you don’t need me to repeat at this point…the grades, the size, the asthma) remains as compelling as ever. Still, it’s almost impossible to consider a goalie with a 9-17-3 record for this award, and it’s a tribute to Lerg’s outstanding on- and off-ice performance over his career that he even gets mentioned in this space.

The race for the top 10 this year may wind up being as interesting as the competition for the Hobey itself, and in that race, while five goalies may be a longshot, four is a possibility worth keeping an eye on.

If you heard a whoosh of air over the last couple of weeks, look for a flash of red: it just may have been the free-fall of Ben Scrivens’ save percentage.

OK, that may not entirely be fair, but the Cornell goalie has allowed a total of 15 goals in his last six starts, including the early exit against St. Lawrence in that 8-1 win three weeks ago. He also gave up eight goals last weekend in the Big Red’s lost weekend at Dartmouth and Harvard.

Now, I don’t say this to pick on Scrivens; he’s had a great seson, and he’s going to be a finalist for the award. As we know, though, Hobey doesn’t like goalies (can I talk about Hobey’s likes and dislikes the way movie people do with Oscar?), especially not when they come from a system that regularly produces strong goaltending numbers. Scrivens’ best shot was – and possibly still is – to get into Ryan Miller territory for the year (1.32 GAA, .950 SV%), and after the last three weeks, he’s not there (1.63 GAA, .940 SV%).

But then again, there’s no skater with an especailly strong claim to the award, either. The top two scorers in the country – Quinnipiac’s Bryan Leitch and Boston University’s Colin Wilson – have a disproportionate number of assists as part of their total, and Hobey likes forwards to have lots of goals. Jamie McBain has a higher scoring average than any college defenseman since Matt Carle in his 2005-06 Hobey season, but he doesn’t have two national championships, which is kind of important for individual recognition when your team is on the NCAA torunament bubble. Besides, we’re still waiting for the promotional appearance by Rainier Wolfcastle.

So, what does all this mean? Well, in contrast to last year, when Kevin Porter was the prohibitive favorite for the Hobey for weeks before he collected his hardware in Denver – and Nate Gerbe was mounting one hell of a challenge – there is no true front-runner in this race from a statistical standpoint.

That’s excellent news for three people in particular: Brad Thiessen of Northeastern, Matt Gilroy of Boston University, and Jacques Lamoureux of Air Force.

Why those three? Because they have a story, and that makes them more attractive Hobey candidates, particularly when there’s no clear front-runner (and when there is a front-runner, a compelling story makes that lead almost unassailable; just ask Kevin Porter).

Thiessen doesn’t have Scrivens’ numbers – even with Cornell’s recent slide – but he’s taking Northeastern, a perennial also-ran in the city of Boston and in Hockey East – and made them a force to be reckoned with. There are probably those out there who consider Thiessen’s performance this season more impressive than Scrivens’. I’m not one of them, but I think they’re out there.

Gilroy, meanwhile, was my preseason pick to fill Porter’s role as the guy who stayed in school when he had the opportunity to turn pro, and led his team to the Frozen Four. Well, that seems to be the one pick I was solid on (and if you want some entertainment, go back to my preseason “casting” and look at just how wrong I was). He’s also a guy who brings a ton of elements that don’t show up on the stat sheet, and when no one is really filling the stat sheet at what we’ve come to recognize as Hobey levels, that becomes much more important.

Lamoureux, meanwhile, is the national leader in goals, power-play goals, and game-winning goals, so he’s already got the numbers on his side as much as Wilson does (or possibly more). Add to that the idea of an Air Force cadet being up for an award named for a fighter pilot, his candidacy for the Hockey Humanitarian Award, and the fact that he was so set on going to Air Force – in wartime, no less – that he transferred from Northern Michigan, and he may be on the verge of becoming the favorite for the award.

But we shall see. Right now, it’s anyone’s race.

OK, I’ll admit it, I was briefly annoyed with myself for not asking Northeastern goalie Brad Thiessen about the Hobey race  on Monday at the Beanpot. However, the truth is, it’s not really necessary. Any player worthy of the award will give an answer along these lines: “It’s a tremendous honor to be considered for the award, and I’d love to win, but it’s not something I really think about.”

Besides, Thiessen did what a Hobey candidate should do: he let his game do the talking: 45 saves on 46 shots, backstopping the Huskies into the Beanpot final against BU.

To be fair, Thiessen should have entered the Hobey conversation more seriously long before now. He’s the biggest reason Northeastern has emerged as a force to be reckoned with on the national level these last two seasons, and clearly an elite goaltender. However, it’s hard to get Hobey consideration as a goalie when Ben Scrivens of Cornell is putting up the kind of numbers that Ryan Miller had when he “ruined” the Hobey chances for all subsequent goalies…or so we thought. 

The fact of the matter is that this is not a great year for Hobey candidates at forward. Colin Wilson and Bryan Leitch are great players, but have far fewer goals than forwards have won the Hobey with in the past. Garrett Roe fits the profile a bit better, but St. Cloud is having an underwhelming year. Jacques Lamoureux has a great combination of numbers and intangibles, but his candidacy may have slipped since Air Force has been overtaken in Atlantic Hockey. The best candidates at forward may be Ryan Stoa of Minnesota and Carter Camper of Miami, who may not be at the very top of the scoring list, but are right around where Ryan Duncan was in his Hobey year of 2006-07.

Duncan, however, didn’t have a goaltender with Scrivens’ numbers to contend with (no disrespect to David Brown), and if he did, this might be a completely different conversation.

Again, though, it comes back to numbers, which begs the question: how can Thiessen win the Hobey if Scrivens has better – even Ryan Miller-level – numbers in the net?

There may not be an answer, but if there is, this is it: history.

As good as Scrivens is, he’s thriving in a system that has traditionally benefitted goaltenders. David McKee and Dave LeNeveu made the Hobey Hat Trick in this system, but didn’t win, and Cornell is known as a defensive team. Northeastern is mostly known for playing in the oldest hockey arena in the nation, and its annual frustration in the Beanpot. The Huskies’ program is a clean slate, and Thiessen is holding the pen as his coach, Greg Cronin, authors an impressive story.

Where Scrivens is doing what’s been done before – albeit much better – Thiessen is doing something new and exciting, and if he is to win the Hobey, that will be why.

As it is, expect him to be a finalist next month. From there, well…we’ll see.

There are many things I love about the Beanpot that wouldn’t change if it were played without a single participating team in the top 10: the energy in the student section (often expressed through some nasty clashes between the BU and Northeastern sections of the balcony), the excellent press meal before the first game (as notable for the camaraderie as for the food), the energy the teams bring to the ice, and yes, Parise help me, the Harvard pep band’s arrangement of “Born to Run.”

Of course, we did have three of the top 12 teams in the country at TD Banknorth Garden on Monday, which clinched it for me to come up and check out the tournament’s first day on Monday, keeping a special eye on Hobey Baker contenders Matt Gilroy and Colin Wilson of BU, Northeastern’s Brad Thiessen, and Brock Bradford of Boston College.

On Friday, I hinted that Gilroy had the most to gain from the Beanpot as a Hobey contender, because a larger audience would have an opportunity to see the contributions he makes that don’t show up on a scoresheet. As it turned out, that’s exactly what happened.

Looking at the box score, Gilroy was a -1 in Monday’s game with an assist on Nick Bonino’s power-play goal. However, to borrow a line from Mark Twain – who was borrowing from someone himself, mind you – that -1 is an illustration of why we say there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics.

When talking about the strong play from his upperclassmen on Monday, BU head coach Jack Parker singled out Gilroy as having a “great game,” as opposed to the “good games” several of his classmates were credited with. He earned it, blocking shots and breaking up passes, especially in the opening minutes, which bore a distinct resemblance to the first round of Balboa vs. Creed (“He doesn’t know it’s a damn show, he thinks it’s a damn fight). Later in the game, he was very noticeable in keeping pucks in at the line, helping to manage the power-play

Pretty common, really. Naturally, though, it doesn’t even begin to do justice to the kind of play Gilroy made to set up Nick Bonino for BU’s game-tying goal. Gilroy won a battle for the puck along the right-wing boards, absorbed contact, stickhandled toward the net and flipped a backhand pass to Bonino to tie the game. It was the kind of play that reminds you that Gilroy used to be a forward, and with good reason: the story of Gilroy’s rise from walk-on to All-American speaks to determination, work ethic and grit, but the fact is that he’s in such high demand at the pro level because he is a tremendously skilled hockey player.

In the long run, Gilroy is a very unlikely Hobey winner – at the end of the day, it’s still very much (too much?) a numbers game – but in terms of being honored as a finalist, Gilroy did himself a tremendous service on Monday.

As for his teammate, Colin Wilson, the numbers lie again. The nation’s No. 3 scorer was even for the game with three shots on goal, but that says nothing of the attention that he commanded when he was on the ice, or the plays he was able to set up. The problem is, though, that that’s not his problem. Everyone knows that Wilson is a force on the ice, and to some extent, the numbers show it. Unfortunately, there’s one place where the numbers really don’t show the impact Wilson has on the ice.

Wilson’s biggest obstacle toward a Hobey win is his goal total, which will probably need to be at least 17 in order for him to win the Hobey (20 would be best, but I’m not holding my breath for 20). He did nothing toward that on Monday night. Unfortunate that that’s probably what it comes down to, but history is against him.

History is also against Brock Bradford in terms of his Hobey chase - BC forwards under Jerry York have no problem being named finalists for the Hobey, but have never actually won it – and in truth, his performance on Monday didn’t do him any favors, either.

Honestly, Bradford wasn’t bad. He’s a good hockey player, and he did what good hockey players do: he put himself in good position to make plays, especially early on. Unfortunately for Bradford, those plays didn’t come together, thanks in large part to Brad Thiessen, whom I’ll get to in a second. Again, people following Hockey East know Bradford is a hell of a player. The Beanpot was a chance to show everyone across the college hockey landscape just how good he is – kickstarting his scoring in the process – and that didn’t happen. Bradford is now 15th on the national scoring chart, and his Hobey campaign is running out of juice.

Meanwhile, Thiessen’s Hobey campaign should get a major surge after Monday night. Thiessen made 45 saves in the Huskies’ 6-1 win over BC, taking full advantage of the spotlight the Beanpot provides. He did it in decisive fashion, too, continuing to shut down BC long after the game’s outcome was decided. Thiessen earned heavy praise for his performance from both BC head coach Jerry York and Northeastern coach Greg Cronin, and while the real big winner at the Beanpot won’t be determined until next Monday’s championship game, for now, Thiessen appears to be the big winner to this point.

I’ll elaborate on that more tomorrow, with some comments from Thiessen and Cronin, but for now, Thiessen and Gilroy are the leaders in the clubhouse when it comes to improving your Hobey chances at the Beanpot.

I know I’ve been on the quiet side since the calendar turned to 2009, but the folks at the New York Daily News have certainly been keeping me busy. But then, that leads me to my subject for today…

Yesterday, I had the chance to go over to the MSG Training Center and talk Beanpot with Chris Drury. The BU alum and New York Rangers captain will be inducted into the Beanpot Hall of Fame on Monday, and with good reason: he was part of the first Terrier class to win four Beanpots, and was MVP of the 1996 tournament.

By the way, one thing you’ll read in that Daily News article I linked is that BU head coach Jack Parker thinks Drury should have been MVP in 1998 as well, although Tom Poti won the honor. Of course, Drury took home a much bigger individual honor in 1998, becoming BU’s only winner of the Hobey Baker, which is, of course, the award we’re most interested in on this blog.

When I was on Hockey On Campus this week with Bernie Corbett and Paul McNamara, I mentioned something I found a little surprising: only two Hobey Baker winners from Beanpot schools won the Beanpot in the year they won the Hobey. The other is 1989 winner Lane MacDonald of Harvard. Mark Fusco, Scott Fusco, David Emma and Mike Mottau were all eluded by the Beanpot in their big years. 

Of course, given the way we talk about BU’s dominance in the Beanpot, and the fact that the Terriers have produced only one Hobey winner, maybe it shouldn’t be that surprising. But the fact is, half of the Beanpots have been won by someone other than the Terriers, and it would make sense if those were won by a team that had the best player in the country that year.

So, one would think that a big performance in the Beanpot wouldn’t really mean much in terms of the Hobey race, right?

Not so fast, there.

For whatever you may think of the Beanpot – and this means you, western fans who complain about all the attention it gets – the fact of the matter is that the eyes of the college hockey world will be on TD Banknorth Garden on Monday night. That wasn’t really the case when the Fuscos and even Dave Emma won the Hobey, as even though the Beanpot was the only game in town, we didn’t have the same kind of satellite coverage available, so that just about anyone with a digital sports package can watch the Beanpot.

That makes the Beanpot a tremendous opportunity for the Hobey contenders at the Beanpot schools to get noticed in a way that goes beyond word of mouth and statistics.

And as it happens, we have several Hobey contenders in the field this year, and they could all stand to benefit from a big night or two at TD Banknorth Garden (or, as I still like to call it, the KurtCenter).

Brock Bradford from BC and Colin Wilson from BU have both been part of the Hobey conversation from the get-go, but there’s no denying that both could use a boost. Bradford has slipped off his pace since a hot start, with nine points in his last 12 games. That lands him outside the top 10 scorers in the country, and a big night or two at the Beanpot could get him right back into the top 10 in dramatic fashion, with a performance that would stick in the minds of Hobey voters.

Wilson, meanwhile, is the nation’s No. 5 scorer, but could use a goal or two. At the moment, Wilson has nine goals as part of his 30 points. That puts him on pace for 14 goals by the end of the regular season, and 16 if BU plays five postseason games. The fewest goals ever by a Hobey winner at forward was 17, by the first Hobey winner, Neal Broten, and he averaged close to two points a game in his Hobey season. Obviously, this is a different era, but if Wilson – or Quinnipiac’s Bryan Leitch, for that matter – is to have a real shot at the Hobey, 20 goals is probably a must.

Northeastern goalie Brad Thiessen hasn’t been part of the Hobey conversation as much as he probably should be – the insane performamance being put on by Ben Scrivens at Cornell has crowded other goalies out of the conversation somewhat – but that .939 save percentage and 1.90 GAA have been keys to the Huskies’ breakout season. The spotlight will be on him against BC on Monday, and if he can deliver and put the Huskies in the final, it’ll be a major feather in his cap, to say nothing of what will happen if he brings that ever-elusive fifth Beanpot back to Matthews Arena.

Finally, BU co-captain Matt Gilroy definitely merits a mention, because he’s definitely the sort of player who can benefit from the spotlight of the Beanpot. Gilroy has 15 points in 24 games for the Terriers, which puts him second on the BU blueline corps in points per game (by a nose to Kevin Shattenkirk). Now, the fact of the matter is that “better than his numbers” does not a Hobey winner make. However, Gilroy is definitely worth keeping an eye on as a finalist for the award, in a similar vein to former St. Lawrence defenseman Drew Bagnall.

Bagnall averaged 0.64 points a game as a senior at St. Lawrence, but his value to the Saints in the 2006-07 season went far beyond his numbers. You can say the same thing for Gilroy, whose leadership and defesneive play have been keys to the Terriers’ success. I doubt that Gilroy’s play this season has done anything to make those 23 NHL teams he famously turned down glad they didn’t get him, and he should be able to show his complete game on Monday against Harvard.

Of course, there’s much more going on on Monday than jockeying in the Hobey race, but we should definitely have some things to keep an eye on when the puck drops at the KurtCenter.

I could be wrong, but I’ve always thought that holiday tournaments have been key opportunities for Hobey Baker candidates to distinguish themselves. With coaches from all across the country involved in the selection process, holiday tournaments offer players exposure to coaches that don’t normally see them, especially when tapes of the games wind up being used for scouting as conference play resumes. I’m not sure how much coaches look at the other team when they break down game footage, but there’s certainly some exposure that  

This was something of an odd year for Hobey contenders in  the holiday tournaments. Two front-runners, Colin Wilson of BU and James vanRiemsdyk of New Hampshire were at the World Juniors – although it’s safe to say that Wilson might have done himself more good at the Denver Cup. Brock Bradford and Boston College skipped the holiday tournament scene in favor of a trip to New Brunswick. 

To some, those are the top three forwards contending for the Hobey – although Air Force’s Jacques Lamoureux might have an opinion about that – and they were all out of Hobey-relevant action. Still, there were several Hobey hopefuls in the holiday tournaments who are worth talking about.

Cornell’s Ben Scrivens has to be viewed as one of the holidays’ big winners, with MVP honors at the Florida College Classic. The Big Red netminder didn’t have his best performances of the season, giving up a pair of goals in both games, but he got the job done, and he now has two wins over WCHA schools this season, which will probably help his cause later on.

When Scrivens did give up a goal against St. Cloud, Garrett Roe had something to do with it, with a goal and an assist in the 3-2 loss to the Big Red. It wasn’t a happy weekend for St. Cloud, though, so I think Roe probably stood pat, possibly helping himself a little. The real story for Roe, though, will be how St. Cloud does in the second half, and whether the Huskies can get that ever-elusive first win in the NCAA tournament.

The Air Force boys took a hard hit with a loss to Quinnipiac in the championship of the Toyota UConn Holiday Classic, although Greg Flynn did find his way onto the all-tournament team. Really, though, the Falcons made their big non-conference statement against Colorado College, and now, it’s a question of whether Flynn and Jacques Lamoureux can keep up their scoring pace over the rest of the Atlantic Hockey season. I’d say that one of the two is a likely Hobey finalist at the Falcons’ current pace, more likely Lamoureux.

It sounds like a boring couple of weekends, Hobey-wise, and unfortunately, that’s what it was, but there are a couple of big winners worth mentioning. One is Matt Gilroy of BU, who was the MVP of the Denver Cup with the game-winning goal in the championship game over Denver. Gilroy doesn’t exactly have eye-popping numbers, but he’s about where he was in the last couple of years, when he’s been an All-American, and this year, he’s the co-captain of a Terriers squad that looks like it has the potential to go deep in the postseason. He’s also a player who’s turned down many, many pro offers to stay in school for his senior year, and in these times, that certainly helps his cause. I don’t think Gilroy’s teammate Colin Wilson has to worry about competition from his captain, but I can certainly see a Hobey finalist berth in Gilroy’s future if he continues to produce at his pace and lead in his own zone.

The other holiday winner is Quinnipiac’s Bryan Leitch, who handed out five assists en route to MVP honors at the UConn tournament, and has tacked on four goals and an assist in wins over Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend to take the national scoring lead. The one thing I’d say is that 23 of Leitch’s 31 points are assists, so he’d probably have a better case as a Hobey contender if he were on the blueline. Then again, the Brian Leetch comparisons would just be too much.

Bad jokes aside, Leitch and Gilroy are definitely worth keeping an eye on in the second half.

A lot of analysis goes into our season-long discussion of the Hobey Baker Award. We look at numbers, watch the way players impact their teams, talk about what goes on – good and bad – off the ice, you name it.

In the end, though, I think it comes down to one thing: being exceptional.

I started to get on this subject in my last post, as it concerns Brock Bradford of Boston College. His numbers so far this season are impressive, and they’ll make him a Hobey finalist, if this keeps up, but that kind of scoring isn’t exceptional at Boston College under Jerry York. It’s worth noting that with all the Eagle forwards who have been named Hobey finalists during York’s tenure at BC, the one Hobey winner at BC under York has been Mike Mottau, a defenseman.

In his Hobey Baker season of 1999-2000, Mottau averaged a point per game from the blueline, while also winning Hockey East’s Defensive Defenseman of the Year award. That’s exceptional.

Ryan Miller set an NCAA record for save percentage in 2000-01, the year he won the Hobey at Michigan State. Exceptional.

Matt Carle had 53 points in 39 games as a defenseman in 2005-06. Again, exceptional.

Peter Sejna had 82 points in 42 games for Colorado College in 2002-03. You see anyone else scoring 80 points in a college season lately?

Kevin Porter spent most of last season atop the national scoring charts, while captaining a team with all of two seniors to a CCHA regular-season championship, the Great Lakes Invitational title, a Mason Cup, and the Frozen Four. You see where I’m going here?

So, the next logical question is: Who’s exceptional in college hockey this season?

Colin Wilson at BU is a good place to start. He’s been quiet in the last couple of weeks, but even with his scoring average “down” to 1.31 points per game (from about 1.54 before the BC series), he’s on pace to score 47 points if he plays 36 games. That would be the rest of the regular season – minus the games he’ll miss for World Juniors – plus four postseason games. Somehow, I think he’ll play more than that, but even if he doesn’t, 47 points would be the most scored at BU since Chris Drury scored 57 in his Hobey Baker season, 1997-98. That may not mean much if he doesn’t wind up at or near the top of the national scoring chart, but if Wilson can resume his previous pace, I think he has a much better shot at the Hobey than does his rival from further up Commonwealth Avenue, Brock Bradford.

The nation’s current leading scorer, James vanRiemsdyk of UNH, also has a shot at being exceptional and winning the Hobey. The Wildcat sophomore is on pace for 55 points in 36 games, which hasn’t been done at UNH since 2004-05, when Sean Collins scored 56 points in 42 games. Before that, you’d have to go back to Jason Krog’s mind-blowing 79 points in 38 games in his Hobey Baker year of 1998-99. Clearly, vanRiemsdyk is scoring at an exceptional pace. Of course, the real exception they’d like to see in Durham is an exception to the Wildcats’ recent run of early exits from the NCAA tournament.

There are also a couple of blueliners who strike me as exceptional in their play thus far. Gregg Flynn of Air Force has 22 points in 16 games and may give teammate Jacques Lamoureux a run for the Atlantic Hockey entry into the Hobey race (Brent Olson is also racking up the points in the Springs, but Lamoureux has 12 goals to Olson’s five, and goals definitely count for more than assists when it comes to comparing point totals among Hobey contenders).

Also on the blueline, Minnesota State’s Kurt Davis is on pace for 47 points, which isn’t too far away from Carle’s Hobey numbers, and certainly notable among defensemen. Of course, it can be hard to win the Hobey when your team doesn’t make the playoffs, and while that didn’t stop Carle, he’d already been part of two NCAA championship teams, which was a point in his favor. I think Minnesota State will have to at least make the NCAA tournament this year for Davis to get any serious Hobey consideration, but it may be a possibility.

I’ve pointed out that it’s very hard for Cornell goalies to win, because their numbers are chalked up to The System, but Ben Scrivens is stopping shots at a Miller-esque pace: His 1.21 goals-against average and .954 save percentage are both better than Miller’s at this point, and that even includes a sound drubbing at the hands of North Dakota the day after Thanksgiving. Obviously, those numbers are going to be hard to keep up through the second half of the season, but if Scrivens can do it, it’s going to be very hard to deny him the award.

Of course, we’re just reaching the end of the first half of the season now, and the second half may tell a much different story. However, the story will end with someone hoisting the Hobey in D.C., and one thing you can count on is that that somebody will be exceptional.

So far, these are some of the guys who look like they might fit the bill.