USCHO.com’s Jim Connelly and Ed Trefzger are joined by Miami RedHawks coach Rico Blasi as they look at four Hobey Baker candidates from the CCHA: Miami’s Andy Miele and Carter Camper, Michigan’s Carl Hagelin, and Ferris State goaltender Pat Nagle.
USCHO.com Hobey Watch 2011 Podcast, Episode 2: Rico Blasi
Learning to love Atlantic Hockey’s pods
With five weekends left in the regular season, the Atlantic Hockey standings are shaping up a lot like the coaches expected at the beginning of the season. The six western scheduling “pod” teams hold down the top six spots in the standings. This will make for a very unbalanced playoff bracket if things stay that way.
To recap: Beginning this season, a single set of AHA standings are kept, but in the first round of the playoffs, the top two teams in each scheduling pod get byes in the first round of the playoffs. For the quarterfinals, the overall standings are used to seed the teams for a best-of-three series, with the four winners advancing to Rochester as in years past.
With inter-pod play now over, not much will change unless one or two East teams run through the rest of their schedule and the West teams split a lot of their series.
Here’s the scenario if the playoffs started this weekend:
• First-place Rochester Institute of Technology — West pod No. 1 bye
• Second-place Niagara — West pod No. 2 bye
• Third-place Robert Morris — Home ice in the first round vs. Mercyhurst
• Fourth-place Air Force — Home ice in the first round vs. Canisius
• Fifth-place Canisius — Road first-round game at Air Force
• Sixth-place Mercyhurst — Road first-round game at Robert Morris
• Seventh-place Connecticut — East pod No. 1 bye
• Eighth-place Holy Cross — East pod No. 2 bye
• Ninth-place Army — Home ice in the first round vs. American International
• 10th-place Bentley — Home ice in the first round vs. Sacred Heart
• 11th-place Sacred Heart — Road first-round game at Bentley
• 12th-place American International — Road first-round game at Army
As it stands now, the fifth- and sixth-place teams will be on the road, while the seventh- and eighth-place teams will get a bye to the quarterfinals and the ninth- and 10th-place teams will get a home-ice playoff game. If the top seeds all win, the quarterfinal pairings would be:
• No. 10 Bentley at No. 1 RIT
• No. 9 Army at No. 2 Niagara
• No. 8 Holy Cross at No. 3 Robert Morris
• No. 7 Connecticut at No. 4 Air Force
So even if the highest seeds possible win, the current fifth and sixth seeds would not get a chance to advance to the quarterfinals.
“We can’t worry about it,” RIT coach Wayne Wilson told me at the beginning of the season. “Your focus has to be to win your pod, since that’s all you can control.”
Mr. goal
Canisius senior Cory Conacher scored four goals last week, including the game-winner against American International on Monday. But it was his second of the game on Sunday that put him into the Golden Griffins’ record book.
His 51st career goal moved him into first place all-time at Canisius, breaking the record of former teammate Jason Weeks.
“I’ve had talks with Jason over the phone,” said Conacher. “He’s been a big supporter. I give the credit to my linemates and my coaches. For sure [linemates] Vince Scarsella and Preston Shupe have been a big part of this. Vince has been hunting down the [career] assists record and most of them have been on my goals. I give him and Preston a lot of credit for working their butts off. They always seem to know where to find me. Our chemistry has been extremely strong.”
Conacher, the reigning AHA player of the year, is putting the final touches on a college career that saw him come to Canisius as a 17-year old freshman. The Burlington, Ontario, native chose Canisius because he wanted to stay close to home and he saw a chance to make an immediate impact.
“No regrets at all,” said the business management major. “I had a chance to play right away. I had good talks with coach [Dave] Smith and the other coaches and they had faith in me. Maybe waiting [and playing another year or two of juniors] or going to a bigger school, I might not have had the chance to come in right away and play on a top line or on the power play, to have the opportunities that they gave me.”
Conacher hopes to help his team improve on last season, where the Griffs made it to the AHA semifinals for the first time since 2004.
“It’s crunch time,” he said. “We finish with all the top teams in our division and our goal is to finish in the top two and get home ice. We need to really bear down and play our best. If we play selfishly we won’t be able to do that. We need to use our systems and play solid hockey. We have a chance to win a championship if we stick to the game plan.”
When his college career is over, Conacher says he’d like to give pro hockey a shot.
“[Former teammate] Carl Hudson played in the AHL last season and we’ve talked about it,” he said. “I’m a kid that can work his way up, if given the chance.”
Congratulations all around
There have been a couple of causes to celebrate at RIT over the past week or so. Associate head coach Brian Hills was named the 2011 winner of the American College Hockey Coaches Terry Flanagan Award, which recognizes an assistant coach’s career body of work. Hills has been at RIT for six seasons. Before that he was a head coach at Division III Geneseo, and prior to that an assistant at Bowling Green, his alma mater.
“Brian is a very deserving recipient of this prestigious award,” said Wilson, the 2010 ACHA coach of the year, in a statement. “His hard work and commitment to RIT and our program is evident in our team’s success. Brian is a proven winner and would be an excellent Division I head coach.”
One of the players Hills recruited to RIT, defenseman Chris Tanev, became the first RIT player to play in an NHL game last week. Tanev was called up by Vancouver from Manitoba of the AHL and has played the last four games for the Canucks, picking up his first point on Jan. 24 in a game against Dallas.
More honors
A record 25 finalists have been announced for the Hockey Humanitarian Award, given annually to “college hockey’s finest citizen”. Three Atlantic Hockey players were among the list of finalists: seniors Joe Calvi (Bentley) and Paul Zanette (Niagara) and junior Scott Moser (Canisius). The winner will be announced at the Frozen Four in St. Paul, Minn., in April.
Victories help St. Cloud State put focus back on the ice
“What’s happening up there in St. Cloud?” was a commonly asked question in the wake of one of St. Cloud State’s more forgettable halves of a season in recent history.
The voting media rated SCSU fourth in the preseason poll but the Huskies quickly descended down the rankings with each loss until they were completely off the radar. The Huskies ended the fall with two home losses to Colorado College, their third and fourth straight defeats.
“We weren’t very consistent in the beginning of the year,” said freshman Nic Dowd. “We weren’t getting very many shots on goal and our forwards weren’t playing good hockey. Myself included.”
It wasn’t the start many envisioned of a team that lost just five players from the 2009-10 season when the Huskies were runners-up of the Final Five and a game away from the Frozen Four.
“It was frustrating for a lot of guys,” said SCSU junior forward Drew LeBlanc. “We had high expectations and things didn’t pan out. Surprisingly, the mood was never bad.”
SCSU went down south and won the Florida College Classic with wins against Cornell and No. 6 Miami but the Huskies couldn’t make it back to St. Cloud without an incident. Chris Hepp left the team and Tony Mosey was dismissed from the program after the tournament. David Eddy was benched for the team’s next series, against Michigan Tech.
There was a lot of speculation whether the cases were related. SCSU President Earl H. Potter III told the St. Cloud Times that Hepp and Mosey violated team curfew in Florida “involving a third player and alcohol consumption.” Potter said both players were already “walking on thin ice.”
Mosey was arrested Sept. 20 after St. Cloud Police accused him of caving in the roof of a car by walking on it. He served a two-game suspension as a result. The Jan. 11 Times report also stated Hepp was present at the scene and police found “a small amount of marijuana” on him.
Mosey and Hepp each signed with ECHL teams.
It was getting to the point where the Huskies were going to have to win to take some of the focus away from the off-ice issues. That’s what they’ve done.
After the Huskies beat Cornell 4-3 and Miami 4-3, SCSU has been able to feast on the WCHA’s lesser teams to resume the league schedule. The Huskies swept Michigan Tech 3-0 and 5-1 on Jan. 7-8.
SCSU needed overtime to beat Bemidji State, 2-1, last Friday and completed the sweep with 5-1 win Saturday.
The Huskies were known for their ability to score the past few seasons but offense was one of SCSU’s weaknesses in the fall, averaging just 2.5 goals per game in 18 games. They’ve scored 23 goals in the past six games, all wins.
Five Huskies — LeBlanc (2 goals, 10 assists), Cam Reid (4 goals, 6 assists), Garrett Roe (3 goals, 7 assists), Dowd (3 goals, 6 assists) and Eddy (3 goals, 3 assists) — averaged a point or more per game in those six wins.
“The break was a real nice thing to get home, spend some time with the family and forget about what a killing we took at the beginning of the season,” said Dowd, who was named WCHA rookie of the week twice in a row earlier this month after he scored eight points (two goals, six assists) in four games at the Florida College Classic and in the home series against Michigan Tech.
“We have half a season to prove we can turn it around.”
One of the team’s best young scorers, Eddy’s return to the lineup gave the Huskies a boost after he sat out the fall semester while academically ineligible.
Goaltender Mike Lee was 3-7-1 with a .891 save percentage and allowed three goals per game in his first 13 games of the season. Lee split time with Dan Dunn in goal but Huskies coach Bob Motzko has recently made Lee the No. 1 goalie.
In the last six games, Lee has allowed just nine goals in six games with a save percentage of .940 during the streak.
These games against some of the league’s cellar dwellers could give the Huskies the momentum they need when they break into a meat grinder of a schedule to end the season.
SCSU has road series at No. 15 Nebraska-Omaha and No. 5 Minnesota-Duluth followed by home series with No. 4 North Dakota and No. 8 Wisconsin. The Huskies end the season at No. 3 Denver.
“It’s going to be fun and we can’t wait to get it going,” LeBlanc said.
The offense is clicking and Lee has finally found the hot hand, but perhaps the biggest key to SCSU’s streak was losing the distractions.
The weekend series by the numbers
Minnesota State at St. Cloud State
Records: MSU — 10-11-5 (4-11-3 WCHA). SCSU — 11-11-2 (7-8-1 WCHA).
Last meeting: SCSU knocked MSU out of the WCHA first round in three games last season: MSU 5-4 (OT), SCSU 3-2, SCSU 3-2 (OT).
Special teams: MSU — 14.2 percent PP (47th in nation), 81.9 percent PK (33rd in nation). SCSU — 15.8 percent PP (38th in nation). 82.5 percent PK (27th in nation).
Streaks: MSU four-game winless. SCSU six-game winning.
Goaltending: MSU — Phil Cook (15 GP, 8-6-1, 3.01 GAA, .908 save percentage). SCSU — Mike Lee (17 GP, 7-7-1, 2.89 GAA, .901 save percentage).
Leading scorer: MSU — Kurt Davis (7-12–19). SCSU — Drew LeBlanc (8-21–29).
North Dakota at Colorado College
Records: UND — 18-7-2 (13-5-0 WCHA). CC — 14-11-1 (8-8-0 WCHA).
Last meeting: UND swept CC late last season in Colorado Springs in a pair 3-2 Sioux wins.
Special teams: UND — 20.8 percent PP (15th in nation), 83.7 percent PK (20th in nation). CC — 23.6 percent PP (5th in nation). 85.5 percent PK (11th in nation).
Streaks: UND one-game winning. CC two-game winning.
Goaltending: UND — Aaron Dell (23 GP, 17-5-1, 2.07 GAA, .916 save percentage). CC — Joe Howe (21 GP, 11-9-1, 2.70 GAA, .908 save percentage).
Leading scorer: UND — Matt Frattin (20-10–30). CC — Tyler Johnson (16-12–28) and Stephen Schultz (12-16–28).
Alaska-Anchorage at Minnesota
Records: UAA — 7-12-3 (6-10-2 WCHA). MINN — 10-9-3 (7-7-2 WCHA).
Last meeting: The teams split a January series last season in Anchorage. MINN 7-4, UAA 2-1
Special teams: UAA — 14.6 percent PP (46th in nation), 80 percent PK (42nd in nation). MINN — 21.1 percent PP (13th in nation). 73.5 percent PK (57th in nation).
Streaks: UAA two-game losing. MINN one-game losing.
Goaltending: UAA — Rob Gunderson (16 GP, 8-4-3, 2.58 GAA, .916 save percentage). MINN — Kent Patterson (16 GP, 8-4-3, 2.56 GAA, .916 save percentage).
Leading scorer: UAA — Tommy Grant (10-10–20). MINN — Jay Barriball (11-11–22).
Wisconsin at Michigan Tech
Records: UW — 17-8-3 (9-7-2 WCHA). MTU — 3-18-3 (1-14-1 WCHA).
Last meeting: UW swept MTU in October in Madison. UW 5-2, UW 4-1
Special teams: UW — 25.7 percent PP (2nd in nation), 81.5 percent PK (35th in nation). MTU — 20 percent PP (17th in nation). 74.2 percent PK (56th in nation).
Streaks: UW three-game winning. MTU 18-game winless.
Goaltending: UW — Scott Gudmandson (21 GP, 13-6-1, 1.77 GAA, .935 save percentage). MTU — Josh Robertson (14 GP, 1-9-2, 4.42 GAA, .888 save percentage) and Kevin Genoe (12 GP, 2-9-1, 4.02 GAA, .888 save percentage).
Leading scorer: UW — Craig Smith (14-22–36). MTU — Milos Gordic (11-16–27).
Alabama-Huntsville at Nebraska-Omaha
Records: UAH — 3-23-2. UNO — 13-9-2.
Last meeting: UNO beat UAH 5-1 in October 2007 in Omaha.
Special teams: UAH — 19.7 percent PP (21st in nation), 78.1 percent PK (48th in nation). UNO — 23 percent PP (7th in nation). 83.2 percent PK (23rd in nation).
Streaks: UAH four-game losing. UNO one-game losing.
Goaltending: UAH — Clark Saunders (15 GP, 3-12-0, 3.87 GAA, .887 save percentage). UNO — John Faulkner (24 GP, 13-8-2, 2.61 GAA, .908 save percentage).
Leading scorer: UAH — Matt Baxter (9-11–20). UNO — Joey Martin (8-18–26).
Biggest change for Clarkson: expecting to win
Clarkson has pursued a season unlike almost any other in ECAC Hockey. It’s not their fortunes or their superlatives that have set the Golden Knights apart, but their immensely intimidating docket.
The Knights have played three of their non-conference games against Nebraska-Omaha and Minnesota-Duluth — each of which has earned first-place votes at one point or another this year. They played St. Cloud State in Omaha, Air Force and Lake Superior State in Denver, and — just for fun — threw in a non-conference game at a neutral site against the one team that would know Clarkson best: St. Lawrence.
Wouldn’t you know it, ‘Tech has survived all of it, and now gets to meet the real challenge: the heart of the league schedule. At 6-2-0 in their last eight ECAC contests, that should be a piece of cake.
“I was pleased with our stretch. Other than the Union game … I thought we played hard five out of [our last] six games,” said coach George Roll. “In the last six road games in our league, we’ve gone 4-2 in those games, so I like the identity of our team. I’m really pleased with the direction of the program right now.”
One of the team’s biggest problems approaching the holiday break was the power play, which barely registered on the stat sheet for the Knights’ first dozen-plus games. It’s not setting the world on fire now, either, but hey, 11.2 percent beats low-single-digits any day of the week.
“The percentage on the power play has improved, and the big thing for me is generating opportunities, and we’ve done that,” said Roll. “I think we’ve gotten better in that area. Our penalty killing has been strong all year, our power play has gotten better … we’ve scored six short-handed goals and only given up one. Overall, I think there’s always room for improvement, but in the last couple weeks, it’s come to life a little bit. We’re generating chances on just about every one.”
One of Roll’s other primary challenges has been in replacing the productivity of rookie sniper Ben Sexton, lost in his sixth game with a broken leg and still a few weeks out from game shape.
“He’s still two to three weeks away. I talked to [Boston College coach Jerry] York yesterday; [former Eagles forward] Brock Bradford had the same injury, and I think he came back too early,” Roll stated, after consulting his former coach from his playing days at Bowling Green. “You may recall he broke it in his first or second game back. Jerry couldn’t recollect exactly how many weeks he was out — thought it was around 10 — he came back, they thought it was healed, and it’s not so much the bone that needs to heal, but the muscle surrounding it.
“I think Ben’s close to coming back, but right now the issue is the muscle around it, and he’s not quite back yet. We’re hopeful that he’ll be back before the playoffs begin, but we’re not going to rush it.”
Even without Sexton’s nearly point-a-game contributions, the veteran coach feels vastly more confident about this year’s Knights than in previous vintages.
“I think we have [first-round bye] potential, and I think our team has improved from where we were earlier in the season, so obviously we have an opportunity to get a first-round bye.
“More importantly, the culture within the program has changed: They expect to win now, as compared to the last two years, where we were more worried about not losing than winning. Losing became contagious, and conversely this year we step on the ice every game and the players expect to win. It’s a completely different mentality change from where we were at this stage last year. So, yeah, I do like the makeup of our team, and I do obviously feel that we can finish in the top four this year.”
The young and the restless
You don’t have to think too far back to the last time the Tigers stole hockey headlines. No, I’m not talking about Rochester Institute of Technology — though that was fun, wasn’t it? I am, of course, reminiscing about the jet-fueled, 20-cylinder, twine-twisting shooting machine that was the 2007-09 Princeton Tigers.
Twenty-win NCAA contenders each, the ’07-08 and ’08-09 P-Cats were Yale before Yale was Yale. And guess what? They’re back.
The Tigers are tied for third in the conference with 15 points and a .625 winning percentage. They’ve scored the fourth-most goals in the league (34, 2.83 per ECAC contest), have a top-half defense (fifth, 2.33 goals-against per league game), and — would you believe this, after all the Union hype? — have the league’s best power play, at 23.2 percent (again, in ECAC play). They’re also 5-1-0 on the road this year.
Oh yeah, and they’re all freshmen. (At least, it seems like it sometimes.)
“I think for the number of freshmen we have — and we have 10 freshmen — that they’ve been coming along great. I think we’re very happy with the progress that they’ve made, and the results that we’ve had,” said coach Guy Gadowsky.
“It’s not only [leading scorer Andrew] Calof: I think in terms of freshmen, we’re getting great performances from a lot of them. Matt Farris, Andrew Ammon, Jack Berger, Kevin Ross, obviously Sean Bonar, Will Ford scored a huge overtime goal at Cornell. I think a lot of freshmen have contributed greatly.”
Gadowsky has also groomed a stable of veritable thoroughbreds in the net, featuring freshman Bonar and sophomore Mike Condon, but also sprinkled with a solid dose of senior Alan Reynolds. Each one boasts an overall save rate over 90 percent.
“We’re very happy with it,” the coach said of his goaltending. “Not only did Alan Reynolds have a great night [Tuesday] night [in a 7-1 trouncing of Sacred Heart], but I think we’ve got three guys that the team’s very confident in, and that’s a great situation to be in. We’re just going to let it play out, and however it plays out, that’s what we’re going to do.
“We don’t have any preconceived notion on what’s going to happen,” he said, when asked about his preference for a single No. 1 goalie or a platoon.
As solid a season as Princeton is having, Gadowsky isn’t taking all the credit: He admits that while last season was simply a black hole of bad luck, this year has been practically bountiful in good fortune.
“There’s a number of things: As a freshman, Sean Bonar coming in and putting up the numbers he has so far is a tremendous surprise,” Gadowsky said. “I think having two freshmen playing along with [junior] Brodie Zuk and having a line that’s been so effective is a nice surprise. Having a freshman come in and lead our team in scoring with the great offensive seniors that we have, that’s a surprise. Seeing Kevin Ross have such a quick transition to D in Division I hockey is a great surprise. Having another freshman score the OT winner at Cornell, such a difficult building to play, that’s a wonderful surprise.”
Is this the year where Princeton picks up where it left off, a year and a half ago?
“Every team’s different because of the personnel, but I see similarities in the style that we try to play,” Gadowsky said gamely.
The Tigers look ahead to the North Country trip, which is the longest road trip for any team (other than Clarkson and SLU, of course) in the league. No sweat, says the coach. Not only are his boys 5-1-0 on away from Baker Rink, but if anything, it’s perfect timing.
“If you look at the standings in the ECAC, every trip is a big trip,” he began. “We just finished exams, so the guys have been sort of away from each other for a couple weeks. I think it’s good timing; they can spend some time with each other and head to the North Country.
“We like to see the progress that we’ve made. We were sort of anticipating a good team, but the results, we thought would take a lot longer. So we’re very happy that a young team has been able to have some success on the road.”
But let’s get to the good stuff: Will these Tigers be ready to roar come playoff time?
Gadowsky: “We’ve got a long way to go before we think about that.
“I don’t see us as being very different from a lot of teams in the league right now. I’m very happy to be in the spot we’re in, with the number of great teams in the ECAC right now. We’re happy with where we’re at, and we’re trying to get better every day.”
Joe is back in the saddle
Great to hear that St. Lawrence coach and ECAC Hockey institution Joe Marsh is set to return to work this week after complications from a medical procedure kept him for overtime at Massachusetts General Hospital. He missed last weekend’s deuce at Brown and Yale, but — according to Dan Cassavaugh at the Watertown Daily Times — Joe is good to go once more.
It’s great news with which to end the week, and the column. I hope he never leaves us again.
Massachusetts, Providence keeping heads above water in Hockey East
Not too hot. Not too cold.
This week it’s time to look at two teams that aren’t in the national rankings but are on pace to make the Hockey East playoffs, albeit as road teams.
Massachusetts: Back to square one? Absolutely not
They’re almost certainly not going to earn home ice in the playoffs, but you’ve still got to like the way the Massachusetts Minutemen have performed this year. After an offseason which saw them lose a staggering amount of talent, they’ve dealt with the ups and downs well enough to be in seventh place, just two games under .500 in league play.
Of late, they’ve been playing particularly well, winning three of their last four. They swept sister school Massachusetts-Lowell two weekends ago before splitting a two-game set this past weekend at Vermont. Even better is the way they played in the split. After a 2-1 loss on Friday night, they took no prisoners on Saturday, thumping their hosts, 6-0.
Hey, the standings don’t reflect style points but as a measure of how the team has been playing a 6-0 win looks mighty nice.
“It’s a team that has shown improvement,” UMass coach Don “Toot” Cahoon says. “You hope teams will show that over the course of the year.
“We’re getting it from a variety of sources because of the kind of injuries that all teams go through. It’s to their credit that they’ve been able to withstand all the disruption along the way.
“Being a young team can itself be an excuse not to compete, but they’ve shown that they can withstand adversity, and that’s good.”
The freshman class is carrying its share of the load and then some. Michael Pereira, tied for second on the team in scoring, was expected to make an immediate contribution, but the list of impressive rookies extends a lot further than him.
Four defensemen — Joel Hanley, Adam Phillips, Colin Shea and Conor Allen — have played regularly as have forwards Branden Gracel (10 points) and Conor Sheary (9).
“As young players in this league, it’s oftentimes a real struggle to get serious contribution, productive contribution, but those guys have really done a great job,” Cahoon says. “To have four freshmen defensemen that are in the lineup every night — it’s remarkable what they’ve been able to accomplish.
“Hopefully it keeps moving in that direction and they keep working hard, feeling good about what they’ve been doing and continue to improve.”
At first glance, it’s a team without any glaring weakness. In league games, the Minutemen rank fifth in the league in team scoring, team defense and power-play percentage. Although they’re eighth on the penalty kill, they’re one of the top teams in staying out of the penalty box.
“It looks like we’re in the middle of the pack in most of those areas,” Cahoon says with a rueful laugh. “But what it seems to be is that we’re really on on certain nights and really off on other nights.
“There have been a lot of games that we’ve played in crucial situations and the penalty kill has been just great and shut people down. Then there are other nights like our first game against Northeastern that we took a lot of bad penalties and we did a horrific job trying to kill the penalties. They got three power-play goals. Game over.
“That might speak to the youthfulness of the team. Sometimes we can really lock in and play that complete game, and other nights it gets away from us. So we’re working on trying to develop a little more consistency.”
Does it matter whether the team finishes sixth or seventh? Seventh or eighth? Is it best to not even pay attention to the standings?
“I don’t think there’s a week that goes by that you don’t glimpse at the standings, see where you stand and then as a fan of college hockey pay attention to what all the leagues are doing and how things are going,” Cahoon says. “But you don’t dwell on it.
“This is about teaching and coaching. So you spend your time each and every day preparing your lesson plan, your practice, and you go out and you try to execute it.
“Then you have the challenge of working with individual players and dealing with individual issues that oftentimes take place with kids this age. You have maybe 28 guys in the program that you try to manage.
“So you get so blocked into that on a day-to-day basis that you don’t get too caught up with the standings. You just try to get ready for the next outing and do the best you can each and every outing.”
With a team this young, two games under .500 in the league is not too shabby. However, the schedule down the stretch is daunting. After a home-and-home series with Northeastern this weekend, UMass will face nationally ranked teams in nine of its final 10 regular season games.
“Our heads are above water,” Cahoon says. “We’re not really were we need to be, but we’re hanging in there.
“But we’ve got to keep getting better. We’ve got a huge undertaking staring us in the face, whether it be Northeastern this week or into the future with some of the opponents that we’ve got to play.
“We’ve got a ton of hockey ahead of us. If we can just take care of our business day to day, we might have some success.”
Providence: Close but no cigar
The Providence Friars have been one of the most pleasant surprises in the league this year. Picked in the preseason to finish in last place for the third straight year, they’ve instead stayed on a pace that would put them in the playoffs and have an overall record just three games under .500.
Their hold on a playoff berth, however, has grown considerably more tenuous in recent weeks as they’ve lost all four league games in 2011. You have to go back to Nov. 5 for Providence’s last league win.
To simply state, though, that the Friars have gone 0-for-2011 in Hockey East belies their actual performances. The first two losses came at the hands of second-ranked Boston College, 4-1 and 3-1. Both of the next two came in overtime, first to 12th-ranked Maine and then to seventh-ranked New Hampshire.
“Unfortunately we didn’t at least come away with a point in those games, particularly in the UNH game because we were down to under a minute to go in the overtime,” PC coach Tim Army says. “I think we’ve played well.
“We’re battling for a playoff spot so those points are important. Close isn’t good enough. We have to find a way to finish the deal.
“I thought in both games that we lost in overtime what led to the winning goal was a situation where we just got above the puck — [overskating it] — and we weren’t detailed enough away from the puck and it led to ultimately the goal against.
“Those are common mistakes, but you can’t make them in those situations. For us to move forward I want to see us continue to play the way that we’re playing, do the things that we’re doing, but make good decisions in those situations where we don’t have the puck, it’s getting late in the game and we’re playing against a good team with good players.”
Since it has been a while since the Friars have collected a league win, doubts could be creeping in. Since they’ve come close-but-no-cigar against teams that will be contending for a national championship, frustration could also be creeping in.
“I try to talk more about the good things that we’ve done and that we’re in a situation to have an opportunity to win,” Army says. “But [I’ve also stressed that] in those tight situations we need to make better decisions. We’ve got to learn from the mistakes that we’ve made so that as we go forward we play more detailed in those situations.”
Providence will get a shot at immediate revenge against UNH because the schedule offers a unique three-game set broken only by last weekend’s exhibition win over the national Under-18 team.
“It’s three games in a row,” Army says. “This is what the schedule is. It’s not good. It’s not bad. It’s just the way the schedule is.
“It’s almost like playing a playoff series where you’re seeing that same team for a few nights. From a preparation standpoint, it’s good because you’re totally focused on that one team.
“Beyond that, we’re playing against obviously a great team and we need to be ready to play our best game.”
The one area that has shown recent promise has been the area of Providence’s greatest weakness. The Friars rank dead last (and a distant dead last it is) in Hockey East power-play percentage. They’ve converted only 8.5 percent of man advantages in league play, scoring six times in 71 chances while allowing two short-handed goals.
Not a recipe for success.
Two of those goals, however, came against New Hampshire last Friday.
“We have struggled and our percentages obviously indicate that we’ve struggled,” Army says. “But I think we’ve had some good power plays, we’ve had some good possession, and we’ve had some good chances we haven’t capitalized on.
“It’s not all bad. I like the personnel the way we have it now.
“We need to get some production from the power play. We are a pretty good team five-on-five scoring, but we need the bump from our power play.”
Comley is leaving and the game is changing
This isn’t the column I planned for this week. Not completely, anyway.
By now you’ve heard that Michigan State coach Rick Comley announced his retirement effective at the end of the 2010-11 season. In his press conference Tuesday, Comley touched on a lot of things (some of which I’ve already mentioned in my CCHA blog), but one thing that struck me repeatedly was the way in which the changes in the business aspect of hockey have forced changes to the way in which Comley coaches — and he’s not a happy man about that.
“I’m really frustrated with the early departures,” said Comley, “you know, and the difficulty in recruiting, and in keeping kids, and not being able to build a team that carries over year to year. That’s where my greatest frustration comes from. But I love the game still.”
Forwards Andrew Rowe and Corey Tropp and defenseman Jeff Petry left the Spartans last summer; together, Rowe and Tropp took 37 goals with them. Last season, MSU averaged 3.03 goals per game and finished second; this year, the Spartans are scoring 2.62 per game and are just out of the cellar.
Of course, the Spartans aren’t alone in losing good players to the professional ranks. Between the 2009-10 and 2010-11 seasons, 40 players with eligibility remaining opted to leave the Division I ranks. That number was more than double the number who chose to do so the year before and the largest number ever to vacate eligibility during an offseason.
When the college hockey talent pool is already diluted because of the aggressive competition from Canadian major junior leagues for NCAA-eligible young players and the sheer number of professional opportunities available for young players who aren’t necessarily keen on getting an education, the NHL’s current collective bargaining agreement — with its salary cap — makes it difficult for professional franchises to resist the pull of young talent that can be signed relatively cheaply. Of course, it’s often difficult for the young talent to resist the pull of the money offered.
As a result, many good players are leaving early and many more will follow.
In the case of Michigan State, all three of its marquee players departed before the start of the season and none in time for the program to figure out an adequate way to deal with it. Sure, MSU isn’t the only program dealing with this, but just look at where Michigan is in the standings in a rare season when every Wolverines player returned to play. Every program struggles with this, but the big-name programs struggle with it to a greater extent. This isn’t the game that Comley once coached, and he knows it.
“My favorite part of the job is still recruiting and being in the rinks,” said Comley. “It’s more difficult to do it now for whatever reason than it used to be, but that aspect — being in rinks and watching players — that’s still my most favorite part of the job.”
Comley’s departure, Penn State going Division I, the renewed talk of something Big Ten-ish — none of these things exists in a vacuum. If there’s big money to be made in college hockey, then someone’s going to make it. Fans of college basketball have already seen this. Big money comes at a big price.
This is the part of the changing face of college hockey that I’ve been dreading. College hockey doesn’t have the talent pool that college basketball does. (I’m talking sheer numbers here.) Down the road, there may be little place for excellent coaches like Comley in this changing landscape, or people who would have otherwise gone into coaching may opt themselves to go pro, so to speak, and work for franchises as scouts — recognizing talent rather than developing it — or in some other capacity.
The haves will have more, the have nots will not, and because there is less talent to go around, the sport itself will diminish. Instead of “growing the sport” — a popular catchphrase now — the changes will only inflate specific wallets.
Then there’s the loss of what we love about our niche sport, that intangible thing that separates it from football and basketball and makes it far more likeable.
I know. It sounds dark. It’s late January and one of my favorite coaches just quit. But I don’t think I’m far off the mark.
A little levity
In the presser announcing his impending retirement, Comley said some things that made me chuckle, like telling the press, “My grandkids, they know nothing but Sparty.” This was Comley’s way of assuring everyone that he’ll remain a fan of Michigan State.
In speculating on what he’d do post-MSU, Comley gave the press this:
“Do I think I’ll coach anywhere else? No, I don’t. Do I think I’ll do anything else in hockey? I might. Might I go to Florida? I might. I don’t want to sit here and make this what it isn’t.”
He also said that he and his wife would return to the city where he built a college hockey program from scratch. “I’m a Yooper,” said Comley. “I’m not sure I want to be in the snow, but we’ll go back to Marquette in some variety.”
What I loved most, though, was the way he ended the announcement. Said Comley, “Interesting to go from this to practice, though, isn’t it?”
There are other things going on, too
Last weekend marked the end of Alaska’s annual two-week, midseason trip to the Lower 48, and the Nanooks have little to show for the long way they traveled.
“It’s been almost two years since we haven’t gotten a point on a weekend, but I don’t think that’s the big picture right now,” UAF coach Dallas Ferguson said last Saturday after Michigan swept Alaska in Ann Arbor. “I thought that we did a lot of good things. We did a lot of good things but at the end of the day, you’ve got to have good execution.”
Although the Nanooks were outscored by one goal in the four-game trip (9-8), the only points they took were from a 4-1 win over Notre Dame Saturday, Jan. 15. Last weekend, the Wolverines won two very close games, 2-0 Friday and 4-3 Saturday.
“It’s a tough one to swallow,” said Ferguson. “I didn’t say a whole lot in the locker room after this one, but we’ll get back to work on Monday and we’ve got to keep pushing forward.
“It’s always something we look at as an important part of our season is to get points on our Christmas trip because many trips we haven’t got any and we didn’t even play well, but right now we felt we played four good games. Obviously, we got one win, but against quality opponents.”
With an overall record of 10-10-4 (7-9-4-2 CCHA), the Nanooks are one of the most under-the-radar teams in college hockey. They play harder and block more shots than any team I’ve seen this season. They play disciplined hockey. Goaltender Scott Greenham is more than merely solid. Alaska’s record is a lesson in how statistics can mislead.
“That’s one thing as a group, you want to make sure that everybody’s leaving everything they have on the ice, and I can say that about our team,” Ferguson said after Saturday’s loss. “Everybody chipped in. Guys stepped up and played hard. We had an opportunity to win the hockey game.
“Definitely proud of our team and the effort we put forth on this road trip, but sometimes it’s a tough one to swallow when you give that type of effort toward your game and you don’t get results. Got a good group of kids that work hard and they compete hard and they’ve got to keep believing in themselves. We’ve got a nice opportunity with eight games left and six of them are at home.”
This is a trip the Nanooks take every year, scheduling back-to-back road series and remaining in Michigan for a week during their midseason break, and Ferguson said that the routine is nearly always the same. They spend time in Grand Rapids, practicing and training at Walker Ice & Fitness Center. “We’ve held up there six of the last seven years I’ve been here,” said Ferguson. “We get good practice times and we’ve got the ability to get in and get light workouts and weight training.”
Staying somewhere other than the city where they’ll meet their next opponent is important for the Nanooks, said Ferguson. “I think teams get a little uncomfortable if they practice right after each other.”
Now, however, it’s back to Fairbanks, where classes began for the Nanooks Jan. 20. “We’ve got to get back to Fairbanks, get ourselves acclimated to home and get ready to play on home ice.
We head right back into it so we’ll have to manage our time wisely as guys get acclimated to getting back in school after a month off.”
Alaska hosts Ohio State in two games this weekend.
Accusations
Here’s a strange story from TSN that came to my attention via my good USCHO colleague Matt Mackinder. Former Wolverines forward Jason Bailey (2005-07) is suing the Anaheim Ducks for damages, charging Bakersfield Condors coach Marty Raymond with anti-Semitism and Condors assistant coach Mark Pederson with “severe and/or pervasive harassment.”
Bailey played 35 games with the Condors (ECHL) in 2007-08 and has been with the Binghamton Senators (AHL) since 2009.
My ballot
Here’s the top 20 as I see it this week. Note that I was one of four people who didn’t put Yale at the top of the list. I’m so clearly anti-East Coast.
1. Boston College
2. North Dakota
3. Yale
4. Michigan
5. Minnesota-Duluth
6. Denver
7. Wisconsin
8. New Hampshire
9. Nebraska-Omaha
10. Notre Dame
11. Maine
12. Boston University
13. Rensselaer
14. Merrimack
15. Union
16. Miami
17. Colorado College
18. Western Michigan
19. Dartmouth
20. Ohio State
Bracketology: A first try at predicting the NCAA pairings
It’s time once again to do what we like to call Bracketology, college hockey style. It’s our weekly look at how I believe the NCAA tournament will wind up come selection time.
It’s a look into what are the possible thought processes behind selecting and seeding the NCAA tournament teams.
This is the first installment of our Bracketology for the 2010-11 season, and we’ll be bringing you a new one every week until we make our final picks before the field is announced on March 20. Make sure to check out our other entries on the Bracketology Blog, where we’ll keep you entertained, guessing and educated throughout the rest of the season.
Here are the facts:
• Sixteen teams are selected to participate in the national tournament.
• There are four regional sites (East — Bridgeport, Conn.; Northeast — Manchester, N.H.; Midwest — Green Bay, Wis.; West — St. Louis)
• A host institution which is invited to the tournament plays in the regional for which it is the host, and cannot be moved. There are three host institutions this year, Yale in Bridgeport, New Hampshire in Manchester and Michigan Tech in Green Bay. St. Louis’ host is the CCHA, not a specific team.
• Seedings will not be switched, as opposed to years past. To avoid undesirable first-round matchups, including intra-conference games (see below), teams will be moved among regionals, not reseeded.
Here are the NCAA’s guidelines on the matter, per a meeting of the championship committee:
In setting up the tournament, the committee begins with a list of priorities to ensure a successful tournament on all fronts including competitive equity, financial success and likelihood of playoff-type atmosphere at each regional site. For the model, the following is a basic set of priorities:
• The top four teams as ranked by the committee are the four No. 1 seeds and will be placed in the bracket so that if all four teams advance to the Men’s Frozen Four, the No. 1 seed will play the No. 4 seed and the No. 2 seed will play the No. 3 seed in the semifinals.
• Host institutions that qualify will be placed at home.
• No. 1 seeds are placed as close to home as possible in order of their ranking 1-4.
• Conference matchups in first round are avoided, unless five or more teams from one conference are selected, then the integrity of the bracket will be preserved.
• Once the five automatic qualifiers and 11 at-large teams are selected, the next step is to develop four groups from the committee’s ranking of 1-16. The top four teams are the No. 1 seeds. The next four are targeted as No. 2 seeds. The next four are No. 3 seeds and the last four are No. 4 seeds. These groupings will be referred to as “bands.”
Given these facts, here is the top 16 of the current PairWise Rankings (PWR), and the conference leaders (through all games of Jan. 25, 2011):
1 Yale
2t Minnesota-Duluth
2t North Dakota
2t Denver
5t Boston College
5t Michigan
7t Wisconsin
7t Rensselaer
9 Notre Dame
10 New Hampshire
11t Merrimack
11t Western Michigan
13t Union
13t Nebraska-Omaha
13t Dartmouth
16 Miami
— Rochester Institute of Technology
Current conference leaders based on winning percentage:
Atlantic Hockey: RIT
CCHA: Michigan
ECAC: Yale
Hockey East: New Hampshire
WCHA: Denver
Notes
• The Bracketology assumes that the season has ended and there are no more games to be played. i.e., the NCAA tournament starts tomorrow.
• Because there are an uneven amount of games played inside each conference, I will be using winning percentage, not points accumulated, to determine who the current leader in each conference is. This team is my assumed conference tournament champion.
Step one
From the committee’s report, choose the 16 teams in the tournament.
We break ties in the PWR by looking at the individual comparisons among the tied teams, and add in any current league leaders that are not currently in the top 16. The only team that is not is RIT.
From there, we can start looking at the ties and bubbles in a more detailed fashion.
The ties and bubbles consist of Minnesota-Duluth, North Dakota and Denver at No. 2, Boston College and Michigan at No. 5, Wisconsin and Rensselaer at No. 7, Merrimack and Western Michigan at No. 11, and Union, Nebraska-Omaha and Dartmouth at No. 13.
We break all of our ties based upon the RPI.
Therefore the 16 teams in the tournament, in rank order, are:
1 Yale
2 Minnesota-Duluth
3 North Dakota
4 Denver
5 Boston College
6 Michigan
7 Wisconsin
8 Rensselaer
9 Notre Dame
10 New Hampshire
11 Merrimack
12 Western Michigan
13 Union
14 Nebraska-Omaha
15 Dartmouth
16 RIT
Step two
Now it’s time to assign the seeds.
No. 1 seeds — Yale, Minnesota-Duluth, North Dakota, Denver
No. 2 seeds — Boston College, Michigan, Wisconsin, Rensselaer
No. 3 seeds — Notre Dame, New Hampshire, Merrimack, Western Michigan
No. 4 seeds — Union, Nebraska-Omaha, Dartmouth, RIT
Step three
Place the No. 1 seeds in regionals. Following the guidelines, there is one host team in this grouping, Yale, so Yale must be placed in its home regional, the East Regional, Bridgeport.
We now place the other No. 1 seeds based on proximity to the regional sites.
No. 1 Yale is placed in the East Regional in Bridgeport.
No. 2 Minnesota-Duluth is placed in the Midwest Regional in Green Bay.
No. 3 North Dakota is placed in the West Regional in St. Louis.
No. 4 Denver is placed in the Northeast Regional in Manchester.
Step four
Now we place the other 12 teams so as to avoid intra-conference matchups if possible.
Begin by filling in each bracket by banding groups. Remember that teams are not assigned to the regional closest to their campus sites by ranking order within the banding (unless you are a host school, in which case you must be assigned to your home regional).
If this is the case, as it was last year, then the committee should seed so that the quarterfinals are seeded such that the four regional championships are played by No. 1 vs. No. 8, No. 2 vs. No. 7, No. 3 vs. No. 6 and No. 4 vs. No. 5.
So therefore:
No. 2 seeds
No. 8 Rensselaer is placed in No. 1 Yale’s regional, the East Regional.
No. 7 Wisconsin is placed in No. 2 Minnesota-Duluth’s regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 6 Michigan is placed in No. 3 North Dakota’s regional, the West
Regional.
No. 5 Boston College is placed in No. 4 Denver’s regional, the Northeast Regional.
No. 3 seeds
Our bracketing system has one regional containing seeds 1, 8, 9, and 16, another with 2, 7, 10, 15, another with 3, 6, 11, 14 and another with 4, 5, 12 and 13.
But we have one host institution, New Hampshire, which needs to be placed first.
Therefore:
No. 10 New Hampshire is placed in No. 5 Boston College’s regional, the Northeast Regional.
No. 9 Notre Dame is placed in No. 8 Rensselaer’s regional, the East Regional.
No. 11 Merrimack is placed in No. 7 Wisconsin’s regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 12 Western Michigan is placed in No. 6 Michigan’s regional, the West Regional.
No. 4 seeds
One more time, taking No. 16 vs. No. 1, No. 15 vs. No. 2, etc.
No. 16 RIT is sent to No. 1 Yale’s regional, the East Regional.
No. 15 Dartmouth is sent to No. 2 Minnesota-Duluth’s regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 14 Nebraska-Omaha is sent to No. 3 North Dakota’s regional, the West Regional.
No. 13 Union is sent to No. 4 Denver’s regional, the Northeast Regional.
The brackets as we have set them up:
West Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
RIT vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Rensselaer
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Boston College
Our first concern is avoiding intra-conference matchups. We have a West Regional with two of them, and a UNH-BC matchup in the Northeast.
Let’s take care of the UNH-BC matchup first. We can’t move UNH because the Wildcats are the host institution, so BC must be moved. The next ranking after BC at No. 5 is Michigan, No. 6. So we switch those two teams.
We’ve now solved two of our intraconference matchup problems.
The last one to solve is UNO-North Dakota.
With three WCHA teams at the No. 1 seed band, we can switch UNO only to a matchup against Yale. So that’s what we do.
So our tournament now becomes:
West Regional:
RIT vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Boston College
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Rensselaer
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Michigan
Do we like the way this looks? We have no intraconference matchups, so we are OK. Bracket integrity seems to be OK.
Do we have an attendance issue? I would say that there are some shaky issues there.
Can we make it better? Of course we can.
Let’s go back to our original bracketing.
West Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
RIT vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Rensselaer
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Boston College
Now, remember, we have to switch out Boston College first. This is a must. But if you switch BC with the next ranking, you send BC out west and bring Michigan east, which creates a little bit of an attendance issue.
So how can we change that?
We can avoid the UNH-BC matchup by swapping BC with Rensselaer. That way, two big fan bases stay in the East.
Let’s look at it now.
West Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
RIT vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
The East and Northeast look good now. We’ve maintained our attendance and straightened out our intraconference matchup.
Now on to the other matchups.
As we mentioned, UNO has to play Yale in the first round to avoid the WCHA-WCHA matchup. So we have to make that switch.
West Regional:
RIT vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
But, at the moment, RIT is not in the top 16, therefore, should be paired with the highest seed. In this case, that’s Minnesota-Duluth.
And then to take care of the WMU-Michigan matchup, we swap WMU with Merrimack.
West Regional:
Dartmouth vs. North Dakota
Merrimack vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
RIT vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Western Michigan vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
So let’s look at our brackets now. It looks pretty good.
In Green Bay we have UMD and Wisconsin, great bracket for attendance.
In Bridgeport we have Yale, BC and Notre Dame. I like that as well.
In Manchester we have New Hampshire and Rensselaer, a nice draw.
In St. Louis we have Michigan and North Dakota, not bad either.
Anything else we can switch up?
I think that I can make a case for one more switch — swapping Dartmouth and Union.
A Manchester regional with two New Hampshire teams? No offense to Union, which may draw fans, but Dartmouth playing in New Hampshire? That sounds like a no-brainer to me.
West Regional:
Union vs. North Dakota
Merrimack vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
RIT vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Western Michigan vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
That is it. My bracket for the week.
More thoughts and education and plain wit on the blog. We’ll see you here next week for the next Bracketology.
Special teams carried UNO in Grand Forks
The home penalty box at Ralph Engelstad Arena does not have a revolving door, but it seemed like it for a stretch in the second period in Friday night’s game between North Dakota and Nebraska-Omaha.
The Sioux gave UNO seven total power plays Friday night and the Mavericks scored on five. Of the 10 goals UNO scored this weekend, eight were scored by its special team units and the Mavericks earned a split with No. 2 North Dakota.
UNO went into the weekend stumbling with the image of a team that overachieved early in the season through a stretch in which the Mavericks went 3-6-1 since Nov. 20. The Mavericks raised some eye brows when it took a 2-0 lead after one period on UND’s home ice and then scored five goals in the second period to take a 7-1 lead.
UND took five penalties in the second period and the first resulted in a Ryan Walters PP goal. Then began a cluster Sioux penalties that resulted in three 5-on-3 opportunities.
The Todd Anderson/Brad Shepard crew didn’t take any mercy on UND when it had a man in the box and UNO spent a total 1:57 on the two-man advantage.
UND’s Derek Forbort and Brett Hextall were called for minor penalties on the same play 9:37 into the period and 24 seconds later Joey Martin scored for UNO. Hextall rejoined Forbort in the box 47 seconds later and this time it only took Rich Purslow 17 seconds to score on the 5-on-3.
Ben Blood went to the box on a cross-checking penalty after the Purslow goal to give UNO another two-man advantage, which UNO used to score its fourth goal in six minutes.
The Mavericks power play ranks sixth nationally with 23 goals in 100 chances and has been a mainstay for UNO, even through its four-game winless skid in which the Mavericks went 4 for 15 on the PP.
Nebraska-Omaha had gone all season without scoring a shorthanded goal and now, after one weekend at UND, the Mavericks have three. UNO killed off 4:34 of the three UND power plays that the Sioux scored on.
The Mavericks penalty kill was cruising Saturday night, killing off six UND power plays and scoring a shorthanded goal to break the scoreless tie early in the third period.
After Michael Young was called for a delayed penalty with 7:05 remaining, Evan Trupp scored the game-tying goal for the Sioux. The new rule awards a team a power play after it scores during a delayed call.
The result: Young went to the box after the Trupp goal and Danny Kristo scored 31 seconds later. Jason Gregoire scored on the power play with under a minute to go to ice the game and salvage the split for the Sioux.
Broadhurst back
Terry Broadhurst’s return to the UNO lineup gave the Mavericks a boost. The sophomore forward led UNO in scoring before he sustained a thumb injury against Colorado College before the holiday break.
Broadhurst finished the UND series with a goal and an assist, playing fourth-line center both nights. UNO was 1-3-1 without him.
MSU continues to struggle to find the net/No. 9 UW survives scare
Minnesota State squandered late leads in a loss and tie to No. 6 Denver Jan. 7-8 and Saturday, when the Mavericks needed just one insurance goal to bury the Pioneers, they couldn’t get it.
One more goal in each third period this weekend at No. 9 Wisconsin would’ve flipped the outcome of the series.
The numbers are eye-opening. The Mavericks outshot the Badgers 17-6 in the third period Friday night and 17-4 in Saturday’s third period. MSU did score in each period but it wasn’t enough.
Michael Dorr has only a goal and an assist in the six games since he earned the Schilleglagh Tournament’s MVP award after posting five points in two games. Since the 10-game stretch in which MSU went 8-2, MSU is 0-3-1.
The Mavericks have lost by one goal in four of those games and the other loss was against UND, in which the Sioux scored an empty-netter with 54 seconds on the clock.
UW goalie Scott Gudmandson stood tall against MSU’s firing squad, stopping 32 of the 34 third-period shots in the series. Gudmandson, a senior, is having his best season as a Badger with a .935 save percentage (third best in the nation) and a .176 goals against average (best in the nation among goalies who’ve logged more than 500 minutes this season).
Gudmandson hasn’t allowed more than two goals per game since he gave up three against Minnesota-Duluth on Nov. 19. He has two shutouts in the 12-game stretch, has stopped 95 percent of opposing shots and has held opponents to one goal in four of those games.
Gudmandson, Miele, Leets named USCHO’s Three Stars for Jan. 26
THIRD STARRyan Leets, Army: He had just set a collegiate best with 42 saves a game earlier, but the sophomore goaltender did it one better last Friday against Robert Morris, stopping 43 shots in a 3-1 victory. He added 30 saves in a 2-2 tie Saturday for a 73-save weekend. :: Ryan Leets’ player page |
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SECOND STARAndy Miele, Miami: The senior forward scored twice in a losing effort at Michigan State on Friday, and he came back with a goal and two assists in a RedHawks rebound victory Saturday. :: Andy Miele’s player page |
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FIRST STARScott Gudmandson, Wisconsin: The senior goaltender made 71 saves against Minnesota State, and the Badgers needed every single one of them to come away with a series sweep. He stopped 37 shots in a 3-2 victory on Friday and 34 shots — 16 of them in the third period — in a 2-1 win on Saturday. :: Scott Gudmandson’s player page |
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After each weekend’s games, make your nomination at www.uscho.com/threestars
The PairWise: Hockey East teams skating a thin line
Warning: before you begin to read this blog post, know that it might sound a bit elitist.
And it should. Hockey East is home to the last three national champions. In the last 14 seasons, a Hockey East team has been in the NCAA title game in all but one season (we all remember the infamous all-WCHA Frozen Four in Columbus, don’t we?)
When it comes to the NCAA tournament, Hockey East is likely royalty, a least for the last decade of so.
The antithesis of Hockey East has been the ECAC. It’s been 22 years since an ECAC team won the national title (Harvard, 1989) and 21 years since an ECAC member reached the title game. Heck, the league hasn’t had a team in the Frozen Four since Cornell lost to New Hampshire in Buffalo in 2003.
So what if I told you that there is a decent chance this season that the ECAC could have two times as many entries as Hockey East in this year’s NCAA tournament. A quick look at the current USCHO.com PairWise Rankings indicates that four ECAC teams would qualify for the tournament. Hockey East would get three entries if the season ended today (Boston College, New Hampshire and Merrimack). But the line of demarcation, right now, is very thin.
This isn’t necessarily about Hockey East having a down year, though if the league were to get only two entries to the tournament it would seem that way. It’s equally as much about the ECAC having an excellent season as a whole.
Never since Hockey East was formed in 1985, when five teams (Boston College, Boston University, Providence, New Hampshire and Northeastern) all split away from the ECAC, has the ECAC had four entries in the Big Dance. Rarely has the conference had three entries and, excluding the Atlantic Hockey/CHA/MAAC conference, no conference has had just one entry as many times as the ECAC.
This year, that all could change.
Anyone who has followed college hockey this season knows that Yale has been the top team in the nation for much of the year. Add in New York’s Capital District teams – Rensselaer and Union – as well as an overachieving Dartmouth team and you have four ECAC teams ranked in the top 15 of the PWR.
For Hockey East, the aforementioned trio inside the top 15 seems to have pretty stable footing. Boston College is tied for fifth, while New Hampshire and Merrimack rank 10th and 11th, respectively. Dartmouth and Union, both part of a three-way tie with Nebraska-Omaha for 13th are truly bubble teams as of today.
At the same time, two Hockey East teams are just on the other side of the bubble. Maine is ranked 17th; Bostnon University is 18th.
So yes, my panic for Hockey East’s prospects for this year’s tournament is a bit sensationalized. But you all can imagine, as I can, what the reaction will be on the east side of Commonwealth Ave. and in Orono, Maine, if the Terriers and Black Bears are both left home come March and Union and Dartmouth are playing on ESPNU for college hockey’s top prize.
Gallery: Bentley at Massachusetts-Lowell
Photographer Melissa Wade captured these images Tuesday at the Tsongas Center, where Massachusetts-Lowell beat Bentley 8-5:
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Comley's graceful departure
Well, I suppose I knew this was coming. I guess I’m just a little surprised that it’s happening now.
Michigan State is 10-12-4 this season. Last year, the Spartans finished second in the CCHA with an overall record of 19-13-6, but their season ended when they were swept in two games at home in the second round of league playoffs – they had a bye for the first round – at the hands of archrival Michigan. No CCHA championship tournament in Joe Louis Arena. No NCAA tournament.
And now, no future with Rick Comley.
When Comley was hired in 2002-03, I told anyone who would listen that the new coach would bring a national championship to East Lansing within five years. He did so four seasons later, but in such a high-profile position, a coach is only as good as his last season. Because of that, this is Comley’s last season.
In the press conference Tuesday announcing his decision to retire, Comley said that he knew what he was signing up for nine years ago when he left Northern Michigan – a program he built from scratch – for a Big Ten school, succeeding the legendary Ron Mason.
“Coming in after somebody I knew you could not replace and that [act of replacement] would not be positive…my belief the day I stepped in this campus was that it would not end positive, and that’s nobody’s fault,” said Comley.
As tough as that quote sounds, Comley wasn’t bitter Tuesday and he’s not bitter about having to leave, something he and the MSU athletic department “certainly talked” about, he said. I had to settle for watching a video of the press conference, and I will say that the tone of everything Comley said was just a little sad around the edges. He’s grateful for the run he’s had in East Lansing. He’s grateful for his whole career.
And there’s still hockey to be played.
“I was fully aware of what [following Mason] was going to be like,” said Comley. “Totally. But you don’t pass up that opportunity. It’s a special opportunity. I’m glad I did it, and I’m glad we won the national championship. Now we’ve just got to find a way to finish this year right.”
It’s hard to keep from eulogizing when writing about Comley’s departure. A colleague at the press conference said the atmosphere – among the press – was funereal. Reporters certainly sounded subdued when they asked Comley questions. When I heard the news, I felt like I’d been kicked in the gut.
The truth is that the press corps really likes Comley. He’s a good man, a decent man, a kind man, a funny man, and everyone who covers Spartan hockey enjoys being able to spend time with him. He’s very human, very down to earth – and that often gets lost on people who don’t interact with him personally.
And the reporters in that room Tuesday knew, as I know, that this affects more than just Comley. Now we’re all thinking of Tom Newton, who’s coached with Michigan State since the 1990-91 season, and Brian Renfrew, who’s been there since 2003-04. These are good men, too, but they differ from Comley in one key regard. Neither Newton nor Renfrew is close to retirement.
“There’s part of the staff that it doesn’t really impact because they’re lifers” said Comley, “and I think that the coaches are probably impacted the most with the uncertainty of what their future holds. That’s probably my biggest concern. I’m sixty-four years old and I’ve done it a long time and I think I still have things to offer if I deem that I still want to do some things, but I think that coaches that are here are both very capable and have done a good job, and you know you just want it to work out for everybody.”
I know collegiate sports are big business, no matter how much we who cover college hockey try to delude ourselves otherwise. College hockey is a very small world, so we get lulled by its counterfeit coziness. I’ve been around it long enough to know better, but I still see the human aspect of it more than the business end – and that’s why I’m a little sad myself tonight.
Sad. Not funereal, though.
That quote that I threw at you at the start of this, about Comley knowing what he was getting into when he arrived, was part of a longer quote in response to a question about his “legacy,” a term that he scoffed at immediately – because he’s Rick Comley. He did, however, list what he considers the things that gave him the most satisfaction as a coach, and here it is in whole:
“Being a head coach at twenty-five. Coaching kids who I played with when they were freshmen. Starting a program at Northern. Getting a rink finally built at Northern. Winning a national championship at Northern and then coming down here, replacing…coming in after somebody I knew you could not replace and that [act of replacement] would not be positive, and my belief the day I stepped in this campus was that it would not end positive, and that’s nobody’s fault. Ron is Ron and you know what he’s like and everything he’s done and what he’s accomplished – but coming down here and winning a national championship. That’s tough. That’s tough to do that.”
That is tough to do, as is announcing your departure in January, the week you play your biggest rival in Joe Louis Arena, when there are still 10 regular-season contests remaining, because you think the timing is good for the program and the other guys coaching with you.
“I wanted to do it now because I think time is an ally in a situation when there’s a coaching change,” said Comley, “and so I think it gives the school time to start an early process. I think it gives assistant coaches time and opportunity to either be candidates or to explore opportunities. I think it gives a team a chance to kind of digest it, and I think, you know, not everything’s positive out there right now and I think it’s hard on the team and I think this will let us settle a little bit.
“Our goals won’t change. My devotion to being successful and doing things the right way the rest of the year aren’t going to change. I still believe every goal is possible and I’d love nothing more to go out on a positive, winning note and that’s what we’ll try to do.”
The way Comley is going out strikes a definite winning note.
And that doesn’t surprise me at all.
Commentary: Good teams know how to respond to poor outings
There are games in a season that can be season-changers. They are games you should have won but lost, and they sent you in a downward spiral. Or they’re games that you won despite overwhelming adversity — statement games that propelled you ahead.
When you see a lot of college hockey, the chance to see one or two of these games increases and last Saturday was the latest in a series of those games. They look like just another game on the schedule but they have had pretty unique potential to affect the big picture.
Start with Saturday night in East Lansing, Mich. A night after what was a dreadful game by Miami, a game in which their defense was soft and their goaltending substandard, the RedHawks coaching staff reacted. Saturday night they dressed 15 skaters, scratching defensemen Will Weber and Cam Schilling and penciling in only nine forwards.
It was outstanding, a move that even if they had lost was the absolute right call by Enrico Blasi to wake his team up. Coming off two losses at Ohio State and two home wins against 11th-place Bowling Green the RedHawks were undone on Friday by a Michigan State team that worked hard and seemed to score on every shot.
Blasi had a major crisis on his hands because with the RedHawks out of the top 11 in the PairWise Rankings (where they need to be to guarantee an at-large berth to the tourney) he needs wins and he might have to win out in the CCHA tournament. Desperation time was at hand and he placed the season in the hands of three players: Carter Camper, Andy Miele and Pat Cannone. He entrusted the game to Connor Knapp in goal and he answered the bell with a shutout.
These battle-tested senior centers, as good a 1-2-3 set of centers college hockey has seen in a decade, rose to the occasion. Cannone gave Miami shift after shift of extra effort and consistency. Camper found big shifts in a game where Michigan State kept a little closer on eye on him. And Miele scored yet another highlight-reel goal and skated and played as if the season were on the line.
Knapp gave Miami saves when it needed them and shook off a poor relief performance the night before. The bottom line was Blasi set off a bomb in his dressing room post game Friday night and the survivors of the blast rebuilt the town and kept it thriving.
That sends us to the other CCHA team that needed a wake-up call after a road loss Friday, and that was Notre Dame, the latest team to lean that Ohio State is once again playing for keeps.
The Domers were routed Friday by the Buckeyes and also needed a response. Coach Jeff Jackson discussed the game and felt Notre Dame didn’t play all that badly, allowed the captains to have a players-only meeting, and made two lineup changes. Feeling that Friday was more about average goaltending and bad bounces, he let the effort from Friday morph into a better all-around game Saturday and the Irish responded.
That sets up the game of the night in college hockey this Friday as the RedHawks travel to South Bend for a matchup with the Fighting Irish (7:35 p.m. EST, CBS College Sports). The teams both are explosive offensively and rank in the top 10 in the nation in scoring. Notre Dame has three scorers with double-digit goals, and Miami has five. Both teams have defense corps that get involved in the play.
It is a game that, despite the high places they each hold in the CCHA standings, is almost a must-win for both on several levels coming off last weekend.
Moving through the CCHA, another game stands out.
This one happened in relative obscurity. While the outdoor game was going on in Ann Arbor last month, the game of the night turned out to be indoors in Kalamazoo. On a night the first Broncos Division I team was being honored the current one was saving its season.
Lake Superior State won the Friday night contest big. Western Michigan was up 2-1 at home midway through and had outshot Lake State 12-1 in the first period. The Lakers opened it up midway through the second and, despite being outshot 29-19 for the game, won it 5-2.
The next night Western stayed the course and despite a 1-0 deficit entering the third period (and a great game in goal by Kevin Kapalka of Lake State) the Broncos came back. They scored on a delayed penalty and then on the ensuing power play for a 2-1 lead and won 4-1. It was a terrific game, hotly contested, and had pretty good up-and-down action in a raucous Lawson Arena. Since then, Western Michigan has played nine games, won five in regulation and two of four others in shootouts. They currently sit in a three-way tie for fourth place in the CCHA.
Over in Hockey East, the Maine Black Bears put out some fires after a 7-1 thrashing at the hands of Merrimack. As it has done in recent weeks, Maine lost a game, got angry, regrouped and won its next game. After blowing a 3-1 third-period lead to New Hampshire at Alfond Arena, the Black Bears took it out on Massachusetts winning 4-1. After a hellacious travel excursion to Fort Myers, Fla., for the Florida College Classic they lost to Miami and the rebounded to beat Cornell in OT. Then came the Merrimack disaster.
Maine licked its wounds and hosted Providence in its next game and won it on a Friday night. Next came a Sunday night game on national TV against the defending champs from BC, and Maine got on the Eagles early and often. They chased two-time national champion goalie John Muse from the nets with a 4-0 lead and won 4-1. They overcame a 2-0 deficit at Northeastern this weekend for a 3-3 tie.
It was the second time Maine needed a big win to right the ship after a bad loss. Early in the season after a 3-2 loss at Michigan State, a game where the Spartans outplayed them in many areas, Maine needed a win. The Black Bears came home to play second-ranked North Dakota on national TV and thrashed the WCHA heavyweights 7-2 en route to a weekend sweep. They went 5-0-1 in their next six.
UNH had a similar situation, and despite it being early you’ll see that the game was a big one. The Wildcats faced an October/November schedule from hell. They started out with a back-to-back Frozen Four team, Miami, in a two-game set in Oxford. They dropped the opener 6-3 in a game on national TV. The next night they Wildcats beat Miami 6-3, responding very well to a somewhat lethargic game the night before.
Following that game they went 6-0-3, winning at Cornell, at BC and against BU, which was a top-three team at the time. They tied Michigan, Northeastern and Massachusetts. Then they lost to BU on Nov. 20 and after that responded with a 6-1-1 run. Those are two examples of games won by UNH after a loss that sent them off on major runs.
Response to adversity is the name of the game in sports and in life. It will continue to be a theme as we head toward the postseason.
Beginning the home stretch
Inter-pod play is now over for the season in Atlantic Hockey, as the East and West scheduling “Pods” will play only in-region games for the rest of the regular season.
The West held a 41-18-13 advantage over the East, so it’s not a surprise that the top six teams in the standings are all from the Western pod. On Thursday, we’ll break down what that means with the new AHA playoff system. It’s turning out the way the AHA coaches it would based on the preseason poll, and it’s imbalance is the worst-case scenario for the league.
But for now, looking ahead, all six East pods teams will play two games each weekend for the next five weeks to wrap up the season, as will Niagara, Air Force and Canisius. Robert Morris will get one night off and Rochester Institute of Technology two as the rest of the teams use their games in hand in an attempt to catch the first-place Tigers.
Besides RIT, Niagara controls it own destiny. Win out and the Purple Eagles are regular season champs. They trail RIT by four points with two games in hand and play the Tigers twice to close out the regular season.
Quote of the Week
“I can look into the mirror and think I see Tom Cruise. But it’s just Frank looking back and Frank needs some work.”
-Air Force coach Frank Serratore to the Colorado Springs Gazette on his team’s complacency after a loss to Army.
USCHO.com AHA Player of the Week:
Paul Zanette, Niagara – The Paul Zanette/Bryan Haczyk show continues as a member of this line wins POTW for the fifth time this season. Zanette had three goals and three assists to help the Purple Eagles to a sweep of Sacred Heart.
Honorables:
Ryan Leets, Army – The sophomore goaltender made a career-best 43 saves to lead the Black Knights to a 3-1 win over Robert Morris. He stopped 30 of 32 shots the next night in a 2-2 tie.
Shane Madolora, RIT – Another sophomore goalie, Madolora stopped 59 of 62 shots to help the Tigers to a 4-0, 3-3 weekend at Holy Cross. Madolora improved to 11-0-4 on the season.
Mike Hull, Army – Hull had his second consecutive four point weekend, tallying two goals and two assists against Robert Morris.
Ben Lynch, RIT – Lynch was the highest scoring rookie in the league last weekend, scoring two goals and adding two assist as the Tigers took three points from Holy Cross.
Cory Conacher, Canisius – The senior had four goals in a sweep of Canisius over American International. He now has 53 goals in his career, best all-time in the Divsiion I era at Canisius.
Bryan Haczyk, Niagara – Haczyk had “only” three goals last weekend, a drop-off in production for the senior, who was averaging two goals a game over his last five contests.
Man Up
Niagara recently celebrated the life of fan Meghan Redenbach, who died from a rare form of ovarian cancer on Dec. 24. The Purple Eagles have been inspired by Meghan thoughout the season and honored her by retiring the Number Six last Friday night.
The Buffalo News did a nice story on what Meghan meant to the team, and you can also see a video produced by NU here.
Getting My Vote
My USCHO.com Men’s D-I Poll ballot this week:
1. Yale
2. Boston College
3. North Dakota
4. Denver
5. Duluth
6. Michigan
7. Notre Dame
8. Wisconsin
9. New Hampshire
10. RPI
11. Miami
12. Maine
13. Union
14. Merrimack
15. UNO
16. BU
17. Western Michigan
18. Dartmouth
19. Colorado College
20. Niagara
Michigan State’s Comley says he’ll retire at season’s end
Michigan State coach Rick Comley will retire at the end of this season, he announced at his weekly news conference Tuesday.
Comley, who led Northern Michigan to the 1991 NCAA championship and Michigan State to the 2007 title, is in his ninth season with the Spartans and his 38th season overall.
He ranks fourth in the all-time coaching wins list with 774, trailing only Ron Mason, Jerry York and Jack Parker. Comley, York and Ned Harkness are the only coaches ever to win NCAA titles at two schools.
Mason hired Comley to follow him when he left the Spartans’ bench for the school’s athletic director position.
“I have been very proud to be a part of Michigan State hockey, and I would like to thank Ron Mason for giving me this opportunity nine years ago,” Comley said in a statement. “This program is very special, with a long tradition of success. I am very proud that we could bring a national championship here in 2007, and not only have we had good hockey players in our locker room, we have had quality young men who represented this program well in the classroom and in the community. I want to thank them, as well as my staff, for an experience at Michigan State that leaves me with many great memories.
“As I continue on as the head coach for the remainder of this season, our focus for our players and staff will not change. We have improved throughout this season, and it is important for all of us to continue to try to improve every day. While the end of my Michigan State career is on the horizon, we owe it to these players to continue with business as usual. We have two important games this weekend, and four more series after that — and each game is important. That is, and will remain, our focus in these coming weeks.”
The school will conduct a national search for Comley’s replacement, athletic director Mark Hollis said in a statement.
“I have a great respect for Rick Comley and his accomplishments not only at Michigan State, but throughout his 38-year coaching career,” Hollis said. “Coach Comley is among a distinguished group of coaches in his sport — one of the top five in victories all-time, and among a handful to win national championships at two institutions. We thank him for his contributions to Michigan State hockey and our athletics department during his tenure.”
Comley spent 26 seasons at Northern Michigan, amassing a 538-429-68 record and winning the 1991 title in a memorable, three-overtime victory over Boston University.
He began his career at his alma mater, Lake Superior State, again taking over for Mason. There, he was 59-46-3 from 1973 to 1976, winning the 1974 NAIA championship.
Since taking over at Michigan State in 2002, Comley has posted a 181-133-39 record, with six straight seasons of at least 20 wins to start his tenure. After a 10-23-5 season in 2008-09, Michigan State was 19-13-6 and missed the national tournament last season. The Spartans are 10-12-4 this season.
Comley was the winner of the Spencer Penrose Award as the national coach of the year with Northern Michigan in 1980 and 1991.
Tuesday Morning Quarterback: Finding their place
Jim: Well, Todd, interesting week around the country. Yale carried out its duty in sweeping St. Lawrence and Clarkson, a nice recovery from its loss to Brown a week earlier. Newly-minted No. 2 Boston College also bounced back nicely from an ugly loss at Maine to beat archrival Boston University and a lowly Massachusetts-Lowell team that had a magical weekend of its own, beating then-No. 13 Merrimack on Friday and giving BC everything it could handle on Saturday. I definitely think as we’re about to head to the home stretch that it’s safe to say both the Bulldogs and Eagles are ready to put a stake in the sand.
Todd: I have very few questions about whether those two teams are in it for the long run. Yale is 13-1 in its last 14 games (with an important series to come this weekend, but more on that later) and BC is 9-1 in its last 10. I guess the only thing I wonder about is whether the mind-set can carry over for another 11 weeks. There’s a long way to go here.
There were a few eye-opening results last Friday in the West. Nebraska-Omaha surged to 7-1 lead before winning 8-4 at North Dakota. Michigan State held off a few Miami rally attempts for a 7-4 victory. And Ohio State blasted Notre Dame 6-1 in a series opener. Those higher-ranked losing teams all responded on Saturday with wins to split the series, which is what you have to expect from a good team. They’re going to lose occasionally, but they can’t let things spiral out of control.
Jim: I guess of those losses you mentioned, what stands out to me was the scores. They were all blowouts. I always ask myself how some of the top-ranked teams in the country can lay such a goose egg. Maybe it’s just a long season and everyone deserves an ugly game now and again. It’s similar to what happened to Maine a couple of weeks ago when it lost 7-1. I was at that game and the team couldn’t stop a nose bleed.
Of the series you mentioned, the Nebraska-Omaha one really was one I was following closely. I wasn’t surprised to see them win but the season hasn’t been a great one for the Mavericks after such a fast start. Is this a team that maybe is trying to prove its legitimacy?
Todd: I think it’s probably a fair thing at this point to define what legitimate is. In my mind, there are legitimate teams that won’t make the NCAA tournament. I don’t know if the Mavericks are going to make the tournament this year, but even if they don’t, I think they’re proving that they’re going to be a program to watch in the coming seasons.
Other than the eight-goal explosion on Friday (and that was quite a sight), they’ve been a fairly average offensive team over the past two months, and I think that has to be a concern going forward, especially with a team that ranks only 22nd nationally in defense.
Jim: You make a really good point here. There are a number of good teams (out in Hockey East, the three that stand out are Merrimack, Maine and Boston University) which come season’s end still might not have done enough to make the NCAA tournament. Which brings me to another interesting point. Have you taken a look at the PairWise of late? It looks like this could be a banner year for the ECAC in terms of qualifying teams for the NCAA field. Right now there are four ECAC teams in the top 15 of the PWR. That would certainly be an interesting change on the national scene.
Todd: I’m very interested to see how the numbers hold up for the ECAC teams. Will those four teams stay strong, make it to Atlantic City and all give themselves a decent shot at the tournament? Or will someone else come on strong and push one or more of them farther toward the margins of the at-large field? If I had to guess, I’d say the ECAC will get three teams in the tournament, which makes it a possibility that a pretty good, 20-win team will be left out.
Jim: I feel like come season’s end, the bubble teams that “survive” in the PairWise generally come from the conference with a pretty high RPI. I can’t substantiate that with hard numbers. That’s based purely on my recollection and remembering that the last team in always seems to come from a pretty strong conference.
Anyway, on to this week. All of the three Eastern conferences have major tilts this weekend. In Hockey East, you have Maine and BU squaring off. In the ECAC, you have Union and Rensselaer facing Yale in single games. And in Atlantic Hockey, Robert Morris and Niagara as well as Mercyhurst and Rochester Institute of Technology play two-game series. Still plenty of play left, but this weekend could mean quite a bit to each of these leagues.
What about out West?
Todd: The highlight of the weekend in the CCHA is going to be Miami’s trip to Notre Dame. As we mentioned before, both teams had to rebound from losses by one-sided scores on Friday to earn splits last weekend. Both of those teams are trailing Michigan in the CCHA standings, and the Irish have a chance to push the RedHawks farther out of the title picture. In the WCHA, Colorado College — back in the top 20 this week — hosts North Dakota, with the Sioux needing to get some road points to stay near the top of the standings.
15 notes connected (in some way) to goaltending
Goaltending in the CCHA and college hockey in general fascinates me this year.
- Twenty-two goaltenders, nationally, enter this weekend’s play with save percentages of .920 or higher. Granted, that number is inflated by three goalies who haven’t seen significant time this season. At the end of then 2009-10 season, however, only nine goalies nationwide had save percentages of .920 or above.
- At the end of the 2009-10 season, five of those nine goalies who ended the season with save percentages of .920 or above played in the CCHA: Brian Stewart (NMU, .927), Pat Nagle (FSU, .923), Riley Gill (WMU, .923), Connor Knapp (Miami, .921), Cody Reichard (.921). Four others – Alaska’s Scott Greenham (.919), MSU’s Drew Palmisano (.917), OSU’s Dustin Carlson (.916), FSU’s Taylor Nelson (.915) – finished among the top 20 goalies in the country.
- Heading into the home stretch of the 2010-11 season, five goaltenders sport save percentages of .920 or above: Shawn Hunwick (UM, .923), Reid Ellingson (NMU, .922), Scott Greenham (Alaska, .922), Pat Nagle (FSU, .920), Cal Heeter (OSU, .920). In other words, at the end of 2009-10, 55.56 percent of goalies with save percentages of .920 or above played in the CCHA, while right now 22.73 percent of goalies with a .920 SV% or above play in the CCHA.
- Hunwick, the CCHA goaltender with the highest save percentage, is No. 14 in that category nationally.
- Also, at the end of the 2009-10 season, 45 percent of the top 20 goalies (for save percentage) in the country played in the CCHA. Currently, CCHA goalies comprise 25 percent of the top 20 goaltenders in the country.
- Buckeye junior Cal Heeter (2.32 GAA) has played more minutes than any other goaltender in the nation (1497:11) and is second in the country in saves (666). Heeter has played all 25 of OSU’s games this season. The Buckeyes are seventh in the CCHA standings with 28 league points.
I hate to look ahead to the NCAA tournament, but this doesn’t seem to look good for the CCHA’s post-season chances. That having been said, three CCHA goaltenders had simply outstanding weekends.
- Reid Ellingson helped the Wildcats sweep the Bulldogs with a .980 SV% on the weekend, stopping 63-of-65 shots he faced and earning him CCHA Goaltender of the Week honors.
- Shawn Hunwick helped the Wolverines sweep the Nanooks, earning his third shutout Friday with a .961 SV% for the weekend.
- Drew Palmisano stood on his head in MSU’s 7-3 win over Miami Friday after finding out during warmups that he’d be starting. The Spartans were shut out by the RedHawks the following night, but Palmisano stopped 43-of-47 in the contest and 85-of-93 on the weekend for a .914 SV%.
- Miami junior Connor Knapp, who allowed two goals on nine shots (.778 SV%) in relief of Cody Reichard in the RedHawks’ 7-4 Friday loss had an impressive rebound with the shutout Saturday, stopping all 26 shots he faced. It was Knapp’s second shutout of the season, the eighth of his career.
Something that doesn’t fascinate me nearly as much as goaltending is the shootout – ironic, since its outcome is so dependent on the goaltender. As long-time readers know, I hate the thought that actual points are awarded for something that has nothing to do with the game that was played for 65 minutes. I also have no problem with a tie. I am, I fear, in the minority.
Here are some shootout tidbits, though, that you may find interesting.
- Western Michigan and Lake Superior played back-to-back ties this past weekend, resulting in them splitting the two subsequent shootouts and setting a new league record for number of rounds in a shootout at seven with 13 shooters. Saturday’s 4-4 tie was the record-setter. The Broncos were also involved in the previous record, a six-round shootout with 10 shooters against Ohio State Feb. 20, 2010.
- Of the 13 shooters in that record-setting game, only one scored: Lake Superior’s Kyle Jean. Jean beat Western goaltender Jerry Kuhn in the seventh round, giving the Lakers the even three-point split on the weekend. LSSU’s Kevin Kapalka stopped all six shooters he faced.
- There have been four other weekend regular-season series involving back-to-back ties since the CCHA adopted the shootout at the start of the 2008-09 season, and the Lakers played in two of those series: NMU at LSSU, Dec. 5-6, 2008 (NMU won both shootouts); FSU at Miami, Nov. 13-14, 2009 (FSU won both shootouts); FSU vs. WMU, Feb. 26-27, 2010 (FSU won in Big Rapids; WMU won the following night in Kalamazoo); BGSU at LSSU, Dec. 3-4, 2010 (LSSU won both shootouts).
- The Wolverines have played two games that have gone to shootouts since the rule was enacted and have benefitted from neither. Jan. 16, 2010, FSU won the shootout following a 2-2 tie. Oct. 29, 2010, UAF won the shootout following a 3-3 tie.
- Miami and Ohio State participated in the first regular-season shootout in CCHA history, on the opening day of regular-season play of the 2008-09 season (Oct. 10, 2008). Following a 3-3 tie in Columbus, the shootout went to three rounds with the Buckeyes prevailing. OSU’s Corey Elkins was the first CCHA player to score a shootout goal, and Buckeye Joseph Palmer was the first CCHA goaltender to win a league shootout. Miami’s Cody Reichard was in the net at the other end in his first game of his Division I career. “The shootout was exciting for the fans,” said then-OSU head coach John Markell. “I didn’t expect it this early in the season.” Said Miami head coach Enrico Blasi, It doesn’t feel like a loss because we got a point.”
