Michigan Wolverines Hockey

[Mike]

I didn’t see that coming either. I knew the Big Ten was very good this year but I didn’t think it would be like the SEC playing the Sun Belt in football.

[Mike]

Oh, Michigan won 11-1. Lots of records and such.

[iam416]

Since Mike sauntered in here and smugly noted, Goofers are tied with Canisisu after 2 -- the B10 outscored opponents 34-2 in the next 10 periods of play. For those not great at math, that's 3.4 goals....PER PERIOD.

That was as good a day of tournament hockey that any conference has ever had.

[iam416]

Again, these teams all played home and home 2-game series against each other. M, who is really good, managed to go 12-10-2. I think Ohio State is pretty good and they were 11-11-2. Penn State, FFS, was 10-13-1. And the Goofer, of course was, 19-4-1. This league, all year, was super-competitive. I mean, shit, based on the two games with ECAC teams, Sparty and Notre Dame would have won that league.

Anywho:

Goofer and StC split their 2 game series earlier this year in close games. That'll be a tough one, but I'd pick the Goofers.

M was 3-1 vs PSU -- scored a bunch in AA, but was really close in HV.

OSU-Q -- no clue. Q gums things up, but OSU is used to playing in those types of games.

BU-Colonel. -- I'll go with the Patriot League.

Minnesota, M, Q, Colonel. Steaming toward another Goofer-M matchup. But, tournament hockey beign what it is, we'll probably get St Cloud-Boston or some such garbage.

[Dr. Strangelove]

BU and Cornell played this year in Boston. BU won 4-3. We split the season series with Quinnipiac

[Mike]

Michigan’s road to a championship goes through PSU, OSU, and Minny. That’s a tall order.

[AlabamAlum]

I wish Alabama played more than club hockey. We were supposed to upgrade it to a scholarship sport a couple of years ago, but never did. We play Division-I level of ACHA hockey, which doesn’t mean a lot.

Jealous.

[iam416]

Just from the looks of it, I'd guess UAT could compete pretty easily with the Ivy teams and Faux Ivy team.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Even the majority of northern schools don't support hockey. I imagine it's one of the more expensive ones and not many schools turn a profit on it.

For a fair number of schools that DO play it it's their only D-1 sport. Pretty sure that's true of teams like Clarkson, St. Lawrence, Lake Superior, the Alaska schools, etc

[iam416]

There's a real concern amongst the college hockey faithful that the B10 with all it's goddamn money is going to make it rough sledding for the small, poor "hockey schools." They get so much money from TV that they can pour it back into hockey (men's and women's) and make it tough for other schools -- probably more the smaller eastern schools you were mentioned -- former WCHA schools, probably not.

Ohio State is going to be build a hockey-only arena (thank god).

[Dr. Strangelove]

There's a real concern amongst the college hockey faithful that the B10 with all it's goddamn money is going to make it rough sledding for the small, poor "hockey schools." They get so much money from TV that they can pour it back into hockey (men's and women's) and make it tough for other schools -- probably more the smaller eastern schools you were mentioned -- former WCHA schools, probably not.

Ohio State is going to be build a hockey-only arena (thank god).

Yeah the ECAC has at least 4, the two I mentioned plus RPI and Union. Michigan Tech, Northern Michigan, Nebraska-Omaha, the little brother Minnesota schools, maybe a half dozen others. Hockey is literally their only “big time” sports. And the total number of teams is small so they make up probably 15-20% of the sport.

Re: new arena. Was 900 people scattered around the Schott not creating an exciting atmosphere?

[lineygoblue]

I'd like to see all the B1G schools establish hockey programs. If Western Michigan and Lake Superior State can have competitive programs, so can Indiana, Purdue and Illinois, etc.

[AlabamAlum]

Even the majority of northern schools don't support hockey. I imagine it's one of the more expensive ones and not many schools turn a profit on it.

For a fair number of schools that DO play it it's their only D-1 sport. Pretty sure that's true of teams like Clarkson, St. Lawrence, Lake Superior, the Alaska schools, etc

Alabama athletics has money. Buckets of it. Although one issue is the hockey rink we play at is 45 minutes off campus in a suburb of Bham. They know they would have to build a rink on campus and with Coleman (the basketball arena) needing to be retired and a new one built (at $100m or so) some think we’re pinching pennies unnecessarily. I think the real reason is we’d constantly be traveling to play other scholarshipped teams. I don’t know, but with the sibling rivalry in the SEC, I truly believe other SEC teams (but not all) would add hockey if Bama did.

[iam416]

I'd like to see all the B1G schools establish hockey programs. If Western Michigan and Lake Superior State can have competitive programs, so can Indiana, Purdue and Illinois, etc.

Illinois was adding hockey but put the brakes on it. Never cared enough to investigate the cause. But, they could be the 8th team at some point.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Illinois was adding hockey but put the brakes on it. Never cared enough to investigate the cause. But, they could be the 8th team at some point.

Yeah now that you mention it I remember hearing that too and never heard why it got scrapped.