Showing posts with label College ice hockey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label College ice hockey. Show all posts

Friday, October 04, 2013

1st Annual NCHC Blog/Web Media Preseason Poll.

ATradition of Excellence has posted the results of the 1st Annual NCHC Blog/Web Media Preseason Poll, that Sioux7 and I participated in.   The poll had 16 participants, representing six of the eight schools that make up the conference. What's interesting this poll does mirror the NCHC media poll. I will post my ballot when I get a chance. 


Team (1st Place Votes)
Points
1.
Miami (11)
123
2.
North Dakota (2)
103
3.
St. Cloud State (3)
100
4.
Denver
71
5.
Minnesota-Duluth
57
6.
Colorado College
45
6.
Western Michigan
45
8.
Nebraska-Omaha
32


All-Conference Team


F -
Austin Czarnik, Miami
F -
Ryan Walters, Nebraska-Omaha
F -
Rocco Grimaldi, North Dakota
D -
Joey LaLeggia, Denver
D -
Dillon Simpson, North Dakota
G -
Ryan McKay, Miami


Preseason Player of the Year
Austin Czarnik, Miami (8)

Others receiving multiple votes:
Ryan Walters, Nebraska-Omaha (4)
Riley Barber, Miami (2)

Rookie of the Year
Dominic Toninato, Minnesota-Duluth (6)

Others receiving multiple votes:
Adam Tambellini, North Dakota (4)
Will Butcher, Denver (2)
Anthony Louis, Miami (2)

Defenseman of the Year
Joey LaLeggia, Denver (10)

Others receiving multiple votes:
Dillon Simpson, North Dakota (3)

Breakout Player of the Year
Joey Benik, St. Cloud State (5)

11 others received a single vote.


Again, a big thank you to everyone who took part:
Timothy Boger,
Kelly Green & White
(North Dakota)
Jeremy Larson (@jclarson02),
Husky Hockey Time
(St. Cloud State)
Andrew Craig,
College Hockey High Horse (Minnesota-Duluth)

Brian Halverson, Minnesota Hockey Magazine
Matt Christians (@Matt_Christians),
UMD Bulldog Country/CHN/SBN (Minnesota-Duluth)
Chris Peters (@chrismpeters), United States of Hockey/CBSSports.com
Dave Berger, Sioux Sports (North Dakota) 
Donna, Runnin' With the Dogs (Minnesota-Duluth)
Dave Starman (@DStarmanHockey), CBS Sports Network
Rick Shanley (@rickshanley), Western College Hockey Blog (Western Michigan)
UMD Hockey Blog (Minnesota-Duluth)
Eric Burton (Goon),
Goon's World/The Hockey Writers (North Dakota)
Joe Paisley,
The CS Gazette College Hockey Blog (Colorado College)

Doug Cutler & Mike Swainey (@MiamiHockeyBlog), The Blog of Brotherhood (Miami)
Donn Schuschke (Sioux 7),
Goon's World (North Dakota)
Chad, A Tradition of Excellence (North Dakota)
Enhanced by Zemanta

Thursday, September 19, 2013

Comparing the Trophies (NCHC vs. B1G)


Jackie was too chicken to put this picture up herself, even though she has full blogger rights on this blog. :) So, I will take the heat for her. Comparing the two trophies which one do you like better? Obviously, I like the Julie and Spencer Penrose Memorial Cup better.
Enhanced by Zemanta

Monday, September 16, 2013

UND Hockey: A couple of ex-UND hockey players get into fights



Here's a couple of fight videos, from two ex-UND hockey players that happened to get into fights during the prospects tourney that was held on September 8, 2013. Looks like Andrew MacWilliam was a willing combatant, and I was always wondered if I would ever get to see him drop the gloves. When he was in college the refs always seem to rescue the opposition before MacWilliam got a chance to drop the gloves...


Enhanced by Zemanta

Big Ten Hockey: Conference releases their TV Schedule


The Big Ten Hockey Conference released it's television schedule today for the 2013-14 hockey season.  The league will also cover the inaugural Big Ten Hockey hockey tournament at the Xcel Energy Center as well.


Enhanced by Zemanta

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Big Ten Hockey: To use Point System like NCHC

Brad Elliot Schlossman from the Grand Forks Herald, is reporting that the Big Ten Hockey conference will use a point system like the one that the NCHC announced a few weeks ago.

This past May, it was announced that the Big Ten will also use the shootout.


Enhanced by Zemanta

Monday, September 09, 2013

NCHC Hockey Releases Media Guide



You can go to this link and look at the NCHC's new Media Guide. It's pretty sharp as well. On this link you will be able to navigate to the page where you can peruse at all of the teams in the NCHC. This is the link for the UND page.



Enhanced by Zemanta

Saturday, September 07, 2013

UMN Hockey: Lou Nanne wants to make a name for himself

British Columbia Hockey League
British Columbia Hockey League (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This was a story that of broke on twitter tonight. I was at the football game when these tweets hit twitter. Sounds like University of Minnesota Golden Gopher hockey recruit is wanting to make a name for himself and doesn't want live in the shadows of his Grand Father former Minnesota North Stars great Lou Nanne. Personally, I see nothing wrong with that, and more power to him.

According to Jason Gonzalez, beat writer for the Star and Tribune who covers the Minnesota Gophers; Nanne has decommited from the University of Minnesota and will again explore  and ponder his options on where he will play his college hockey.



Enhanced by Zemanta

Monday, August 26, 2013

WCHA Promoting B1G Hockey Tourney


I touched on this subject back in March, after the Press Conference,  before the championship game of the Final Five. Looks like the WCHA marketing plan is coming to fruition. Here's a screen shot of the WCHA's webpage. 

Rachel Blount asked, “Can you explain exactly how the Big Ten and the WCHA will be working together and what kinds of things you will be working together on and how you will be partnered?”
Jennifer Heppel responded back with this, “What we have done so far is again the WCHA and the Xcel Energy Center since the time the facility has opened has really built a tradition with the fan base here. We recognize the support the fans in this area have given to college hockey. We have for the last month made available the opportunity to purchase tickets in advance for those fans in this area that supported the WCHA tournament. Tickets for the general public go on sale on Monday. We wanted to extend that opportunity. We worked out some initial joint marketing efforts and we will continue to do that. Again, this community has a lot of fans of specific schools, but you also have just incredible support for hockey and college hockey.  The WCHA and the Big Ten want it to be a seamless transition from year-to-year for those that support college hockey and the “X” has been on that same page, and they don’t want there to be any drop-off in the tradition that has been created.”
So after Jennifer Heppel gave us her canned answer, WCHA Commissioner Bruce McLeod jumped in and said this.
“Rachel… we set a record this year in our packages [tickets]," McLeod said . "We sold pre-tournament wise, I would have to check, almost 13,000 [tickets]. I think. That was a record for us. All of those ticket bases; those email addresses have been shared with the Big Ten people, and hopefully as Jen said the end result is, everyone benefits.  We’re working on the same, you know, kind of the same [fan] base, and sharing all of those names, and I think the basic idea of what Jen says if we can provide, I don’t know what you’re going to call it eventually, the collegiate hockey weekend, or something like that. One year it’s the Big Ten Hockey weekend, the next year it’s the WCHA. The more we can get that across, the better off we’re going to be.”
You got that? Those people that bought tickets to the Red Baron Final Five will get a first crack at next year’s Big Ten Hockey tourney.  So the Big Ten is hoping that you will decide to not go to the WCHA conference tourney in Grand Rapids and instead go the Xcel next season.

That’s absolutely brilliant.
Enhanced by Zemanta

Saturday, August 24, 2013

UND Hockey: Team Returning to Grand Forks














Enhanced by Zemanta

Tuesday, July 02, 2013

Time for a National College Hockey pay per view television package

English: Logo for DirecTV
English: Logo for DirecTV (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
As most of you know, as of right now, home UND Hockey games are not going to be on DirecTV anymore.  As of right now, there will be “no" UND Hockey games shown outside of the regional area unless the games are on CBSSN… So, going forward, you will have to use the webcasts if you want to watch the games live.

Now, here’s what we “could” do, I suggest that we flood the lines at DirecTV 1-800-531-5000 and tell them that we would like to have MidcoSportsnet.com from Midcontinent Communications on DirecTV. I would even suggest that you’re willing to pay extra so you can have those games on your DirecTV programming. 

Also, let's start a campaign to call MidcoSportsnet at (605)-274-7638 and flood their lines as well.


College hockey needs to have a hockey television packed like the NHL does. Recently, I touched on some of these issues at the Hockey Writers. 

Obviously, the Big Ten has the Big Ten Network, which is a financial gold mine. The NCHC has a new television deal with 
CBS Sports Network. In its current form, the WCHA has no current television deal.

Without a current television deal, the WCHA will get little exposure on the national level.

I am not sure, how a web deal is going to do much for national exposure. Hooking up a desktop computer or laptop to your home television can be a bit difficult, if you’re not very tech savvy.

During the 
2012-13 NHL Lockout, college hockey played a major role in filling the gap left by the NHL lockout, especially in the USA. NBC Sports Network and CBS Sports Network allowed college hockey fans to see firsthand that Division I college hockey is a viable game and gave them an option to the NHL. Some hockey fans, decided to stick with the NCAA Hockey after the NHL lockout ended.

If you have DirecTV package – with the sports package – you can watch many regional broadcasts of college hockey. This season, thanks to DirecTV, I watched both Monday’s of the 
Beanpot Tournament, as well as both games of the 2013 Hockey City Classic.

Why not develop a college hockey television package like the NHL and the NBA have? I know many fans that would pay extra money to subscribe to a college hockey television package 



Enhanced by Zemanta

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Catching up and moving forward

Stanley Cup, on display at the Hockey Hall of ...
Well the NHL playoffs are over. Finally, we can move forward, the College Hockey season is roughly three months away.  The Stanley Cup Playoffs were exciting and a grind as well.


Moving forward, I close one chapter and open another one. Last September, I was invited to write for the Hockey Writers Combine by the former editor Andrew Eide.  The Hockey Writers Editor Bruce Hollingdrake decided that he no longer wanted to have a number of 'off shoot' sites connected to THW.  I was invited to write for the Hockey Writers and I can now be found here as a lead college hockey writer.  Below are two of my latest submissions. 





I was also invited to write for the Hockey Wilderness by Bryan Reynolds on his way out the door as editor of the Hockey Wilderness …. So, now I will write a weekly college hockey column or two during the regular season as some Wild related stuff.  Currently, during the summer months, every Saturday afternoon have been writing a weekly column that’s published at 2:00 p.m..

This was one of the latest. Stupid Penalties: Two minutes for taking your helmet off during a fight


I have also continued to write for the new hockey blog Get Real Hockey which is owned by Former NHL great Bernie Nicholls. Click to view 


Enhanced by Zemanta

Thursday, May 23, 2013

Former Eagle Kreider saves Rangers bacon and forces game five against Bruins....



It was the night of the former college hockey players and former B.C. Eagle Chris Kreider kept the New York Rangers slim playoff hopes alive as his game winning goal in overtime beat the Boston Bruins 4-3. In tonight's game.


Enhanced by Zemanta

Saturday, April 20, 2013

NCAA Hockey: The more things change, the more they won't be the same

Photo from Brian Sullivan, USCHO

This morning, I was reading the Grand Forks Herald, when I came across another great article; Change may-or may not-be coming for college hockey, written by Hall of Fame sports writer Virg Foss. Check it out.
Virg Foss, Grand Forks Herald — Of course more change is already upon us as the Western Collegiate Hockey Association as we’ve known it all our lives breaks apart.
As Minnesota and Wisconsin head to the Big Ten and North Dakota, Duluth, St. Cloud State, Colorado College and Denver land in the new National Collegiate Hockey Conference, more change is coming, like it or not.
We’re already seen that college hockey’s most intense rivalry, that of North Dakota and Minnesota, won’t continue on a yearly basis, at least as long as Don Lucia is coaching the Gophers.
It’s Lucia’s decision to limit that rivalry, against the expressed wishes of past and current UND and Gopher players and fans of all ages. It’s a decision I do not understand and for reasons given by Lucia that are questionable at best.
I am with Virg, I’ve never really understood, why one team would kill a very popular and lucrative college hockey rivalry, but maybe college hockey will go on without it. I am sure that Ohio State and Penn State will fill the void though. Yeah right!  This past spring, when it seemed like there might be a chance to have a mulligan on this historic series, the hockey God’s didn’t allow the rivalry to happen, so maybe it wasn’t meant to be.
Maybe it’s time that we embrace change?
I am almost certain, that Miami and Western Michigan fans will soon hate the team from the University of North Dakota with no-name. Probably, after the second time, the two teams play on the ice.
Moving forward.
After watching 2012-13 college hockey season, nothing really made sense this season. The traditional “sexy” teams (Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, North Dakota, Boston College, Boston University) weren’t in the Frozen Four.  ECAC teams Yale and Quinnipiac proved that you don’t have to have a roster full of NHL first round draft choices to win the NCAA title either.
That doesn’t mean that these teams didn’t have talent, because they had some great talent. Yale had talented guys that bought into a system and played a great team game. Yale was a miserable team to play against, defensively. Yale also got hot at the right time and was the best team for the last four games of the season, when it mattered the most.
The list of teams the Yale Bulldogs beat was impressive, because they beat some of the best teams in the country, to win the NCAA title, erasing any doubts who the best team in the country was.
During that time frame, the Yale Bulldogs took down Minnesota no. 1 seed, North Dakota no. 2 seed, UMass-Lowell no. 1 seed and Quinnipiac no. 1 overall seed. That’s a pretty good hockey resume, it also proved that their season wasn’t a fluke.  If you’re still not a believer, Yale also went 4-0 against the WCHA, a league that sent six teams to the NCAA tourney.
What has happened is the college hockey world has changed, the other schools have found a way to persevere and they overcome some of the self-perceived advantages that the bigger schools thought they had. Apparently  big television contracts and cathedrals  posing as hockey arena’s doesn’t always equate to wins and NCAA titles.
Maybe these teams flew under the radar a bit, while other teams were patting themselves on the back. That being said, the rest of the college hockey world was put back on notice last weekend. There are no gimmes in college hockey, not any more.
Finally, I think what also caught people’s eye, was Yale head coach Keith Allain celebrating a win with his team and enjoying the moment.