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Colgate Joins Scholarship Ranks

USCHO Staff Report
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Colgate is leaving the ranks of the few remaining non-Ivy League schools playing Division I men’s ice hockey that do not award athletic scholarships. A decision was reached Saturday by the school’s Board of Trustees to reverse its long-standing policy, and to award athletic scholarships for the first time.

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A total of approximately 16 scholarships will be available to men’s and women’s hockey over a four-year span, two short of the NCAA limit of 18 that most teams enjoy. A total of 31 scholarships will be available, per year, for men and women in basketball, ice hockey, lacrosse, soccer, and swimming and diving.

Colgate competes in the Patriot League in most sports, a conference that once had its own ban on athletic scholarships. That was lifted three years ago, but Colgate continued to participate without scholarships.

“Our aim is to make Colgate the school of choice for students committed to making meaningful contributions both in the classroom and on the playing field,” said Jack Dovidio, provost of the school which enrolls approximately 2,800 students.

“We are enabling our coaches to selectively recruit that special blend of scholar-athlete — the student who is currently being wooed away by schools with equally high academic standards but with more to offer in terms of scholarship aid. This effectively levels the playing field and puts us in a position to improve both our academic and athletic profiles.

“A lot of times, we end up having to turn our backs on some kids because they’re great students and great athletes but have little or no financial need. A lot of times we’re losing those kids to scholarship schools.”

The policy change was reached after a 13-month study by committee comprised of about 20 senior administrators and faculty.

“Winning teams are phenomenal for school spirit. So the more winning teams we can have, the better it is for all of our students and faculty,” Colgate president Rebecca Chopp said.

Union, a Division III institution, is a fellow ECAC member that still does not award athletic scholarships of any kind, as do not the six Ivy League schools. St. Lawrence was the most recent to add them, in 1998. Atlantic Hockey schools are limited to 11 scholarships by league rules, though many of the schools offer much fewer if any.

Between the Lines: Weekend Wrapup, Oct. 20, 2003

By Adam Wodon
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With the slate of games providing very few premiere matchups, other than the obvious Boston College-North Dakota doubleheader, the weekend contained many interesting happenings nonetheless, on and off the ice.

• Ohio State marched into Munn and pummeled Michigan State to a 9-1 tune. I’m not really sure you can call the wins an upset, but the decisiveness of the victories, on the road, were pretty stunning. I felt Michigan State would have a good year last year, but it took most of the season to get heated up. This year, I figured they would carry that over to this season.

The same people who were calling for Ron Mason’s head because he couldn’t win NCAA games, now are calling for Rick Comley’s head already, just one season and four games into his tenure, a tenure where he’s trying to completely change the team’s system, and currently has just one senior. I’m a little surprised at Michigan State’s failures myself, but, please, it’s about two years too early to be blaming Rick Comley. Give it a chance.

• Quinnipiac channeled the memory of Mercyhurst’s 2001 NCAA tournament game in Ann Arbor, a 4-3 loss for the Lakers — the first-ever MAAC representative — against a big bad Wolverines team on their way to the Frozen Four. Quinnipiac was right in the same boat, taking a one-goal lead into the third period Friday night, before Michigan rallied for two goals, winning 5-4 on the back of four scores from Brandon Kaleniecki.

But then Quinnipiac did it again the next night, tying the game 2-2 in the third period before Jeff Tambellini completed a hat trick and a 3-2 win for Michigan. On both nights, the Bobcats were heavily outshot. But you can call one night a fluke, not two. Consider that Quinnipiac’s history against the ‘Big 4’ ain’t exactly pretty — Cornell 6-1 in 2002 NCAAs, and Maine 9-0 the same season. Quinnipiac would probably lose the next 10 times against Michigan too, but let’s give credit to Quinnipiac and Atlantic Hockey, for taking strides in closing the gap against the big boys.

• We spotted Paul Martin on the dish Saturday night, scoring his first NHL goal for the New Jersey Devils. The former Gophers defenseman left a year early, and jumped right into the Devils’ lineup, along with fellow WCHA wouldbe-senior backliner David Hale of North Dakota. Here’s an organization that wins Stanley Cups by not being afraid to play guys like Brian Gionta and John Madden, and yet it continues to amaze you how many other NHL teams still haven’t gotten it. Five years from now, when Zach Parise scores 30 goals for the Devils, maybe it will finally dawn on some of these knuckleheads.

• I’ve been watching this great baseball postseason like everyone else. But few things are as dumb as baseball fans that boo when the opposing pitcher throws a pickoff attempt to first base. It’s almost as dumb as the “that’s a balk” catcalls when a pitcher fakes a throw to second. It apparently doesn’t dawn on these fans that their team’s pitchers do the same thing. Nothing is as dumb, though, as the booing on the fake-to-third, throw-to-first play — except actually doing the fruitless fake-to-third, throw-to-first play.

• Nice to see Clarkson get off on the right foot under new coach George Roll, following the scandal which led to long-time coach Mark Morris’ departure early last season, and the subsequent effort of the overwhelmed Fred Parker as interim head coach. Clarkson got a win and a tie on the road against Bemidji State, which is no slouch as the CHA favorite this season. Last year, the Golden Knights split at home against Bemidji, a couple weeks after Morris’ dismissal. It gets tougher, though, with Colorado College coming to Cheel Arena next weekend.

• In the spirit of long-time White House reporter Helen Thomas, who uttered the priceless phrase “This is the worst president ever,” we say: “Grady F-in Little. Worst … decision … ever.” ‘Nuff said.

• Mike Gilligan picked a heckuva year to retire, leaving incoming coach Kevin Sneddon with this start to his season: No. 1 Boston College, No. 2 New Hampshire, No. 7 Boston University. Ouch. Welcome to Burlington, Kevin. But thanks in large part to the play of goaltender Travis Russell, the Catamounts hung in those games, getting two losses and a nice tie against BU. In the mish-mash that is the ECAC, there’s no reason Vermont can’t finish in the top half of the league this year. The Cats get a break next weekend with just one exhibition game, against Canadian school St. Francis Xavier.

• Britney Spears and Halle Berry on the same Saturday Night Live episode? Isn’t that like someone taking you to Vegas for your birthday, and then winning two grand in craps?

• Maine has just four seniors, and found out during the summer that its best defenseman, Francis Nault, had exhausted his NCAA eligibility. Its top five scorers, accounting for more than 50 percent of its offense, was not returning. And Jimmy Howard, its phenom freshman goaltender from last year, proved himself extremely vulnerable down the stretch. Conventional wisdom had Maine taking a dip in the Hockey East standings and national prominence.

And not just because of that. Let’s face it — there is still a large contingent out there who is waiting for the bottom to fall out of the program, not believing Tim Whitehead is up to the task, long term, of replacing legendary Sean Walsh. Yeah sure, they said, the Black Bears made the NCAA final in 2002 in Whitehead’s first year, but that was just riding the emotion of Walsh.

Well, I’m not putting Maine in the Frozen Four just yet, and Whitehead doesn’t yet have Walsh’s credentials, but I think it’s high time to dismiss any notion that Maine’s program is just going to fall off the map. Sorry Black Bear haters, but it ain’t happening. A 3-0 record, including wins over Minnesota and Wisconsin, to start the season, newcomers on fire, and the goaltending holding up. The program is in good hands.

• Jamie Russell is not used to 7-6 games. As the coach who ran the defense the last few years at Cornell, he was part of a unit that was just about the stingiest in the nation. The last time Cornell allowed six goals was January 2001. A 7-6 game, then, may be a culture shock to Russell, but considering his Michigan Tech Huskies were down 6-3 in the third period, he’ll take it. Saturday night’s comeback was huge for the program, which has been mired in the dumps for a while. The stunning comeback came at home, and it came against their Upper Peninsula rivals, Northern Michigan. “It’s one of those games that will people will remember for an awful long time I’m sure,” Russell said.

• Who did we see on the ice at Union on Saturday night for their between-periods shootout contest? Which randomly-selected fan was plucked out of the crowd to compete? Why, it was none other than the son of ECAC commissioner Phil Buttafuoco. Fishier than a Florida ballot box? You be the judge.

• You want to win me over forever, get broadband into the press box. As such, it was with great glee I covered the Philadelphia Eagles home opener on Sept. 8, a Monday Night game against Tampa in the brand spankin’ new Lincoln Financial Field. The press box has broadband access at every seat. However, if you are not prepared, this can bite you in the proverbial fanny. You see, at home, I have a router with a built in firewall. No need for a software firewall. No such luck at The Linc. I went over a month before realizing I had a derivative of the Blaster Worm on my laptop. When I realized it, I noticed the save dates of the dubious files were none other than Sept. 8. The worst effect of this was to slow down my Internet connection — which means I guess I can stop cursing Comcast, at least over this. But now I know, and you do too: Zone Alarm … don’t leave home without it.

• I get the feeling this amazing start by the NHL’s Atlanta Thrashers is not just an emotional reaction that’s bound to fall apart. They aren’t going to go undefeated this season, but this is a pretty good team, that would have been legitimate contenders for first place in their division with a healthy Dany Heatley, and may be anyway. It’s still remarkable, in any event, to see what they have done in the face of tragedy — in this case, the loss of a teammate in a car accident in which another teammate was driving. How can you not be rooting for them?

By the way, is it OK to say we really feel for Dany Heatley as much as we’re heartbroken about Dan Snyder, who lost his life? We in the college hockey community didn’t really know Snyder, but many of us know Heatley as “one of us.” Of course we feel for Snyder’s family. And of course Heatley was wrong, and will have to pay for his actions. But thinking of what Heatley — someone with all that promise — now has to live with, and what he has possibly lost, is heartbreaking in and of itself.

• I am torn over what to do. I’m not really a fan of kung fu movies, but I am a big fan of Quentin Tarantino movies (“I’m trying real hard to be the shepherd.“). Many critics have killed his latest movie, but my most respected resource, Roger Ebert — the world’s greatest film columnist (not movie critic) — gave it 4 stars out of 4. Should I see Kill Bill? Or plunk down my $10 for Lost In Translation, with the most underrated actor of our generation, Bill Murray. Uma Thurman or Scarlet Johansson? When you have two young kids, and get to the movies twice a year, you have to mull these kinds of questions long and hard.

• Of course, we can’t just forget about the premiere matchup, the clash between No. 1 Boston College and No. 4 North Dakota. It appeared early on that Boston College was separating itself from the rest of the field, with a dominant opening 25 minutes of Friday night’s game. The Sioux’s defensive concerns were in full display, with bad giveaways and bad penalties, and BC took a 3-0 lead. But suddenly, North Dakota reversed itself, and showed it was in fact to be taken as a serious national title contender. Brandon Bochenski picked up a hat trick, and suddenly, North Dakota won.

At the same time, Boston College — which looked so flawless in the first period — had its worst fears realized. It was the fourth straight game where the defense broke down in the third period, and much-maligned Matti Kaltiainen did not look sharp. In fact, before Friday’s game, all of Boston College’s goals had been allowed in the third period, in two wins and a tie. The Sioux did have two second-period goals to break that trend, but then scored four in the third.

That disturbing trend was broken the next night, when BC held for a 2-1 win. Credit here really has to go to both teams — to the Sioux, for breaking out of their funk in Game 1, and to the Eagles, for responding with a great defensive effort the next night.

For Boston College, the plusses included: getting all their guys back in the lineup after probation, suspension and injury came into play early; a great penalty kill that didn’t allow a goal; the defensive response in Game 2; and the fact that an already loaded lineup was boosted by the addition of forwards Greg Lauze, a transfer from Merrimack, and freshman Brian Boyle, who each scored Friday. The minuses: the continued concern over those third-period goals; Kaltiainen’s inconsistency; and the injury to Ben Eaves on Saturday.

For North Dakota, the plusses included: bouncing back strong in Game 1 after looking very poor early on; getting solid play from two goaltenders, Jordan Parise and Jake Brandt; and the play of freshman stud Drew Stafford. The minuses: still needing to watch the penalties, especially from Andy Schneider, who took over the captaincy after David Hale’s early departure; the power-play going 0-for-13, albeit against a great Eagles PK unit; and a mere one-assist weekend from Zach Parise, who may not be 100 percent following the previous weekend’s knee injury.

• And now, I just have to say this …

Fifteen minutes after my initial knee-jerk reaction over Rush Limbaugh’s comments three weeks ago, I settled down into figuring out what I really had a problem with over what he was saying. After all, his comments — that Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb was overrated because the liberal media wants to see black quarterbacks succeed — were not really racist so much as they were just typical Rush Limbaugh, which is to say bombastic, sanctimonious, and thoroughly disingenuous. And he was using sports to perpetuate a political myth, which is bad enough in politics, but just plain absurd in sports. The good thing is, the absurdity of it was exposed, because he basically hyper-extended himself.

In defending himself from his comments Limbaugh said he’s been critical of white quarterbacks too. But what he said about McNabb was that he was overrated by the media specifically because he was black. If he wasn’t Rush Limbaugh, he might have been able to make the point with more subtlety. He may have said, “I think McNabb is overrated. Maybe we just are afraid to criticize him sometimes because we don’t want to appear racist.” He’d have been dead wrong, but it might not have caused as much of a stir.

McNabb is definitely having a bad year, and he has his flaws, too — happy feet, throws the short ball too hard. And perhaps he is overrated — it’s debateable. But, for one, do you really think the hard-as-nails Philadelphia media gives anyone a free pass? Please. Black, white, the Philadelphia media is an equal opportunity ripper. Rich Kotite, Ray Rhodes, Rodney Peete, Bubby Brister, doesn’t matter. And do you really think there’s no one in the Philadelphia media criticizing McNabb? And if anyone is giving him a pass, perhaps it’s not because he’s black … perhaps he gets the benefit of the doubt because he’s a) been to two Pro Bowls and two NFC Championship games; b) he has just about the worst group of skill players around him as anyone in the entire NFL; and c) he happens to be, as I can attest first hand, one of the nicest guys in the world.

But this never occured to Limbaugh. Or if it did, he disingenuously ignored it in order to make a political point. And ultimately, that’s what is most offensive to me. Limbaugh has done more than any other American figure to poison the dialogue in this country. Politics were always nasty, but this “liberal media” thing is a complete myth. Everything that goes wrong, or everything you disagree with, is instantly blamed on the So Called Liberal Media bogeyman. That’s bad enough in politics, where I think it’s not only unhelpful, but complete baloney. But it’s worse in sports, which really has nothing to do with any of that. Sports reporters are hardly the constituency of the nation’s liberal progressives.

Charges of bias are easy when you use selective examples. Here at USCHO, every time we write an article about a Boston school, we get accused of “East Coast Bias.” Or, if we endorse a Minnesota player for the Hobey, we get accused of “West Coast Bias.” North Dakota fans accuse us of “Big School Bias” whenever we have a photo of a Michigan player on the front page. I worked at a newspaper for five years, which was located in a town with two high schools. People from each side of town were constantly complaining that we were biased towards the other side. Never mind that I grew up 200 miles away and couldn’t care less.

The whole thing is ridiculous — but this is what happens when you make blanket statements void of subtlety.

By reaching to make the connection between “liberal media” and overrating Donovan McNabb, Limbaugh helped expose the whole “liberal media” concoction for what it is: A witch hunt intended to rally your side by finding a scapegoat to villainize.

It’s offensive to me not because it’s racist — but because I’m a journalist.

RPI Men’s Assistant Burke To Coach Women’s Team

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Rensselaer named John Burke, currently the top assistant for the men’s hockey team, as the acting head coach of the women’s hockey team. Burke will succeed Bill Cahill, who passed away from a heart attack Oct. 5.

“I am thrilled that John has accepted the position,” Rensselaer’s Athletic Director Ken Ralph said. “Bill established great momentum with our women’s hockey team and John has the energy, knowledge and work ethic to continue the program’s progress. He is more than ready for this job and I am very happy he will continue to serve our student-athletes in this new capacity.”

“I am honored to have the opportunity to take over the women’s program,” said Burke. “Bill was a man I really enjoyed being around and learned a lot from, not just in hockey but in life. I look forward to building on the foundation and tradition he established. It remains our goal to make Rensselaer one of the top women’s hockey programs in the country.”

Burke entered his ninth season as Dan Fridgen’s top assistant this year. Prior to joining the Engineer staff he was an assistant at Hamilton and the head coach of Worcester Academy after he graduated from Bowling Green in 1991.

Rensselaer opens its season this weekend at Union after finishing last year in second place in the ECAC East. The Engineers attained their first 20-win season in 2002-03 and Cahill was named the ECAC East Coach of the Year. The Engineers return 11 of their 12 top scorers and both goaltenders.

This Week in the WCHA: Oct. 16, 2003

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They Meet Again

Some thoughts this week, while deciding which was the better game: The 2000 North Dakota-Boston College championship game or the 2001 one.

  • Zach Parise and North Dakota fans everywhere both may have escaped major injuries last weekend. Parise’s strained medial collateral ligament might not sideline him for long. If it had, Sioux fans might have been the ones with the catastrophic, self-inflicted injuries.
  • For Alaska-Anchorage, the streak is dead. Long live the streak?
  • Welcome to the 2003-04 season, St. Cloud State. One exhibition and right into the WCHA schedule.
  • We’re glad the Minnesota offense got to Omaha last weekend. Sadly, it was a game and a half late.
  • Your feel-good story of last weekend: Wisconsin’s Dan Boeser, whose junior season was a disaster after battling cancer and a broken hand, started his senior season with an overtime winner against Nebraska-Omaha. It snapped a 42-game goalscoring drought.
  • And finally, we’ll go with the 2000 final in Providence. The 2001 title game didn’t really pick up until the last five minutes of the third period, whereas the first of back-to-back BC-UND deciders was on edge for most of the third period until the Sioux won it.

    Finding Common Ground

    St. Cloud State’s first true action of the season comes against WCHA foe Wisconsin this weekend. North Dakota’s first conference series is three weeks away.

    Coaches may never be comfortable with the amount of time they have to prepare their teams for the conference season, but for some this year, the process is especially rushed.

    This won’t be the last time coaches will be in a hurry to prepare, but it may be the last time there’s such a disparity in the differing amounts of time teams have to get ready.

    Starting next season, a common start date will be in effect, dictating when teams start practicing. It’s the Saturday of the 25th full weekend before the first round of the NCAA tournament. Next season, it counts out to Oct. 2.

    The rule is meeting with approval from WCHA coaches, who see it as a step in the right direction, yet not a cure-all.

    “Points in October count the same as points in February,” St. Cloud coach Craig Dahl said. “And certainly that’s the reality of the situation.”

    The Huskies are in a tough spot this season, but there’s no guarantee this situation won’t happen with the common start date. The only regulating the new system will do is fixing a start date for practice. It’s still possible that a team could be faced with a league game right off the bat.

    But evening out the gaps in starting dates is enough for some WCHA coaches.

    “I don’t think teams should be starting 10 days before other teams,” Minnesota coach Don Lucia said.

    To open last season, Minnesota State played a Providence team that already had two games under its belt. It’s the same scenario this season.

    “Those first couple weekends, when everybody’s adjusting to the speed of the college game and picking it up, I think it is definitely a factor,” said Mavericks coach Troy Jutting, whose team opened practice on Oct. 6. “I think it’ll provide a little bit more even ground for those first couple of weekends, those first couple of series for everybody.”

    Colorado College coach Scott Owens predicted more teams would play exhibition games against Canadian schools under the new system. He also emphathized with Dahl: “It’d be tough to start league play already,” he said.

    Said Dahl: “Ideally, it would be really nice if we could have an exhibition game and a non-conference series to open the season. It gets everybody a chance to get some games under your belt and get things ironed out before points come up. But it just so happened with our schedule this year there was no way to do that.”

    Parise Possible

    Details on Parise’s injured knee are sketchy due to the new federal law that limits what can be said publicly about patients, but the North Dakota star has told the media there’s a chance he’ll play in this weekend’s featured non-conference series against Boston College.

    Parise, a sophomore who had 61 points in his rookie season, was injured in an exhibition game last Saturday.

    “I went down funny and heard a pop,” Parise told the Grand Forks Herald. “My knee pushed in funny. I don’t think it’s anything bad. We don’t know exactly what’s going on.”

    Signs later in the week pointed to Parise giving it a go on Friday night. It would add a little more spice to an early-season battle between the teams that squared off for the national titles in 2000 and 2001, with each winning one.

    Just Missing the Sweep

    Out of any number of ways of looking at Alaska-Anchorage’s collapse in the last half-minute of its series against Alaska-Fairbanks last weekend, coach John Hill prefers to play the balancing game.

    “Things,” he said,” have a way of evening out.”

    The Seawolves ended a 35-game winless streak by defeating the Nanooks on Friday in a game some might say they should have lost. So when Fairbanks scored three times in the last 28 seconds to erase a one-goal UAA lead and earn a split, it was a case of turnabout being fair play.

    It just didn’t seem fair for these long-suffering Seawolves.

    After the streak ended, Anchorage goaltender Chris King poignantly told the Anchorage Daily News, “It’s been so long since we won a game, I’m ready to cry.”

    A day later, the Seawolves had a 3-2 lead when they iced the puck, setting up Ryan Campbell’s tying goal on a rebound off the faceoff. (“At that point, I probably should have called timeout,” Hill said.) Ten seconds later, the Nanooks went ahead on a Seawolves defensive breakdown that allowed a 3-on-1. Fairbanks sealed things with an empty-net goal with one second left.

    Hill said his goal entering the weekend was the road standard — to win one game. “Obviously, being ahead the second game with 30 seconds left and losing doesn’t make it any easier to take, knowing that you had won on Friday,” he said.

    The Seawolves now can only hope history doesn’t repeat itself. They beat Fairbanks in the first game last season, but then started the 35-game winless streak.

    Late Arrival

    As the minutes and seconds ticked by and the goose egg stayed on Minnesota’s side of the scoreboard last weekend at the Maverick Stampede in Omaha, the apparent frustration from Gophers players grew to a boiling point.

    So it’s fortunate for the Gophers that Barry Tallackson finally got their first goal of the season, 97 minutes and 36 seconds into the weekend, heading off a potential crisis in just Game 2. It started a landslide that allowed Minnesota to save some face with a resounding victory over Nebraska-Omaha.

    But the damage to the Gophers’ pride had been done a day before, when Maine became the first team to shut out the two-time defending national champions since the 2001 WCHA Final Five, a stretch of 91 games.

    The lasting impact may be minimal — it may, in fact, steer Minnesota in the right direction and keep Gopher heads from getting too big — but, for a while, it seemed the champs were in offensive peril.

    Lucia said his players were too individualistic in the loss to Maine.

    “When we break down the last couple years, that’s usually the reason for it,” Lucia said. “One guy tries to do it himself and then he turns the puck over at the top of the circle and away they come at us in transition. When we’re playing well, we’re not doing that.”

    Lucia said he didn’t see that a day later, a sign that his players took the lessons to heart immediately, though a dip in the quality of the opponent also should be noted.

    The frustration continued into Saturday, but once Tallackson got things rolling, all appeared well with the Minnesota offense yet again.

    “Once that first one went in, it just seemed to relax everybody,” Lucia said. “I never dreamed we’d give up the first seven goals of the season, that’s for sure.”

    Still Looking

    In his one opportunity to see his team in a game situation before the WCHA opener, Dahl sat out some of his top St. Cloud State players to get a look at some younger players. In last Saturday’s 8-2 victory over St. Clair College of Ontario, the Huskies got a good look at their young defensemen, who impressed Dahl.

    Casey Borer had three points and was plus-3. Justin Fletcher had a goal and an assist, and Grant Clafton registered two points.

    “I really liked them,” Dahl said. “They moved the puck well and they see the ice well for rookies. I think they’re very underrated.”

    With Matt Hendricks and Peter Szabo sitting out, Mike Doyle got an opportunity to play the scoring role. He took advantage, scoring three times on four shots on goal.

    “It’s a really good thing to see, particularly since he worked so hard this summer,” Dahl said. “He put on 20 pounds, increased his strength significantly, and to see him get rewarded for that work obviously is good for his mental state.

    “Szabo didn’t play, but he’s looked good in practice. Those two guys are certainly going to have to join Hendricks as guys that are going to have to be go-to-type guys.”

    Dahl played all three of his goaltenders in the exhibition, with Jason Montgomery getting the start. He’ll get the start against Wisconsin on Friday, too, Dahl said.

    But the coach said he’ll also give Adam Coole and Tim Boron some time to prove themselves this season.

    “There’s no clear standout,” Dahl said. “They all do pretty well in practice, so I need to see them play in a game and give them a chance to play. As young as we’re going to be, and with them all being equal like they are, I think it’s imperative for me to give them all a chance to play early and let it come out in the wash, so to speak.”

    Watch the Rookies

    Minnesota State has no margin for error on defense this season, so Jutting and his staff are keeping a close eye on the progress of the three freshman defensemen who are expected to play regularly this season.

    They’ll have to be ready right off the bat, since Mavericks essentially are playing with only six defensemen because of season-ending shoulder injuries to Matt Paluczak and Jon Dubel. That puts freshmen Lucas Fransen, Chad Brownlee and Kyle Peto (he took a medical redshirt last season) to the test in an increased capacity.

    “Anytime you play three freshman defensemen in this league, you’re going to be a little nervous. At least I am,” Jutting said. “Not that I don’t think that they’re good players. But I do know how tough this league is and I do know what it’s like for freshman defensemen in this league. To have to play three basically every night, they’re going to have to learn and learn fast. And learn with their feet on the coals, not necessarily edge them into anything.”

    Jutting said he’s counting on seniors Aaron Forsythe and Nate Metcalf and junior Steven Johns to show the newcomers the ropes this season — and to do it quickly. The Mavericks have been notoriously slow starters in recent seasons, and they’re trying to avoid a similar fate this weekend at home against Providence.

    “I would like to get out of the blocks a little bit better than we have the last couple of years,” Jutting said. “It’s a big weekend for us in the sense that we are at home to start the season this year, which we have not been for the last couple of years. … I’d like to see us come out and see that we’re getting a decent understanding of the systems we’re trying to put in.”

    Line ‘Em Up

    Two exhibition games last weekend weren’t enough to determine a line chart for Colorado College, so the Tigers will continue experimenting with combinations in this weekend’s home series with Alaska-Fairbanks.

    Owens said he has a little more of a grasp of what to expect from his team after games against British Columbia and the U.S. Under-18 Team, but a lot of what he was looking at last weekend surrounded his young players and how they fared.

    The most pressing need for the Tigers, Owens said, is to firm up the line combinations and figure out who’ll play on the power-play units. CC scored on five of 13 advantages last weekend, but Owens isn’t fooling himself into believing that’ll be the case against stronger opponents.

    Brett Sterling came through with a hat trick against the U.S. team, but Owens said he also was impressed by a pair of freshmen. Left winger Scott Thauwald, a late addition to the team after Jamie Hoffman signed a pro baseball contract just before he was to start classes at CC, scored the Tigers’ fifth goal Saturday night. Centerman Brandon Polich also caught the coach’s eye despite not getting on the scoresheet.

    Instant connection

    Wisconsin’s much-heralded freshmen made an immediate impact in their first game. Forwards Andrew Joudrey and Robbie Earl earned assists on each other’s third-period goals in a season-opening overtime victory over Nebraska-Omaha.

    Of note was the Earl-Joudrey connection that provided the Badgers’ third goal. Earl raced for a puck behind the net and, without looking, found an open Joudrey in front.

    “He knew where I was going to be without even looking,” Joudrey said. “That’s a good sign that we can read each other already.”

    Said Earl: “Some people just have it.”

    Joudrey centers a line that is the only one untouched by coach Mike Eaves after last weekend. The right winger is Ryan MacMurchy.

    A Shot in the Arm

    Hill said he wasn’t alone in thinking the number of shots credited to Alaska-Fairbanks in a series against his Seawolves last weekend was slightly inflated. But that doesn’t hide the fact that Anchorage allowed a number of shots that won’t allow them to win many games this season.

    By official count, the Nanooks had 52 shots on goal last Friday and 53 last Saturday, making it quite a weekend of work for King and his goaltending counterpart, Kevin Reiter.

    Hill was happy that his team was able to keep most of the shots to the outside of the rink. But five of the six defensemen dressed for UAA last weekend were freshmen or sophomores, and Hill has admitted there will be some growing pains there.

    “We definitely need to lower the number of shots, because any time something is headed towards that net, it can go off a body, and there’s always a chance for rebounds,” Hill said. “So we need to do a better job.”

    In Other Words

    WCHA players of the week were Minnesota-Duluth’s Junior Lessard on offense, Alaska-Anchorage’s King on defense and Wisconsin’s Joudrey as the top rookie. … With Minnesota’s streak of not being shut out ending at 91 games last Friday, Minnesota-Duluth now holds the longest streak among WCHA teams at 85 games. … That long-awaited Seawolves victory last Friday was the 350th in program history. … UMD’s Lessard has a six-game scoring streak after a goal in each game at the Ice Breaker Invitational. … The Bulldogs’ Steve Czech (knee) and Tyler Brosz (triceps) picked up injuries last weekend. … Denver rookie Glenn Fisher stopped 19 of 21 shots he faced in a 6-2 victory over the U.S. Under-18 Team last Friday.

    • This Week in the CCHA: Oct. 16, 2003

    By
    -

    “The adage of splitting on the road and winning at home is a great one,” said Notre Dame head coach Dave Poulin, after his Irish split with OSU in Columbus last weekend.

    “It’s pretty rare in this league. Five-hundred in this league is probably where six teams are going to be at the end of the year, or pretty close to it.”

    At the end of the year? Try this week.

    Let’s hope your bookie has a sense of humor.

    Every ranked team in the league went down last Friday. Miami creamed Michigan, 8-3; Findlay beat Michigan State — in East Lansing — 4-3; Western Michigan doubled up on Ferris State, 4-2; and Notre Dame soundly defeated Ohio State, 5-3.

    In two of these games, the underdog exploded with third-period goals that took the contest away from the favorite. In one, it was a second-period flurry that gave the unranked team the necessary momentum. In the fourth, the third period merely lengthened an existing lead, putting the game away for good for a team not favored to win.

    But it was more than just late or latish hustle that determined the outcome of each contest. On Friday, Oct. 10, the moon was full.

    A cursory glance at hockey played on or near full moon days last season gives us all the explanation we need.

    Saturday, Feb. 15, 2003: Lake State records one of six wins for the season, a 4-2 decision over Northern Michigan. The moon was full the following night.

    Friday, Jan. 17, 2003: Lake State records a 2-2 tie against Alaska-Fairbanks. This was another full moon eve.

    Friday and Saturday, Nov. 15-16: Ohio State sweeps Michigan State. Sweeps. Full moon? Nov. 19.

    Spooky occurrences, all. Don’t believe in the lunar theory? Explain Maine blanking Minnesota, Minnesota-Duluth tying Boston College, Wayne State tying St. Lawrence, and Quinnipiac needing overtime to beat American International.

    You’re still a skeptic? You say that perhaps — just maybe — last week’s scores say more about the play in any given first week of a season rather than a force that can move oceans, fool roosters into crowing all night long, and turn otherwise normal, healthy men into bloodthirsty werewolves?

    You mean it’s not time to fire Rick Comley, to anoint Enrico Blasi, to declare Ferris State overrated, to panic if you’re a Seawolves fan?

    What kind of lunatic are you?

    They’re Number One!

    Five teams are undefeated in league play, but four of them haven’t seen a CCHA contest. Last weekend, Northern Michigan was the only team to make a clean sweep of it, beating the visiting Bowling Green Falcons in two games, 2-1 and 6-3.

    This put the Wildcats at the top of league standings and landed them a spot in this week’s USCHO poll, but Walt Kyle isn’t reading anything into this — yet.

    “It feels good but I don’t think it means much this early in the season,” said Kyle, NMU’s head coach.

    Kyle never expected to simply skate past the Falcons, a team in transition. Last year, BGSU swept NMU in Ohio, and without the outstanding play of senior goaltender Craig Kowalski last weekend, Kyle said that history could have easily repeated.

    “They’re a good team,” said Kyle of the Falcons. “We went up four goals really early [in the second game] and then we got really sloppy.”

    NMU scored early and often in that first period, with Dirk Southern finding the net at 1:48, followed by Pat Bateman five minutes later, Darin Olver at 10:53, and Dusty Collins 59 seconds after that.

    But Kevin Bieksa got BG on the board at 12:39 in the first, and the Falcons opened the second period with another goal, this time from Don Morrison, less than a minute into play. With a goal by BGSU’s Rich Meloche at 7:46 in the second, Northern saw its 4-0 lead dwindle to 4-3.

    And the Falcons kept coming and coming. “They have an excellent work ethic,” said Kyle. “They’re very well coached.”

    Kowalski earned his keep in the third period of that contest, turning aside all 13 shots he faced, as the Falcons outgunned the Wildcats 13-6 in the last stanza.

    In all, Kowalski stopped 38 in Saturday’s contest and 27 Friday, earning him CCHA Defensive Player of the Week.

    The Wildcats are a young team, and that added to the inconsistency of play during the series. “We’re playing every night, 14 or 15 freshmen and sophomores,” said Kyle. “When one of those juniors and seniors is our backup goalie, it really only gives you four upperclassmen every night.”

    But Kyle liked what he saw from those youngsters; freshmen accounted for three of the first-period goals in the 6-3 win.

    Having so many freshmen and sophomores is “a real advantage” for a second-year coach, said Kyle.

    “Any time you take over as a head coach, you want to put your imprint on the program right away. That was one thing that was a benefit to me — we had a lot of guys who hadn’t been here to play a lot for Rick [Comley].”

    Kyle said at the start of this year that he was lucky to have such character upperclassmen last year and this, players who helped the team make the transition from Comley to Kyle, players who Kyle said were real teachers on and off the ice.

    He still has a few upperclassmen left, and they still exhibit the integrity and class they did last season, said Kyle, but with so many newcomers, these leaders are having to compete for jobs with the very youngsters they’re mentoring.

    “One of the problems we have here this year is that a lot of the guys who are upperclassmen have never really established regular roles here, so they’re in a difficult situation,” said Kyle. “I give those guys a lot of credit for doing what they’re doing.”

    This weekend, the Wildcats play the Michigan Tech Huskies in a home-and-home, all-Yoop series, the significance of which may be lost on those of us a little further south.

    “It’s one of the best rivalries in college hockey,” said Kyle, who participated in this rivalry as a player as well. “In my opinion, it’s as big as it ever was. The hockey world is a small place, but it’s even smaller in the U.P. There’s a lot of pride that goes on up here in each community. There’s a lot of pride on the line. We want to prove that we’re the best hockey team in the U.P.”

    There as no mistaking the tone in Kyle’s voice; he’s dead serious, and he has reason to be beyond the local pride factor.

    “We lost to Tech and lost to Wisconsin [last season],” said Kyle. “If we win a couple of those games, it may have made a difference in [getting into] the NCAA tournament.”

    The Wildcats, you may recall, missed an invitation to the NCAAs by just a hair. They also dropped two to Bowling Green last season.

    Watch out, Huskies.

    Really Special

    In Miami’s first CCHA game this season, the RedHawks handed the Michigan Wolverines an 8-3 loss, the first time since Dec. 30, 2001, that anyone had scored eight goals against Michigan.

    How did they do it? Their special teams were really, well, special. Four of Miami’s goals were power-play tallies, one was shorthanded. You take those away and it’s a 3-3 game — unless, in fairness, you also take away T.J. Hensick’s power-play goal at 17:43 in the first for the Wolverines, which makes this a 3-2 game and a Miami win any way you spin it.

    Michigan head coach Red Berenson was taken a bit aback by the number of penalties in the game, but not by the play of the RedHawks.

    “The special teams were huge. Our power play was disappointing and the penalty kill, obviously,” said Berenson. “No matter how you cut it, there were still too many goals against. It’s a defensive responsibility, a team responsibility.”

    Berenson said that one reason for the penalties in the first game is just the initial, start-of-the-season adjustment to how the game is being called — this year. It’s all a matter of seeing how the officials are going to call certain infractions, how the players are going to settle into it, and how all concerned adjust.

    “I can’t tell you that we took any bad penalties, really,” said Berenson. “I was surprised. I couldn’t believe that there were that many penalties in the games. In saying that, I’m not saying that the officials did a bad job and I’m not taking anything away from Miami.”

    Berenson said the adjustment to officiating is “not just the league, it’s the country” at this time of year, and added, “It’s probably difficult for the officials as well.”

    At this year’s CCHA media day, Berenson said that Miami may take a few people by surprise. “I think they’ll be one of the top teams in the league. Now that we’ve played them twice, I haven’t changed my mind. On paper and from what I’ve seen, they’re a very good team.”

    In the Berenson philosophy, there are two keys to winning any game: leadership, and consistent performance from top players. In Miami’s win, that’s exactly what happened. “Their senior leadership was there and their best players played their best.”

    Sophomore Al Montoya allowed six goals before being pulled in the third, but Berenson said that only one could even be considered a “bad” goal. “They scored in the first minute of the third, then the dam broke.”

    Twenty seconds into the third, Mike Kompon made it a 4-2 Miami game. Then Greg Hogeboom (1:24), Marty Guerin (5:50), Chris Michael (8:23), and Derek Edwardson (10:22) made the home crowd very, very happy, ending a 14-game losing streak against the Wolverines and giving Miami its first win of the season.

    The following night, the Wolverines settled down, hunkered down, and won the game. Michigan held Miami scoreless in eight power plays on Saturday, Montoya allowed one third-period goal, and Michigan won 2-1.

    This weekend, the Wolverines host the Quinnipiac Bobcats for two, and Berenson isn’t looking past these nonconference games to the following week, when the Wolverines welcome NMU.

    “Quinnipiac is a much better team than that league gets credit for,” said Berenson. “They’ve got kids from all over; they’re recruiting nationally. I think they’ll be a solid team. They’ve taken on a very ambitious schedule.”

    Last week, the Bobcats beat American International 3-2 and Air Force 4-3 to open their season. Quinnipiac returns three of its top scorers from a season ago, so fans in Yost will see Matt Craig, Matt Froehlich, and Chris White lead the Bobcat offense. Justin Eddy and Jamie Holden split time in the Quinnipiac net.

    Games of the Week

    Let’s get this “super cluster” stuff out of the way, right away.

    Ohio State (2-2-0, 1-1-0 CCHA) at No. 13 Michigan State (1-1-0, 0-0-0 CCHA)
    Friday and Saturday, 7:05 p.m., Munn Arena, East Lansing, Mich.

    Both teams were defeated at home on opening night last Friday, one surprised by Findlay, the other not surprised but certainly annoyed by Notre Dame.

    Before facing the Findlay Oilers in the opening game of last week’s Ice Breaker, MSU head coach Rick Comley warned that Findlay is well coached and hard-working. After losing 4-3 to the Oilers Friday night, Comley said that his Spartans were simply outworked.

    “You have to work hard, you have to compete hard, to win,” said Comley. “I don’t care who you are and who you’re playing, whether you’re an underdog, whether you’re a favorite. I thought they had a lot more players who competed very well.”

    After losing for the first time in 10 games against Notre Dame, OSU head coach John Markell said, “I don’t think we played particularly well, and some individuals did but others didn’t.” He added, “It wasn’t a total team effort.”

    Looks like the Spartans and Buckeyes have more in common this season than just this cluster.

    MSU is undoubtedly still making an adjustment to Comley, in his second year. Additionally, it will probably take a while for things to solidify in the Spartan net; MSU remains a team still looking for an identity in the post-Ryan Miller era.

    Comley told the Lansing State Journal this week that Matt Migliaccio and Dominic Vicari will split time between the Spartan pipes. “I don’t have any interest right now in declaring a No. 1 goalie,” Comley told my esteemed colleague, Neil Koepke. “The only plan I have is to play Migliaccio on Friday. But I will not let Dom sit very long.”

    Migliaccio had the win against Minnesota-Duluth last weekend with 30 saves. Vicari stopped 20 in the loss to Findlay.

    The Buckeyes, too, split goaltending duties last weekend, with David Caruso making 24 saves in the loss to Notre Dame before Mike Betz stopped 29 in OSU’s win the following night.

    Don’t look for two OSU netminders this weekend, however, if Betz looks as good as he did Saturday. He’s a horse the OSU staff is willing to ride all season, and if he plays as he should, there will be no reason to see anyone else backstopping for the Buckeyes.

    Beyond goal, however, it seems that the Buckeyes are always making some adjustment or another at the start of any given season. For the past couple of years, OSU has presented a less-than-stellar offensive effort, with a mediocre power play; in this short season, the offense has yet to play up to its potential and the man advantage is so anemic that it couldn’t voluntarily give blood.

    It’s a little early in the season to give point-by-point statistical comparisons, but here are the early overall numbers for each team.

  • Goals per game: MSU 4.00, OSU 3.00
  • Goals allowed per game: MSU 4.00, OSU 3.50
  • Power play: MSU 28.6%, OSU 7.7%
  • Penalty kill: MSU 70.0%, OSU 78.6%
  • Top scorer: MSU Jim Slater (4-1–5), OSU Paul Caponigri (3-2–5) and Dan Knapp (0-5–5)
  • Top ‘tender: MSU Matt Migliaccio (.882 SV%), OSU Mike Betz (.898 SV%)

    The Spartans own a healthy all-time lead in this series, 69-15-7, but the Buckeyes are 2-0-2 against MSU in their last four meetings. Ohio State has won just two games — ever — in East Lansing, tying there once.

    Buckeye senior Scott May — who missed his first game in an OSU uniform last Saturday, a healthy scratch — has nine points against the Spartans. Ash Goldie has two goals and three assists and Jim Slater has two goals and three assists all-time against the Buckeyes.

    Each team is going through growing pains. It took the Spartans half a year last season to find their collective offensive identity, just in time for their two top scorers to finish their brilliant careers. The Buckeyes are loaded up front but can’t find the net, plain and simple.

    Those two top scorers for MSU were also their top blueliners, so the Spartans are struggling to define themselves there, too. OSU plays at least four rookies on D every night.

    I’ll say this again: when Mike Betz is on, he’s the equal of anyone in net in this league, and if he’s on this weekend, that’s an advantage that the Buckeyes will need, given the youthful defense.

    In the first meeting ever between these teams, way back in 1957, MSU won 18-0. The score may not be as lopsided this time.

    Picks: MSU 4-3, 4-3

    • This Week in the ECAC: Oct. 16, 2003

    By Juan Martinez
    -

    The successful head coaching debut of Nate Leaman highlighted the week that was in the ECAC. Union’s victory was the lone win for the league in nonconference action as six teams compiled a 1-3-3 mark.

    Matchups against Atlantic Hockey, the CCHA, the CHA and Hockey East continue this week with a number of ECAC teams facing programs they know very little about. Coaches around the league are wearing out VCRs looking at game tape, but more than anything, they are focused on early-season problems.

    What’s on that agenda? Penalties and special teams — what else?

    Batting A Thousand

    One game, one win. Simple enough, this game of hockey.

    Leaman captured his first victory as head coach when Union defeated Niagara on the road, 4-2. The win marked the Dutchmen’s third opening-night success in the last five seasons. In 1998-99, they also defeated Niagara. Last season, it took three tries before Union earned a victory; it, too, came against the Purple Eagles.

    “Obviously, I’m pleased,” said Leaman about Saturday’s win. “It was a good game. I didn’t think we gave up a lot until the third period. That’s when we took four penalties and it almost came back to haunt us. But we stuck together through that adversity and overcame it.”

    Leaman was pleased with Union’s resiliency, but noted signs of a team still getting used to a new coach and a new system.

    “It looked like we were thinking the game more than just playing it,” observed the coach. “Sometimes when you introduce a new system, guys are thinking too much about being in the right position, instead of just playing.”

    It isn’t a complicated system, but it is one that Union will need in order to address what Leaman considers the team’s main concern.

    “We’re strong in net, I like that,” he explained. “We have depth up front and experience, but our weakness, if we had to pick one, would have to be around our defense. But our system focuses on supporting our D (with the forwards), to make life as easy as possible for them.”

    The system will be put to the test again this weekend. Union hosts Merrimack and American International before departing for a three-game road trip against Bowling Green and UNH.

    “I don’t know a lot about AIC,” said Leaman, “I’ve never played them. However, we do know that Merrimack had a good game against Sacred Heart (a 4-2 win). We also know that Marco Rosa can win a game by himself.

    “We’ll need to play tight on him, like we did against [Joe] Tallari at Niagara. We can’t give Rosa time with the puck.”

    In addition, Leaman pointed out that Union will need to focus on creating more scoring chances and playing a more disciplined style to remain on the winning end of the scoreboard.

    “We have to get the puck to the net and look for second-chance opportunities,” he said. “We also need to stay out of the box. We need to be a tough team to play against, but we can’t do any boneheaded things that will compromise our chances to be successful.”

    Bonus Hockey for All

    Three games went into overtime last weekend, with Colgate and St. Lawrence each skating to ties in their respective contests. As with most deadlocks, some teams view them as positives, others as negatives.

    More often than not, the feelings are somewhere in between.

    “We went out there knowing we had to win the third period in order to have a chance to play overtime,” said Colgate interim head coach Stan Moore, “and we did that, so I was very pleased.

    “I’m encouraged with the fact that we fell behind three times and came back, but I’m disappointed in our consistency. We proved that we need to work on it.”

    Moore also noted that, in the Raiders’ tie, “our offense showed signs after all of our early penalties, but I’m very disappointed about [the penalties]. The players we count on offensively were probably a bit tired from having to kill all of them off.

    “They were deserving penalties, but we need to put more emphasis on playing well.”

    Moore’s squad will get that chance this weekend when they open their home schedule with a pair against defending CCHA regular-season champion Ferris State.

    “I know they’re ranked eighth in the country,” said Moore when asked what he knows about the Bulldogs. “That’s enough for me.

    “[Head coach] Bob Daniels and his staff do a great job. No one would have been disappointed to have seen them advance in the NCAAs last year. “Bob is a good teaching coach. His players will come out loose, less nervous and ready to play. Hopefully, we’ll have a healthy respect for them.”

    The Raiders will need to be armed with more than just that.

    “Our penalty killing needs to improve,” Moore said, “as I’m certain [Ferris State] has a sound power play. And we need to execute on our power plays.

    “We also need to take away the red line, the middle of the ice. Some of Northeastern’s quicker players went after our middle and that’s where forwards would like to play. But it makes it tough for our defensemen.”

    Another element that has had an impact in the early going is the change at the top.

    “You work for three years, learn a system, know who the coach is, who the assistants are and what to expect,” said Moore. “It’s your senior year, the year you’ve looked forward to and then, in September, your coach changes.

    “A number of [the players] were taken aback by the change so late. It was very emotional for them. I thank [former coach] Don [Vaughan] for doing a great job to help them understand the need for the change. We always tell them, ‘Intelligence is the ability to adjust.'”

    Moore is no stranger to the club, however, having twice been an assistant under Vaughan, including since 1998. And coming off a 17-win season, Moore is just looking to build upon his predecessor’s success.

    “I think our ranking this year is consistent to where we’ve ranked the last few years,” he said. “If we play to our potential, like we did over the last 15 games last year, we have a chance to improve on that. We’d like to spread out that play over the whole season, though, and not have to wait until the last 15 games.”

    Meanwhile, in the North Country, the Saints skated to a pair of ties against Wayne State (4-4 on Friday, 1-1 on Saturday).

    “They were very competitive games,” said Saints’ coach Joe Marsh. “[Wayne State] is going to be a good team. They really outplayed us in the first two periods of the first night, but we played well in the third period.

    “We played much better the second night, but just ran into a hot goaltender.”

    The Warriors’ Matt Kelly made 41 saves.

    “I wish our record was better,” said Marsh of his 1-1-2 team, “but it’s probably where we’re at. We just need to improve.”

    One area he’s focusing on is the Saints’ power play, which went 1-18 against Wayne State.

    “I think we are making some progress in a lot of areas,” said the coach, “but we still have a lot of things we need to work on. We need to get our power play down. We created some chances, but you have to finish things off.”

    On the flip side, St. Lawrence’s penalty killing has been sharp, including killing off an overtime opportunity for the Warriors.

    “The way the games are being called,” said Marsh, “a lot of calls are being made, which I agree with. The league has made that decision, so it is incumbent on each team to respond to that and be sound fundamentally and disciplined.

    “The referees are looking to reduce some of the things that have crept into the game over the last few seasons. Finishing checks up high, anything to the head. Overall, the refs are doing a pretty good job. It’s a good wake-up call for all the guys.

    “If you keep going with just improving the equipment, you’ll have guys with football helmets out there. It’s been proven that the more the equipment has improved, the less respect there is.

    “It’s bad fundamental hockey anyway. Far too much emphasis is placed on hitting and not on checking. You need to control the tempo of the game and control the defensive zone. I’d rather see a defenseman go in and wrap a guy up than throw a big hit.”

    In addition to the power play, the Saints were also affected by injuries to forwards Adam Hogg and Josh Anderson.

    “We’re banged up a lot right now,” Marsh said, “and that made a difference. That’s not an excuse, though, since we would platoon players at this time of year anyway. We just have to work through it and have guys step up in place of those who can’t play. But, because of that, everyone’s been in and played, which gives us a chance to evaluate everyone.

    “We came back in way better shape than a year ago. Some of it is just luck. Over the course of the year, it’s a matter of how quickly they come back. Are they in good enough shape to get back soon and respond better? That’s the real issue.”

    Marsh will need health on the Saints’ side, especially over the next two weeks as St. Lawrence squares off against Massachusetts this weekend, before hosting Maine.

    “When I think of [Massachusetts],” said Marsh, “I think of them going into Maine and winning last year. They are going to be a very tough team over the course of the year. ‘Toot’ (Don Cahoon) is a great coach and last year will really help them for this season. You don’t win championships in one year, it takes time. They know how important every game is.

    “It will be a tough game for us. Hopefully, we’ll play our best game, then we have Maine coming in here. That’s the point of our schedule, though, to get battle-tested. It will be a real tough test for us.

    “Again, special teams are the key. Our power play needs to get to the point where we’re confident and enthused. We need to throw some in to get guys feeling good about going over the boards. It’s early, so I don’t read too much into percentages. I’m looking more at confidence.”

    One Saint playing with a world of confidence is netminder Kevin Ackley, who will likely start again this weekend.

    “He stole our first win against Miami,” Marsh said. “We’ve relied on him less in the following games. He’s a good, smart goaltender playing with confidence. He has a great mental approach, never too up or too down. The kids really like having him in there.”

    Taking on Hockey East Heavies

    The Vermont Catamounts are not shying away from big games right off the bat. After a pair of losses to Boston College and UNH to start the season, UVM continues its march through Hockey East with a home tilt against Boston University.

    “From a coaching standpoint,” said Vermont bench boss Kevin Sneddon, “we want to get better every day, and [against UNH], we were a little better hockey club than we were against Boston College.

    “The brightest spot for us, and this was a question in a lot of minds heading into the season, was the goaltending. I thought Travis Russell played an outstanding game again.”

    While Sneddon said that UVM played much better defensively against the Wildcats than in the opener against BC, he admits, “we still have a long way to go.

    “The biggest thing is finding ways to win and learning how to win. We’re not there yet, but we’re obviously going up against teams that are number one and number two in the country.”

    But how exactly does a team figure out how to win?

    “Learning to win means dealing with the little things,” Sneddon said, “mastering the details. That’s what wins you hockey games. New Hampshire did that, capitalizing on some mistakes we made. That’s what good teams do.

    “A lot of it is attitude. We don’t have a lot of guys here who have won, so you need to build that.”

    Looking ahead to Saturday’s matchup against seventh-ranked BU, Sneddon knows the Catamounts will have their hands full.

    “They are another very good team, an elite hockey team coming into Gutterson Fieldhouse. Jack Parker is another coach that’s sustained excellence. They come in with that attitude I spoke of and they have a good transition game that capitalizes on opponents’ mistakes.

    “We are going to spend a lot of time in practice on the fundamentals and special teams. We gave up some power-play goals against New Hampshire while our power play didn’t produce. We’ll need to prepare for the aggressive penalty killing of BU.

    “[The Terriers] will come in here and try to outwork us. We need to be ready for that and not let anyone outwork us in our own building.”

    Sneddon doesn’t expect any major lineup changes heading into the contest, but he is leaving his options open.

    “The lineup is day-to-day. We keep saying that practice means something, so every day is an evaluation. We may change some of the lines around.”

    The possibilities for change also include who’s in net, although Russell has played very well.

    “There’s been no decision yet on our goaltender,” Sneddon said, “but obviously Travis has done a great job and he continues to impress.”

    Engineers Look to Rebound

    Coming off a pair of losses in New England, against BU and Providence, the Rensselaer Engineers look to notch their first win of the season when they open their home slate hosting Atlantic Hockey’s Connecticut Huskies.

    “I don’t know too much about UConn,” said head coach Dan Fridgen, “it’s the first time we’ve played them in a while as a program. At this point, though, it’s a matter of focusing on our club first.”

    The reason for that is last week’s showing against the Terriers and Friars.

    “We played pretty hard both games,” said Fridgen, “but not very smart. I thought our defensive coverage in the BU game was a factor in the second period, otherwise I thought we played pretty even with them for two periods.

    “I thought we started to get a little cute carrying the puck into the zone and paid the price for it. If we had capitalized early on, it would have been them coming from behind instead of us, which is a different kind of game to play.

    “We were pretty soft; we were playing nice for whatever reason. That’s certainly not going to be the kind of hockey that we’re going to be playing, and I think they got the message.”

    As for the game in Providence, “we just made too many turnovers and gave them too many chances.

    “Don’t get me wrong, there were lots of positives from this weekend, we just need to work on some things.

    “We need to play smarter in all the zones. Offensively, we need to protect the puck better and not have as many turnovers. Defensively, we need to do a better job communicating with each other.”

    Between the pipes, senior Nathan Marsters stopped 47 shots on the weekend.

    “Nate played well,” said Fridgen. “Statistics can be deceiving. There were a lot of rebounds and you hope he can make the save and give you some momentum. He stopped some, but overall we just left him out to dry.

    “We missed assignments [too]. I thought we played soft in our end of the rink at times, and not making the opposition pay the price for standing in that prime real estate area.”

    Fridgen had yet to make a decision on who would start against Connecticut.

    Knights Roll Into Opening Weekend

    George Roll officially begins his Clarkson head coaching career this weekend as the Golden Knights travel out West to take on preseason CHA favorites Bemidji State. Each team is coming off exhibition wins.

    “We are looking forward to going on the road,” said Roll. “I think it is always good to have a trip early in the season where the guys can get together and bond as a team.

    “Bemidji is a quality opponent. It certainly won’t be an easy road trip out there, but the guys are focused and they seem excited. They are enjoying their time coming to the rink every day. When that happens, a lot of times it carries over to the game situations.”

    Roll is looking to make his mark on the program, especially after Clarkson’s disastrous 2002-03 campaign. To that end, he waited until just two weeks ago before making final cuts.

    “A lot remains to be seen,” he explained. “We’ll have a lot better handle on the team after this weekend and next week when Colorado College comes into town. We have a hardworking team and we’ll be in games this year.

    “But we’re still getting ourselves together. The biggest thing will be discipline. We need to stay out of the box. That plagued Clarkson all year last year and it will not be tolerated. It’s something we’ll need to work on.”

    The discipline issue will be key for Clarkson if it plans on being successful this weekend and throughout the season. But while Roll knows he’s facing a talented, well-coached team, he’s more concerned about the Knights.

    “Right now, our concentration is on preparing our team,” he said, “and getting better in specialty teams areas. We’ll need to work on our forechecks and our defensive zone coverage as well.”

    Sophomore Dustin Traylen will start the season opener for Clarkson after missing the exhibition contest due to what Roll called “a minor team violation.” Rookie Kyle McNulty started in his place.

    “It was noting major,” Roll continued, “but that’s something that will not be tolerated. It wasn’t about using him as an example, but we’ve got to get everyone to understand. He understood and accepted it.”

    The Envelope, Please …

    The season’s first set of ECAC weekly awards have been dished out. Saints sophomore T.J. Trevelyan was named Player of the Week, while teammate Drew Bagnall nabbed Rookie of the Week honors.

    “The Trevelyan line did a great job offensively [last weekend],” said Marsh, “and Drew has played well for us. He brings a lot of enthusiasm and the right kind of intensity.

    “The sophomore class is a key class for us. The freshman class isn’t a big class, but it is a good one. We still show signs of being a young hockey team, but, eventually, you can’t keep saying that. The young guys are playing so much, they need to grow up quickly.”

    Colgate senior David Cann earned Goaltender of the Week acclaim for the second time in his career.

    “I was pleasantly surprised to see him named,” said Moore. “He and Steve Silverthorn were very close last year with almost identical numbers. The only difference between the two was in the letters, “Ws” and “Ls”.

    Cann was 4-9-2 with a 2.90 goals against average (GAA) and .901 save percentage in 2002-03. Silverthorn, meanwhile, was 13-10-2, with a 2.90 GAA and .900 save percentage.

    “We looked at how they performed in practice this season,” Moore said, “and David showed that he wanted it. He asked for the opportunity. I don’t know of any coach who, when you have someone who has been so loyal, will not give a senior that chance after such a statement.”

    (Players named to the weekly Honor Roll are listed in the sidebar.)

    Two Minutes For …

    Each week in this section we are going to give a reader the opportunity to offer their opinion on a relevant ECAC news story. One reader will be selected and will have comments included in the column. All commentary will be edited for grammar and decency (just in case!), but opinions will not be altered. E-mail us after this weekend’s games, but keep in mind that for space reasons, all comments should be kept to fewer than 300 words.

    Scott Weighart contributed to this column.

    This Week in Hockey East: Oct. 16, 2003

    By
    -

    A Hockey East Homer?

    I have been called “Homer” before, namely on a softball team I used to play for.

    Sadly, the nickname did not reflect my performance at the plate, but rather the one time I was allowed to pitch. I have since retired with a career earned run average of infinity. Batters accumulated a 1.000 on-base percentage against me and a slugging percentage of over 3.000. My former teammates claim their uniforms still have meatball stains.

    That regrettable disclaimer aside, however, I will now contend that I am not a Hockey East homer despite what the Top 15 list in the sidebar to your right shows.

    Yes, there are six teams from the league in my Top 15, including four in the top six, but a good case can be made for all of them.

    Everyone had Boston College, New Hampshire and Boston University rated highly going into the season and they’ve done nothing to change that opinion. There were questions about Maine, but after convincing wins last weekend over defending national champion and top-ranked Minnesota and then Wisconsin, Maine deserves to be very close to the top.

    As for Massachusetts and Providence, that’s another story. They’re in the same boat as Northern Michigan, namely with 2-0 records accumulated against low-rated opponents. A month from now it will be a surprise if any more than one of them, if that, is still in the national rankings.

    But for now, they’re the teams that have gotten it done. There are no other teams with more than a single win. Ferris State, Ohio State and Michigan State have fallen out of my Top 15 because of bad losses.

    So is it homerism that six Hockey East teams are in my Top 15?

    Not when you realize that the league teams haven’t lost a single game to date except for the intraleague contest on Saturday between UMass and UMass-Lowell. Contrast that with the CCHA, where only Northern Michigan (with two wins over rebuilding Bowling Green) and Michigan have winning records.

    Does that mean anything?

    Not yet. It’s waaaaayyyy too early to start the thumping of league chests. A month from now the scene could be completely different.

    But for now, seeing four Hockey East teams high in the rankings and another two sneaking in as well is very defensible.

    The Biggest Surprise

    Without a doubt, the stunner of last weekend was Maine’s blanking of Minnesota, 4-0. The defending national champions had far fewer offseason losses than the Black Bears, who had struggled down the stretch last year while the Gophers rolled.

    While a lot of the focus on the Maine roster has been the gaping holes left behind by attrition, attention must be paid to the considerable strengths.

    That starts with goaltender Jimmy Howard, whose stellar play last year gave way to struggles down the stretch that mirrored the entire team’s. If the game against Minnesota is any indication, however, those struggles are long gone and it’s back to business as one of the top netminders in the country.

    “He was great,” Maine coach Tim Whitehead said after the win. “Every time he was tested he was sharp. I thought he was really focused this week in practice and it kind of culminated in this game tonight.”

    Todd Jackson also was a major force, scoring two goals, one of them a shorthander, in each game. He certainly seized the opportunity for extra ice time, especially on special teams, created by the departure of the team’s top five scorers.

    “Jackson just played so well,” Whitehead said. “It’s great when a senior can emerge like that. He just played with a lot of heart.”

    He was named tournament MVP, which bodes very well indeed for Maine’s offensive prospects.

    The Shutout King

    Congratulations to New Hampshire goaltender Michael Ayers, who broke his school’s all-time shutout record with the ninth of his career in a 3-0 win over Vermont. Ayers had shared the mark with Sean Matile.

    “I really didn’t think about it,” Ayers said after the game. “I just thought it was great that the team got out to an early lead. This was more of a team-based win. Their work down low enabled me to make the saves that I needed to make.”

    Although Ayers is as instinctive at deflecting praise to his teammates as he is deflecting shots into the corners, his achievement is impressive. He played less than 26 minutes total as a freshman and as a sophomore didn’t record his lone shutout until late February.

    Since then, though, he’s been lights out. Last year, he posted seven whitewashings, including three in a row over Boston University.

    So don’t be surprised if by March he’s toppled all the Hockey East marks, which are based on regular season league games only. He already has four in that category and another four would match the career mark of Boston College’s Scott Clemmensen (1997-2001) as well as the season mark of fellow Wildcat Ty Conklin (2000-01).

    Based on how Ayers has had BU’s number of late, that matchup on Nov. 7 bears watching.

    The Legend Continues

    Presumably, you’ve already read Scott Weighart’s excellent feature on BU’s Matt Radoslovich. If not, you should. Radoslovich is one of those rarest of collegiate hockey players, an unrecruited walk-on who is making a significant contribution.

    Every team has its recruited walk-ons, players it has scouted and would love to have, but can’t fit into the NCAA-mandated budget of 18 scholarships. Unrecruited walk-ons are another story completely.

    Radoslovich couldn’t get coaches from the newer conferences or even from some D-III schools to return his phone calls. Now he’s figuring prominently in the fortunes of a perennial powerhouse.

    Go figure.

    The legend continued last Saturday when he was named number one star in the Terriers’ win over Rensselaer, 5-2.

    “It’s really something, isn’t it?” coach Jack Parker said after the game. “Couldn’t be more of a walk-on than Rado. He kills every penalty now and plays every shift on a regular [line] now. He’s so reliable: he can play left wing, right wing, center. He’s a very, very smart player.”

    Radoslovich only became aware of the honor when asked in the post-game interview room if he thought he’d ever be named a number one star when he came to BU.

    “Not at all,” he said. “And I didn’t know until you told me.”

    He went on to praise his linemates, David Klema and John Laliberte, as well as defensemen Ryan Whitney and Sean Sullivan, who contributed to his goal and assist.

    “That first star goes to my linemates also, and the defense,” Radoslovich said. “Everybody played a phenomenal game. Each goal that we got as a line, everybody had to chip in whether they got an assist or not. Klema’s goal, which I got the assist on, Whitney and Sullivan [contributed] great defensive play and Klema [worked] down low in our zone and chipped it to Laliberte, and then we went two-on-one. It all started with them. I have a lot of accolades for them.”

    The modest junior who aspires to score “ten goals or so” added, “We’ve got a lot of guys who can score. I’m glad to contribute anything I can do.”

    A Shorthanded Week

    Hockey East teams benefited in a big way from shorthanded goals last weekend. In nonconference play, not a single one was scored against them while they poured in five. Todd Jackson led the way with one each game in Maine’s Maverick Stampede tournament win. Sean Collins opened New Hampshire’s scoring this season with one in the first period that proved to be the game-winner over Vermont. And BC’s Ryan Murphy and Providence’s Stephen Wood picked up shorthanded empty-netters to seal wins for their teams.

    Jackson’s heroics notwithstanding, however, the biggest of them all came in Hockey East’s lone league game when James Salon and Peter Trovato collaborated with 4:10 remaining to give UMass its 3-2 win over Lowell.

    “It was a perfectly executed penalty kill that we had been working on all week,” Travato said. “We jammed up the middle on their break-in and next thing you know the puck squirts to Jamie. My hat’s off to Jamie Solon for taking it wide and getting it on net. That’s basically a gimme goal. It popped right out to me and I stuck it in the net.”

    Travato then added what was a top candidate for quote of the week: “Those are the types of goals that I get. I’m not going to come down and snipe one from the corner. I’m a rebound goal-getter. That’s my area right there.”

    From The Mailbag

    Emails from the 207 area code have filled my electronic inbox since the Black Bears’ impressive season opener. Almost universally they’ve railed about the doubts I expressed in my season preview about the team’s ability to fill holes left behind by departed big-time contributors … plus the fact that Maine’s game against Minnesota was the only loss I predicted for league teams in last week’s column… plus Maine’s ranking in my Top 15 last week was 14th, a position considered far too low.

    Of course, none of these gloating diatribes arrived before the game.

    The following, to which I couldn’t respond because the reply-to address didn’t work, is one example.

    Dear Mr. Hendrickson,

    You picked the Black Bears 14 in the nation, and yet they shut out the defending champions who are also ranked number one, in a 4-0 defeat in the season opener. The Gophers haven’t been shut out in three years. The Black Bears destroyed Wisconsin, 6-2, and look like one of the best, if not the best, team in the nation. So just one question, What’s up with your rankings?

    Sincerely,
    Umaine fan

    In my defense, I ranked Maine 14th before the two performances this fan mentions. At that time the Black Bears were 0-0-0.

    My ranking after the two wins is now second in the country.

    Fair, no?

    So I ask all you Maine fans, are we back to being friends again? At least, that is, until your team loses a few and I have to drop them?

    Where’s the love?

    All Alone In First Place

    When a grinning media member last Saturday informed UMass coach Don “Toot” Cahoon that his team’s win over Lowell gave it undisputed first place in Hockey East, he blinked, momentarily speechless.

    After a few seconds, he laughed and said, “I’m going to have a glass of wine on that one.”

    P.S. On Exhibition Games

    As an addendum to last week’s column on exhibition games, it’s worth noting that the landscape changes a bit next year when the universal starting date kicks in. No team will be able to start practices until Oct. 2 no matter how much time it takes off during other stretches.

    Until then, each school has simply needed to meet the NCAA mandates for length of schedule during the season. So if, for example, a team took a longer break during Christmas, it could start practices earlier and, as a result, have an advantage in some of the early nonconference games and tournaments that open the season. Next year, that potential disparity won’t be possible.

    On A Personal Note

    It’s been great to see Vermont goaltender Travis Russell playing so well in losing efforts to Boston College and New Hampshire.

    His coach, Kevin Sneddon, said after the UNH contest, “A positive out of this [game] that we’re focusing on now, which was a question mark coming into the season, was the play of Travis.”

    Russell played a few summer all-star tournaments with the 1984-birthdate New England Generals, a team I helped coach. He was a great kid from a fine family and he sure could stop the puck.

    Sometimes, though, he played for a rival team from his native Vermont and despite the fact that he was probably the best goalie those Generals teams ever had, I still prefer to think of him in his white Vermont jersey with matching white pads, blocker, glove and mask.

    You see, of the many hockey photographs that line my office, he plays a major role in the best of them. Sadly for him, it shows him down in a butterfly with the clearly visible puck roofed over him into the top of the net.

    The scorer? Number seven for the New England Generals, otherwise known as my son Ryan.

    It’s a great photograph, believe me. Hey, stop by the office and check it out some day.

    Quote of the Week

    A high school player of some renown has been attracting the attention of a couple Ivy League schools. The key to getting him through admissions, the Ivy recruiters told him, would be to get his combined verbal and math SAT scores up to 1200.

    Later, the young man told his friends, “First, I think I need to break 1000.”

    And Finally, Not That It Has Anything To Do With Anything, But…

  • Can we please lobby to get Jerry Remy on national postseason broadcasts? Most Sox fans have known they have something special with the Remdawg, but this postseason has underlined that with some utterly rancid work by network “talent.” Make that alleged talent. Thom Brennaman’s (or maybe it was Steve Lyons’) long-winded diatribe about Manny Ramirez’s home in Game Five against Oakland was bad enough. (Have they watched even a single home run that Barry Bonds has hit over the last half dozen years?) But Tim McCarver’s windbag rant after Pedro ole-ed Don Zimmah was the most hysterical, ridiculous commentary I can recall. Who charged whom? What else was Pedro supposed to do?
  • Topping McCarver for stupidity, though, was New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who said that Pedro should be arrested. Hey, Bloomberg, here are three words for you: You’re No Giuliani.
  • That said, Pedro did start all the problems and in the biggest game of the season to that point didn’t get it done. Pitch inside, sure, but don’t go headhunting.
  • The subpar performance in Game Three, however, will be completely forgotten with a lights-out win in Game Seven.
  • If the Yankees lose, Roger Clemens final game will be a head-to-head loss against Pedro. Sounds good to me.
  • I was teaching during Game Six and ran out to check the score on the car radio during break. The Sox were leading, 7-6, in the eighth inning. When I returned, a student who appears to thoroughly know the subject asked what I’d be discussing for the next half hour. I told him and he headed off to listen to the end of the game. He came back all smiles with news of the win. I categorically deny any allegations that he was awarded extra credit.
  • A friend on the college hockey trails who happens to be a Yankees fan — I swear it, I didn’t know about his dark secret until it was too late to rescind the friendship — commented that he liked last week’s column except having to read about the Red Sox. Well, as they say in the business, tough noogies. And so I close with:
  • Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire. Go Sox. Down with the Empire.
  • Hey, it’s a matter of good versus evil.

    Thanks to Scott Weighart, Brian Brashaw and Jim Lothrop for their contributions.

    • This Week in the CHA: Oct. 16, 2003

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    The only thing in October that could be truly shocking is the Cubs winning the World Series.

    Nothing in college hockey fully qualifies. Players must adjust to new systems, new players, new coaches. Freshmen are rarely more than high school players with college sweaters on their backs. The increased propensity for mistakes translates into an increased opportunity for an upset.

    That still doesn’t explain Findlay’s performance at the Ice Breaker last Friday. New coach Pat Ford promised that his team would deliver a few surprises this season, but a 4-3 upset of then-No. 11 Michigan State was not assumed to be among his schemes.

    Give extra credit to sophomore goaltender Jon Horrell. While the Oilers were pouring on a three-goal third period, he held the line between the pipes, earning him the USCHO.com Defensive Player of the Week award. Not bad for someone with less than 60 minutes of previous NCAA experience.

    Bemidji Starts It Up

    Last week, the CHA traveled to the North Country. Wayne State completely knotted up St. Lawrence, 1-1 and 4-4, tarnishing the Saints’ home-opening weekend.

    This week, the North heads West as SLU’s travel partner, Clarkson, treks to Bemidji for a pair of games. The Golden Knights are returning the favor the Beavers paid them a year ago.

    Bemidji begins its season of great expectations in about as good a shape as it could hope. Practices have gone well and everyone is in top form for the games against Clarkson.

    “We want to see how far we’ve progressed over the years,” said Bemidji coach Tom Serratore. “Will we come out and play like the mature, veteran team that we are? Will we avoid the mistake that you don’t expect veterans to make? That’s what we will be looking for this weekend.”

    For added inspiration, the Beavers will honor their 1983-84 team before the game on Friday. That squad had the greatest season, record-wise, of any team at any level of college hockey, going 31-0-0 on its way to the Division II Championship. Bemidji tore through the D-II ranks, outscoring its opposition, 210-71. It allowed one goal or fewer 11 times that season.

    While Bemidji cannot hope to approximate such dominance at the Division I level (that honor belongs to the 1970 Cornell team), it still is the favorite to win the CHA, with three players named to the preseason All-CHA team.

    “This team is a byproduct of what came before them,” Serratore said. “We stress every day in practice what happened at the Division II and Division III levels and we never want our players to forget the great alumni base we have. I’m one of them. We are a product of hockey at the small college level.”

    The Beavers will try to ruin the debut of Clarkson coach George Roll. Roll, last seen piloting Oswego State to the D-III NCAA finals, has the unenviable task of stabilizing a program wrought with turmoil last season over a well-publicized scandal with its former coach, Mark Morris.

    “[Clarkson] will come out with a lot of emotion, it’s going to be intense, there’s no doubt about that,” Serratore said. “They’ve got a great tradition and we respect that. But by the same token, so do we.”

    For the first time in Bemidji’s history, that tradition is expected to include a D-I conference championship. There will be a different atmosphere at the John S. Glas Fieldhouse this weekend as the squad eagerly anticipates the dropping of the puck.

    “The building will be electric the first game,” Serratore said. “We have a laser light show, we’ll have great attendance. It’s gonna be crazy.”

    “This is the first time that we’ve had a veteran team,” he added. “We’ve had a good couple weeks of practice, but not until game time will we know what we’ve got.”

    Niagara Needs to Rev it Up

    Bemidji hopes for better results against an ECAC foe with a new head coach than Niagara, its chief competitor for the CHA crown.

    Union, under new skipper Nate Leaman, trekked up I-87 and knocked off the Purple Eagles, 4-2.

    “We played a good game against Union, but it wasn’t good enough,” said Niagara coach Dave Burkholder. “There was sloppy play on both ends indicative of being an early October game.”

    The Skating Dutchmen’s sojourn left Burkholder with a to-fix list of two things: transition and power play. Niagara’s high-powered offense fell flat against Union’s penalty kill, going 0-for-7, and suffered because it couldn’t move from defense to offense smoothly enough.

    “We’ve had three great, high-spirited practices this week,” Burkholder said. “We were working on multi-component drills to shore up our transitional play.”

    Part of Niagara’s offensive difficulties against Union could be attributed to an injury to star forward Joe Tallari. Tallari strained his abdominal muscle the previous week in practice and played through the pain. He managed an assist and had several scoring chances, but the injuries have not fully healed.

    “Tallari will tell you that he was a little tentative,” Burkholder said. “He is not a hundred percent, but we expect him to be fine real soon.”

    Despite the lingering discomfort, Tallari will dress for this weekend’s exhibition against Brock. Burkholder will use the game for conditioning before next weekend’s College Hockey Showcase in neighboring Buffalo, N.Y.

    Just Wondering

    Is the Air Force schedule part of cadet training? Last weekend, Air Force was in Connecticut for the Q-Cup. This weekend it is in Alaska for the Nye Frontier Classic. That is as grueling a travel itinerary as exists in the country, but then again, the Falcons have an all-Division I schedule for the first time, so it is probably worth it.

    The distance did not prevent Air Force from rolling up Bentley in the first game of the Q-Cup last week, and expect coach Frank Serratore to have his boys ready to play this time.

    And Lastly

    Nobody will ever confuse my prognosticating ability with Punxsutawney Phil, or even an Ask Zoltar machine. Surely many of you in Internet-land think you can consistently do better (I saw the Week One message board standings).

    Therefore, you are hereby invited to submit your predictions to [email protected] Make your calls and give a one-sentence justification for the outcome. Be sure to include your name and hometown, so we all know just who you are.

    I’ll select one response each week to include at the end of the column. Who knows, maybe you can beat the Magic 8-Ball.

    This Week in Women’s Hockey: Oct. 16, 2003

    By
    -

    Sure, there were signs that three-time defending NCAA champion Minnesota-Duluth would be in for a tough time in Mankato last weekend. Consider a UMD team that was already adjusting to the loss of 12 players from its previous season, strip it of its head coach and four players (including two Canadian national representatives) for the weekend, and put an All-Conference goalie in the opposing net, then there was bound to be trouble.

    But it was still stunning to see UMD drop two games to Minnesota State this past weekend. This series matched up one program whose all-time NCAA tournament win total (six) nearly exceeded the other’s all-time WCHA conference win total (seven). Yet the Mavericks didn’t seem to care much about history in rolling to 4-3 and 3-2 wins.

    Did this weekend seal the end of the UMD dynasty? Don’t count on it. The Bulldogs have taken their lumps in the past when they’ve been missing players, and still come out golden in the end. UMD was trounced by 8-0 and 4-0 scores by Minnesota en route to the 2001 NCAA title, and also suffered sweeps to Wisconsin and Minnesota through its revolving-door roster during the 2002 Olympic season.

    It’ll be much harder for UMD to bounce back to the championship level this time. As the Mavericks already proved, the league competition will be much tighter this time around, which makes a Frozen Four berth harder to come by. And Bulldog coach Shannon Miller knows that this year’s roster with 10 freshmen can’t match the experience that those three NCAA championship teams brought at the outset of every season.

    Miller wasn’t there to witness her team’s undoing in Mankato. In serving a one-game suspension for behavior during the 2003 WCHA tournament, she opted to recruit in Quebec over the long weekend. Miller had enough foresight to anticipate some trouble in Mankato. Before assistants Stacy Wilson and Ira Turunen left, they talked about the possibility of losing over the weekend.

    The magnitude of the result still came as a surprise, however.

    “I wasn’t surprised at a loss,” Miller said. “I was surprised by two losses.”

    Two Duluth losses had been Mankato’s dream for months. The Mavericks saw who was on the schedule to start the season, and seized the opportunity to establish themselves at the elite level for the first time.

    “The focus since our kids came in August was to get ourselves ready to play Duluth the first weekend of the season,” said Minnesota State coach Jeff Vizenor, who may have already made himself the clear-cut frontrunner for WCHA coach of the year.

    “Everything we’ve done from lifting, to running, to on ice has been with the focus that we wanted to beat Minnesota-Duluth. We as a coaching staff truly believed and our players believed that we could play with them and that we could beat them. I think as the game went on, and it stayed close, and we kept scoring goals, our kids just kept on getting stronger and scoring more.”

    Duluth’s season began much like the last ended, with Nora Tallus scoring to put the Bulldogs ahead. But in what would be a reoccurring theme for the weekend, the Mavericks scored on the power play within minutes to even the score. UMD never had the lead again for the rest of the weekend.

    In total for the two games, the Bulldogs picked up an astounding 46 penalty minutes for the weekend, leading to 18 Mankato power plays and five power-play goals. On the other end, Maverick senior goaltender Shari Vogt was as good as advertised, making 30 saves — including 16 in the final period — for Friday’s 4-3 win, and 42 saves in Saturday’s 3-2 win.

    “You have to credit Mankato. They obviously did a good job preparing their team,” Miller said. “My assistant coach [Wilson] said [Vogt] was unbeatable basically in both games. Good for her.”

    On the offensive end, Vizenor watched the line of upperclassmen Katie Heinrich, Devon Nichols and Melanie Salatino step up right before his eyes. Nichols and Salatino accounted for three of the four goals on Friday and two of three goals on Saturday. Two freshmen, 5-11 Shera Vis and Cara Hendry, accounted for the other two scores.

    Vogt and forward Amanda Osborn are the team’s only seniors, who have made up for their lack of experience with strength in leadership. Vizenor, now starting his third year, has built a competitive program underneath them. After four years of lingering near the bottom of the WCHA, Mankato has shown it can tangle with the best, which is only good news for the growth of college hockey.

    “We’ve sold kids on a vision of a program that we’re going to build up, and the values and believes we wanted to build the program on,” Vizenor said. “We’ve been fortunate that we’ve had kids buy into that. Each year the recruits that we’ve been getting are stronger and the pool of talent is getting deeper each year. The fruits of our labor are starting to show right now.”

    Where do the two programs go from here? Both rosters are stacked with freshmen and have plenty of room to grow.

    UMD should make the faster strides forward simply because of the bodies they will be getting back. Caroline Ouellette and Krista McArthur will return soon from the Canadian national camp. Freshman Noemie Marin, a player with Canadian U-22 hockey experience, will soon return from duty with the Canadian softball team. In the longer term, Duluth will look for sophomore transfer Bethany Petersen to recover from gall bladder surgery, and Jen Lipman will join the team next semester.

    Miller says Duluth’s competitive disadvantage and lack of team coherence could be due to more than just injuries and national team departures. She says every season, UMD has struggled with ice time during the month of October. While the team does get some afternoon practices, it often has to practice at 6 p.m. when about half the team has night classes.

    “Let’s get real, if you want to be serious about it, you can’t play as a team if you want to practice as a team,” Miller said. “Every year we’ve had to go through this for a month, and every year we’ve survived it because we’ve had so much talent on our roster. When you turn around and you have 10 rookies of 21 spots, obviously you can’t just assume you’re going to walk through October without some lumps when you’re not practicing together.”

    Vizenor, while giving credit to his own team, recognized the struggles UMD was going through with a green roster.

    “You can’t replace the kids that they graduated,” Vizenor said. “[Last weekend] I think they had a lot of players in new roles they hadn’t played before. I think that led to us having more success on the special teams that we hadn’t had in the past on them.”

    As the past three seasons have proven though, you can never count UMD out. March is a long way away.

    “Starting in November we get a regular ice lot and we shouldn’t have more than two or three kids missing, which is probably normal for most teams,” Miller said. “I think we will develop rapidly as a team once we can practice as a team starting in November. Until that point, we’ve got to do the best we can, accept the results, and move forward.”

    While Miller is in the unfamiliar position of rebounding from consecutive season-opening defeats going into a series with Bemidji State this weekend, Vizenor is in the unfamiliar position of preventing a letdown against North Dakota after the weekend’s exhilarating, landmark victories.

    “We feel that we’re doing everything we can as coaches to feel the confidence of this win and enjoy it, but know that our goal this season wasn’t to win two games,” Vizenor said. “It’s one step in a long road. We still want to be playing our best hockey in March. I think our players will be ready to play North Dakota.”

    This Week in Atlantic Hockey: Oct. 16, 2003

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    State of the League

    Two games total have been played in Atlantic Hockey, but that doesn’t mean that the work behind the scenes isn’t as heated as the league’s March playoff run.

    Since early summer Commissioner Bob DeGregorio has had to lay the ground work for a hockey conference from scratch. That translates to everything from finding office space and furniture, to hiring, to working television deals and officiating contracts.

    Amidst all of that, though, lie the themes that existed in the MAAC: scholarships, finances, expansion and contraction.

    Simply put, the formation of Atlantic Hockey is nothing more than an adoption. The nine teams that remained after Iona and Fairfield chose to eliminate hockey carry with them baggage. Finances lead that list, with each of the nine schools at different financial points. Quinnipiac and Mercyhurst are in position to increase spending, while others such as AIC and Bentley can’t make that commitment.

    The result is DeGregorio attempting to develop a road map that appeases each interest.

    Scholarships are the first issue that his plan will tackle. Right now the Atlantic Hockey limit is 11, seven less that the NCAA limit. Schools such as UConn and Holy Cross posses policies similar to Ivy League schools and do not give scholarships. Army’s admission policy and service requirement pays for all of its students’ education, thus taking scholarships out of the mix.

    These schools butt heads with Quinnipiac, Mercyhurst, Canisius, and Sacred Heart, all of which would give additional scholarships if allowed in order to make their programs competitive on a national level.

    According to DeGregorio, this becomes a key issue.

    “Scholarships are an issue that everyone has,” said DeGregorio. “We really haven’t had a full discussion because it will likely be a meeting itself at our annual meeting.

    “There are those that want more and those that want status quo. At some point there will be a compromise, I think, and it’s an issue that bears a lot of discussion and planning.

    DeGregorio said that though he anticipates an increase, it won’t happen this year and definitely won’t be an immediate jump to the maximum.

    “We likely won’t jump from 11 to 18 but there will be some movement,” DeGregorio said. There has to be a well-drawn out plan, if we’re going to do that.

    “No matter what they agree to, it will have to be spread out over a period of time that each school can easily digest. It has to be very doable for all concerned.”

    DeGregorio understands, though, that the lack of movement on this issue could be detrimental to the league, should teams that want to add scholarships find opportunities elsewhere.

    “There’s always the possibility [teams will leave],” said DeGregorio, citing Boston College’s recent jump from the Big East to the ACC. “That could happen to us tomorrow, and if one of our schools decides to go anywhere else it would be devastating.”

    He noted that right now there isn’t anywhere for these schools to go. The ECAC, he said, could become an option should the Ivy schools form their own league. Or that other conferences could decide to expand. All of that, though, is beyond his league’s control.

    “There are plenty of rumblings and if one team leaves it would create a problem,” DeGregorio said. “But we’ve had discussions with the directors of each school and the coaches and they’re all committed to build Atlantic Hockey.”

    Part of that building process could be through expansion. The league has received a formal application from Robert Morris and rumors have surfaced that Navy, Rhode Island and St. Anselm could be potential members.

    That, though, is still down the road.

    “The directors are not prepared to expand the league at this point in time,” said DeGregorio. “They want to get through our first year’s growing pains. We’ve had to get incorporated through the legal end and work on a new officials’ contract. With all of this, and we started this in July, there’s just not enough time to be prepared for expansion. We’re just not ready right now, but by 2005 it’s a very strong possibility.”

    DeGregorio’s number-one goal is to make the conference financially sound, quickly. When he took over as Hockey East commissioner in the mid-90s, the league was in a similar position as Atlantic Hockey is now, operating solely on members’ dues on a year-to-year basis. His plan for that league called for the ability to put one year’s operating budget in reserve and increase the league’s budget three-to-five percent annually. The goal at the end is to return dividends to each member.

    Atlantic Hockey will follow the same financial model, which requires solid corporate sponsorship and revenue from the league tournament. This year’s tournament will be a two-week event at Army’s campus in West Point, N.Y. All nine teams will qualify for a single-elimination format that will produce five separate admission gates over the tournament’s four days.

    The first three rounds, including a play-in game, four quarterfinals and two semis, will take place the first weekend. The championship game will be schedule the following Friday or Saturday contingent upon securing a television contract.

    All of this should generate revenues significantly higher that the receipts of past MAAC championships. Still, there’s work to do.

    “We have a tight budget to maintain an office and a staff and all of the administrative costs that go along with the league,” DeGregorio said. “We hope to build a treasury by using the income from the playoffs … and our ultimate goal is to make this league fiscally sound.”

    Weekly Awards

    Player of the Week: John Kelly, Quinnipiac

    Kelly was named the Quinnipiac Cup MVP after helping the Bobcats win their sixth title in eight years. Kelly assisted on the game-winner in Friday’s 3-2 overtime victory over AIC and a night later scored the OT marker to beat Air Force, 4-3.

    Goaltender of the Week: Simon St. Pierre, Bentley

    Splitting his team’s two games at last weekend’s Quinnipiac Cup, St. Pierre turned in two stellar performances. On Friday night he made 47 saves in a 4-2 loss to Air Force and Saturday bounced back with 33 saves in a 6-3 win over AIC.

    Freshman of the Week: Reid Cashman, Quinnipiac

    The Q-Cup ended up producing all of this week’s award winners, with Cashman collecting a goal and two assists in the Bobcats’ two games. He registered two assists on Friday versus AIC and scored on the power play Saturday night.

    Home Sweet Home in Buffalo

    There’s something strange to the start of the season for Canisius. Unlike other members of Atlantic Hockey who have to trek around to non-league road games, Canisius won’t leave the cozy confines of Buffalo for nearly the first month of the season.

    Playing a schedule the features four home games the first two weekends and then two at Buffalo’s HSBC Arena (home of last year’s Frozen Four), the following week, head coach Brian Cavanaugh doesn’t have to worry about travel details for a while.

    “We spend a lot of time on the road,” said Cavanaugh, whose Griffs have only Mercyhurst within reasonable distance among the eight other Atlantic Hockey clubs. “It’s nice to not have to travel right away.”

    Canisius’ early homestand stems from solid negotiations on Cavanaugh’s part. It began last weekend when Holy Cross traveled to Buffalo for the first two league games in Atlantic Hockey history. According to Holy Cross coach Paul Pearl, he found making an early trip to Buffalo a relief — the series would have been scheduled instead amongst a very difficult month of February.

    This weekend, Canisius hosts Lake Superior as part of a two-year exchange program. Rarely in Atlantic Hockey have teams been able to score home games against non-league opponents from the Big Four conferences. Cavanaugh, though, found that important when negotiating his non-league schedule.

    “I’ve been trying to negotiate playing non-conference games on two-year deals where we play two games at their place and two at ours, as opposed to just going somewhere on a one-year, single game guarantee,” said Cavanaugh. “Fortunately it worked out on the agreement with Lake State that they’d come to Buffalo this year.

    “We’ve done and will do everything to accommodate them when they’re in town to make sure they’re comfortable and enjoy the environment.”

    The translation to Canisius and Cavanaugh is a luxury often missing for Atlantic Hockey teams: non-conference home games. Atlantic Hockey teams, not possessing the top-notch facilities or crowds of their Big Four opponents, have had a more difficult time scheduling home non-league contests. It’s a similar problem as that facing some of the Big Four’s lower-profile schools.

    “When we play a school like Michigan, we have to travel to them,” said Merrimack head coach Chris Serino, who last weekend scheduled his club’s home opener against Sacred Heart. “If we play a team from Atlantic Hockey, they’ll travel to us because they want the game.”

    That, though, is obviously a trend coaches like Cavanaugh want to buck.

    “I think there’s a tremendous advantage to play at home,” said Cavanaugh. “It’s not like the NHL where all the buildings are the same.

    “In the old days of the NHL you had some rinks will smaller ice surfaces and every one had their own aura. Back then, it was a tremendous advantage.

    “College hockey has a certain semblance to the NHL back in that bygone era. You go to Omaha it’s a different game. Go to North Dakota and it’s a different game. You can’t tell me playing BC, BU and Merrimack that it’s all the same environment.

    “So the more games Atlantic Hockey teams can get in their own rinks, the closer they can get to having wins against [nonconference] opponents.”

    Chris Potter Named to Coach Wesleyan

    USCHO Staff Report
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    Chris Potter, a former assistant at Brown and Connecticut, has been named to replace Buddy Powers as head coach at Wesleyan. The deal is on a one-year interim basis, pending a more exhaustive coaching search next offseason.

    Powers, originally named in May, had stepped down without yet coaching a game this year due to family reasons.

    Potter, 32, assisted at Brown from 1998 to 2003 following two seasons in the same position at Connecticut. He was the top assistant coach at both schools. He resigned from the Brown coaching staff in early September.

    Potter is a 1993 graduate of UConn where, as a defenseman, he was an All-American, a two-time ECAC All-Star first team selection, and All-New England.

    After graduating from UConn, Potter spent three years in the East Coast Hockey League playing for the Roanoke Express and attended training camp with the San Jose Sharks of the NHL as a free agent in 1993.

    Potter also received a master’s degree in sport management at UConn in 1998 while serving as an assistant coach there.

    Besides his college experience, Potter was also the associate coach and evaluator for the USA Hockey Region 16 & 17 camps in Fort Bragg, N.C. His duties included selecting the players that would attend national camps in St. Cloud, Minn. and Lake Placid, N.Y. Potter also has served as the Director of the Mid-Atlantic Hockey Camps in Washington, D.C. and has been a head coach at Elite Hockey Camps in Andover, Mass. and Connecticut Hockey Skills in West Haven, Conn.

    Yale assistant Bruce Wolanin and former Union assistant Andrew Will have been reported as other finalists for the Wesleyan job.

    This Week in the WCHA: Oct. 9, 2003

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    Getting Punchy

    Some thoughts this week, while pondering just how far off those preseason predictions are going to be:

  • Here’s setting the tone for a season: North Dakota’s Mike Prpich and Minnesota-Duluth’s Marco Peluso squared off in an old-fashioned donnybrook at center ice in last Saturday’s U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame Game. The game DQs mean each will miss a game against Boston College — Peluso this Friday and Prpich the next.
  • The timing of Alex Leavitt’s $1 million lawsuit against Wisconsin coach Mike Eaves and others? Interesting.
  • The possibility of the home team wearing dark jerseys is still on the table, although the WCHA has no formal policy on the matter. With the decision left up to the home team, we wonder when the first dispute will be.
  • And finally, when thinking about the preseason selection, we’re reminded of words about the WCHA from one of its coaches: “Whatever you think is going to happen usually doesn’t.”

    After Further Review

    The instant replay trial the WCHA planned for this season is on hold because of differences in how the league and the NCAA wanted the system to work.

    Denver’s Magness Arena had been chosen as the test site for a replay system that would be the first allowed in non-tournament regular-season play in college hockey.

    The league petitioned the NCAA ice hockey rules committee for permission for the trial and the committee approved it, but only if the same protocol that governed postseason video replay was followed. The WCHA, which wanted referees to view the replays and make their own decisions instead of sending matters to a replay judge, decided to put the plan on the shelf.

    League commissioner Bruce McLeod said the costs associated with employing another official for every game was the reason the league couldn’t go along with the NCAA’s demands.

    “We’ve worked hard, the WCHA, the last two or three years, to try to come up with what we saw for collegiate hockey as a feasible protocol,” he said. “Collegiate hockey, not just the WCHA, asked for an experiment in this area so people might be able to consider this across the board.”

    McLeod then offered a rhetorical question: “The honest truth is, if the WCHA can’t afford it, who can?”

    Denver coach George Gwozdecky, who would have seen the most of the replay system, called the turn of events “disappointing.”

    “Our officials, in conferring with them, I had heard many of them indicate that, boy, what a great idea to be able to have a television monitor, if there is a questionable goal or if there is a goal they just don’t know, they can go to the timers table and review it,” he said. “If they can’t tell by the review, whatever way they call it stands. That basically was our proposal.”

    McLeod said he has been waiting to talk to someone from the NCAA or the rules committee to see if they’ll give any ground on their stance. But it appears the replay trial is on hold for this season, considering the league still would have to train its referees if it was allowed to do things its way.

    Here We Go Again

    We don’t mean to make a big deal out of an exhibition game, but, in case you missed it last weekend, Alaska-Anchorage lost 2-1 to the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology.

    Enough said.

    Goal Party

    We don’t mean to make a big deal out of an exhibition game, part two, but Michigan Tech racked up 49 shots on goal in a 10-1 victory over Waterloo last Friday.

    Ten players scored the 10 goals for the Huskies, bringing the inevitable line: I didn’t know the Huskies had 10 scorers.

    “I don’t know if that indicates anything,” first-year Huskies coach Jamie Russell said, justifiably taking the shine off an inconsequential victory. “We’ll have a better idea of where we’re at after we play Northern Michigan [next weekend]. It was certainly a good start, and it gives the guys a lot of confidence in the systems and what we’re trying to do.”

    What impressed Russell was his players’ ability to absorb a new system in six days of practice and be able to perform in a game situation. In the days leading up to the exhibition, Russell and the coaching staff introduced a new defensive-zone system, a new forecheck and changes to the power play and penalty kill.

    It’s all part of the master plan for the Huskies. Russell intends to shake the passiveness out of his players and infuse some energy in their style.

    “That was the biggest change for them, and I think they did a good job,” Russell said. “We were real happy with the results.”

    Tech takes a step backward this weekend for an intrasquad scrimmage and skills competition, something Russell would have preferred to see before the exhibition game to ensure more of a steady buildup to the season. The schedule had been finalized before the new coach could do anything about it, however.

    After seeing what a lot of players can do last weekend, the coaches will look to see what role each player will be able to fulfill.

    Russell said he enjoyed his first game behind the Huskies’ bench, but a 10-1 victory will go a long way in making that happen.

    “Anytime you have a 6-0 lead after one,” Russell said, “there’s not a lot of stress in that game.”

    No Turning Back

    A year ago, Minnesota-Duluth opened the season with a pair of games against Notre Dame, then had to play an exhibition game against Lakehead, which it won comfortably.

    “Quite honestly, it was a waste of a game,” Bulldogs coach Scott Sandelin said. “I don’t think either team was really into it.”

    So Sandelin is sticking with his claim that starting with games against North Dakota and Boston College will be good for his team. This may be an opportune time for a warning to be careful what you wish for.

    Sandelin noted fatigue as a factor in the second half of the Bulldogs’ 3-2 loss to the Sioux last Saturday. But he’s much happier with facing the Eagles this weekend than playing a throwaway game.

    “To go into another weekend where you’re going to play some good teams again, obviously right off the bat a team that’s one of the favorites, I think that’s a real good thing,” Sandelin said. “I think it keeps you focused on what you have to do. Also, it’s going to be another measuring stick as to your progress.

    “This gives our guys something to work hard for this week, and I think it keeps that focus on working hard to improve and trying to go in there and play better.”

    The Bulldogs get a weekend off after the Ice Breaker at Michigan State, where they’ll play either the Spartans or Findlay on Saturday. But then they go to Mariucci Arena, so progress this weekend would be especially welcome.

    Legally Speaking

    Just when those around the Wisconsin program thought they could close the book on last season and start fresh, out came the news last Friday that Alex Leavitt is suing Eaves, Wisconsin athletic director Pat Richter, senior associate athletic director Cheryl Marra and the UW athletic department for $250,000 each.

    Leavitt claims his prospects for a high-earning hockey career were damaged by the altercation he had with Eaves in a Grand Forks, N.D., hotel room last November and what he claims were “defamatory statements” made by Eaves during the reporting of the incident.

    Eaves was issued a letter of reprimand by the athletic department after the incident, during which Eaves reportedly grabbed Leavitt by the shirt, threw him across the room and verbally berated him. After sitting out for a period of time after he went public with the story last season, Leavitt returned to practice, only to be dismissed days later.

    In the lawsuit, Leavitt claims his draft status was lowered as a result of the incident and Eaves’ claim that Leavitt broke team rules. Leavitt said he did not break any rules, and is asking the court to order Eaves to retract that statement.

    Among the other claims made by Leavitt in the lawsuit:

  • Richter and Marra were negligent in hiring Eaves, saying had they investigated his past they would have found “one or more outrageous acts of a similar nature in previous employment as a hockey coach.” Specifics were not provided.
  • His status on the team was undermined by demotion, a reduction of playing time and a removal from games after he went public with the story.
  • Eaves’ conduct caused Leavitt to experience “mental harm and emotional distress.”

    The lawsuit also claims Richter failed and refused to fire Eaves “despite having been presented with overwhelming evidence that … Eaves frequently engages in violent, destructive and otherwise inappropriate behavior on a regular basis, has engaged in conduct indicative of mental instability, and is incompetent to perform as the head coach of a Division (I) college hockey program.”

    When approached by a reporter after the Badgers’ intrasquad game last Friday, Eaves said he hadn’t heard about the case and wouldn’t comment on it, other than to say he was surprised. At his weekly news conference on Monday, he said he has been asked by the school’s legal department not to comment on the subject.

    The athletic department issued a statement, saying it is “fully supportive” of Eaves.

    Eaves, Richter, Marra and the athletic department have 45 days after being served with the lawsuit to respond. A trial, if needed, probably wouldn’t start until next October at the earliest, lawyers for Leavitt said.

    The Way You Look Tonight

    The WCHA kicked around the idea of swapping jersey assignments in its meetings last season and over the summer, but is instead letting a new NCAA rule stand on its own.

    NCAA rules this season allow a visiting team to wear a light-colored jersey in the regular season only when the teams have agreed upon the switch in advance. Traditionally, the home team has worn the lighter jersey, but the NHL this season has flopped that.

    “We did talk about it,” McLeod said, “and we just said under the circumstances, let’s just leave it.”

    Setting the Tone

    Minnesota-Duluth and North Dakota square off at least four more times this season.

    At least they won’t have to worry about exchanging pleasantries.

    The Bulldogs and the Sioux combined for 84 penalty minutes last Saturday, including game disqualifications to UMD’s Marco Peluso and North Dakota’s Mike Prpich for a second-period fight.

    “Our games with them, even last year, were very intense games,” Sandelin said. “Obviously, I don’t see it being any different the next four games.

    Those things happen,” he said of the fight. “It’s certainly not something you want in the game, but it happened and you move on.”

    Let It Ride

    Gwozdecky freely admits he didn’t get a whole lot done in the three days of practice for his Denver Pioneers before their first game of the season. There certainly wasn’t any time for a scouting report on their opponents in the Lefty McFadden Invitational.

    So the Pioneers just put it on the ice, and the results came back positive.

    Victories over Ohio State and St. Lawrence aren’t ones they’re going to hang their hats on this season, but they provided excellent feedback.

    “I think anytime you can put a little bit of success together back to back, you gain some confidence, you gain a little momentum,” Gwozdecky said. “There’s a little extra bounce in the step, and players look forward to practicing in preparation for the next series.”

    Some of the credit for Denver’s preparedness goes to those who directed the workouts before the coaches got involved. Over the summer and in captains’ practices in September, the seniors put in the workings of the system that would be taught by the coaches, making it easier to have something of a cohesive unit together for an early game.

    “We knew back in the spring this was going to happen, so we had a number of meetings with our team to prepare them,” Gwozdecky said. “The captains and seniors did a terrific job in the month of September. Really, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday of last week were spent just reviewing a couple of different coverages and some ideas as to how we wanted to approach the game on Friday and on Saturday.”

    In Other Words

    WCHA players of the week were Denver center Jeff Drummond on offense; Pioneers goaltender Adam Berkhoel on defense; and North Dakota goalie Jordan Parise as the top rookie. … For only the fifth time in program history, Alaska-Anchorage opens the season on the road. The Seawolves play a series at Alaska-Fairbanks this weekend. … Denver is 12th in this week’s USCHO.com poll, but the Pioneers received one first-place vote.

    • This Week in Atlantic Hockey: Oct. 9, 2003

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    New top dog for Huskies?

    The regular season hasn’t even begun, but there are rumblings of change in Storrs.

    Despite returning two senior goaltenders in Artie Imbriano and Jason Carey, coach Bruce Marshall is impressed early on with the play of rookie netminder Scott Tomes. The freshman played a complete game in an exhibition Sunday as UConn knocked off Ottawa, 2-1.

    On the night, Tomes finished with 22 saves, including 12 in a second period that saw UConn kill off four Gee Gee power plays. That, according to Marshall, was as much as he could ask.

    “I thought he handled himself very well,” said Marshall, who admitted it was important to him to see how the rookie could perform. “We got outnumbered two-to-one in penalties so he saw a lot of rubber on the [penalty kill]. He handled himself well enough to be in strong consideration for starting the season.”

    The performance was a glimmer of light for Marshall, following a year where goaltending was just one of the many problems on a team that, in many people’s estimation, grossly underachieved.

    Last season, Marshall doubled up on goaltending, rotating Imbriano and Carey as often as possible. In the end Carey took a modest step forward, but still managed only a 6-13-2 record with an .884 save percentage. Imbriano ranked lower still with a 2-10-1 record and .864 sv%.

    That left the door open coming into training camp. Still, one game won’t sew up the starting job for Tomes.

    “I think ideally you would like to be able to throw one guy out there to carry the load,” said Marshall, hoping to return to having a number-one goaltender as the club did back in 2000 when Marc Senerchia led UConn to the MAAC Championship. “Maybe we need to ride a guy a little bit more in the early going. You can start with ‘X’ and let him run with it and if he’s not doing it give it to ‘Y’ and see how he can do.”

    Marshall’s question to answer now is which goaltender is ‘X,’ which is ‘Y,’ and which is S.O.L.

    That question began to be answered Thursday, with UConn in Amherst, Mass., to face cross-border rival Massachusetts. It’s the fourth time in as many years that the Huskies will face UMass in nonconference play.

    Though UConn has never been on the winning end, there’s yet to be a blowout in the series. UConn tied the Minutemen in their first meeting, 2-2 (11/16/00), rallied to a 6-5 defeat two years ago (11/21/01) and saw a 6-5 third-period deficit turn to an 8-6 loss last season (2/14/03).

    The proximity of the two schools and the excitement behind the game suggests that the UConn-UMass hockey game could someday compare to the rivalry between the two in basketball. But, according to Marshall, one thing needs to happen first.

    “Stealing a line from [Boston College football coach] Tom O’Brien when he talked about a potential rivalry with UConn, he said, ‘It’s not a rivalry to me until the other team comes in and beats you.'”

    Still, plenty of excitement will surround this year’s meeting. The game is being billed by UMass as “Operation 8K,” referring to the effort to get attendance over 8,000 and break the single-game mark at the Mullins Center set against Boston University back in 1995.

    Different year, same result

    It’s been three years since Mercyhurst put the fear of God into the Michigan Wolverines in the opening round of the NCAA tournament. Leading, 4-3, midway through their first round NCAA tournament game, the Lakers ended up surrendering the lead in Grand Rapids, Mich., and ultimately the game in a 5-4 loss.

    The result, though tough to swallow, was a moral victory for Mercyhurst and the then-MAAC league. Amid expectations of a blowout in a game in which many questioned whether the league even deserved a bid to the NCAAs, Mercyhurst woke up much of the hockey nation to the fact that MAAC teams could skate with the big boys.

    Last weekend was the first time that the two clubs met since that fateful night. This time the situation was the opposite — particularly the fact that it was Mercyhurst’s first game of the season after skating less than a full week of practice. This time there were no stakes — a loss didn’t end anyone’s season.

    No different, though, was the outcome. Jumping out to a 5-1 lead, Michigan staved off a hungry Lakers team in the third period and won, 5-3.

    According to Mercyhurst coach Rick Gotkin, he got from his players exactly what he hoped.

    “Michigan got a couple of goals and our guys kept at it,” said Gotkin. “You take away the talent difference between Michigan and Mercyhurst — and there’s a big talent difference between the two — and I thought we played well. I thought we played better Saturday night than we did against Michigan in Grand Rapids in 2001.”

    A bold statement, but one supported by truth. The Lakers are a different team than three years ago. Most would argue the talent level has risen, but at this early juncture of the season that’s nearly impossible to judge.

    What was easy to see, though, was the fact that Lakers never packed it in. After falling behind, 3-1, Mercyhurst escaped from the second period without further blemish. Though they surrendered two early goals in the third, the Lakers kept fighting and that was what Gotkin liked best.

    “We just wanted to compete every shift and we did that most of the game,” said Gotkin. “If we can play that way every night, we’re going to win a lot of hockey games. That’s the trick to this thing we call coaching, though — to get them to play that way every night. Some nights it’s just easier than others.”

    The difference came on special teams. Michigan was three-for-six on the power play, while the Lakers were held scoreless. Though not what Gotkin prefers, that won’t send up any red flags yet.

    “The power play and the penalty kill really was the difference,” Gotkin said. “That’s something that takes time to come around and we know it will. It’s just a question of getting in sync.”

    Looking further to take positives from the game, Gotkin said that he was impressed in watching some of his freshmen get their first taste of college action. Among the first-year players, Scott Champagne, Kyle Gourgon, Pat Henk, and Jamie Hunt “really stood out,” according to the coach.

    What’s good news for the Lakers, of course, is that time is now on their side. After the transition from practice to game in a not-so-preferable timeframe, Mercyhurst will wait nearly three weeks before its next game, an October 24 date at Ohio State. The Lakers will face Brock this weekend in an exhibition.

    “This is where the schedule favors us,” said Gotkin. “We can take the things we learned from the Michigan game and work on them in the next couple of weeks.”

    Light fare

    With starts of seasons staggered throughout the league, early action — particularly this weekend — is a bit scarce.

    The highlight of the week’s schedule is the Quinnipiac Cup featuring Air Force, Bentley, AIC and host Quinnipiac. This marks the eighth year of the Q-Cup, Quinnipiac’s own born and bred preseason tournament. Quinnipiac has won five of the first seven editions, including the last three years. The past two years, the tournament field has not been exactly top-notch, with Quinnipiac inviting the now-defunct Fairfield program. This year, Fairfield is replaced by Air Force, and Bentley is better-regarded after last season’s successes.

    Outside of the Q-Cup, there are three nonconference matchups and one conference series — the first of the inaugural Atlantic Hockey season. As mentioned, UConn will play border rival UMass while Sacred Heart takes a Hockey East twin dip, facing Merrimack Friday and Providence Saturday.

    Holy Cross, on the other hand, will travel to Canisius for a two-game Saturday-Sunday series with the Griffs. Not part of the original plan for either school, Holy Cross coach Paul Pearl said that he asked Canisius coach Brian Cavanaugh to switch the series from later in the season to early October to ease travel in the Crusaders’ second-half schedule.

    This Week in Hockey East: Oct. 9, 2003

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    Early Observations

    The universe makes sense.

    Hockey East is undefeated in interconference play. Boston College is undefeated. And Tony Voce in on pace to score 108 regular-season goals.

    Of course, there’s that niggling problem of sample size. Namely, one. BC’s win over Vermont was the only non-exhibition game played last weekend so perhaps we all need to take a grain of salt while extrapolating from the trends to date.

    Hockey East probably isn’t going to finish undefeated in conference play and neither are the Eagles likely to match Cornell’s long-standing mark of a perfect season. And even though Voce lines up alongside the most gifted playmaker in the country (Ben Eaves), Voce just might fall short of the 100-goal barrier.

    It’s only been one game.

    But, hey, it was a pretty good start.

    Exhibitions: To Have or Have Not; To Win or To Lose

    When images flashed onto the TV screen early this week of cars being over turned in Amherst, one Hockey East wag deadpanned, “I guess they’re upset about the loss to St. X’s.”

    Of course, the indefensible behavior had nothing to do with UMass’ surprising loss to St. Francis Xavier, 7-2. There were other, more widely-viewed, sporting events last weekend.

    But it does raise the issue of exhibition games, which typically fall into the no-win category with most fans. Exhibitions are like empty-net goals from 10 feet out. You’re no sniper if you score, but get the goat horns out if you miss.

    So why bother?

    “The value of your exhibition games change from year to year based on the makeup of your team,” UMass-Lowell coach Blaise MacDonald says. “The more mature and older your team is, the less value there is to an exhibition game and the more prepared you are to play a nonconference game right off the bat. The younger a team is, there’s a greater value.”

    It’s no eye-opener, then, that Boston College skipped the usual one-game tune-up. With a juggernaut loaded with returning veterans, coach Jerry York could afford to send his Eagles right into the fray.

    “That made it easier, no question,” York says.

    Nonetheless, the primary factor was mere scheduling. “We have a home-and-home series with Vermont and this particular weekend was their homecoming weekend at UVM. Without football, [hockey] is kind of the focal point and really important for them.

    “No one had an advantage. I think they’d started practicing one day earlier than we did. I felt good about it. Five days of practice is not very much, but it just fit better in the schedule and it was important for Vermont.

    “I’d do it again. It was a good test for us.”

    At first glance Maine would appear to be following BC’s lead, opening the season this weekend against Minnesota in the Maverick Stampede without use of an exhibition game. Appearances, however, are deceiving in this case. The Black Bears aren’t skipping the NCAA’s one-game allotment. They’re merely holding it, like an ace up the sleeve, until their Black Bear Hockey Classic next weekend.

    That two-day, four-team tournament has been an early-season fixture at Alfond Arena and Maine gets the most bang for its buck by having one of its two games be against a Canadian team or, as is the case this year, the U.S. Under-18 team. The program can have the best of all possible worlds by hosting a full weekend tournament while using only one official game from the NCAA regular season limit of 34. And it doesn’t hurt recruiting from the national team to show off Alfond in such a setting.

    As a result, Northeastern is the only team other than BC to bypass exhibition games entirely. It was an approach the Huskies took last year with mixed results. Playing the same homecoming game against Vermont, they had to rally to pull out a 3-3 tie after falling behind, 3-0, against a team coming off a disastrous 3-26-2 season.

    “We just jumped right into the frying pan,” NU coach Bruce Crowder says. “I didn’t really think we gave ourselves enough of a chance to jell and work on things. All of a sudden you get beat by Vermont –”

    Crowder then stops and corrects himself, noting that it was a tie. He doesn’t say it, but the slip points out how much the game felt like a loss. Having got off on the wrong foot, the Huskies then went 0-4-1 in their next five games against the traditional four conferences and 1-7-1 in the next nine.

    Looking for a different approach, Crowder decided to skip not only an early nonconference contest like the one against Vermont, but also an exhibition game. No games at all. Just practices.

    “I just wanted to see what it was like, taking a good solid nine to 10 days of practice before you play your first game,” he says. “Kind of like the way it used to be.”

    Of the teams that did play exhibitions last weekend, only UMass lost. There were plenty of reasons to discount the defeat, namely that coach Don “Toot” Cahoon sat some of his top players, including Greg Mauldin and Thomas Pock, and that the Minutemen had lost last year to the same X-Men only to jump out to a 13-7-1 record and the program’s first national ranking.

    Still, a 7-2 loss while getting outshot 32-19? Yikes.

    “We were soundly beat,” Cahoon says. “When I put the team on the ice, I had hoped that they would compete and play well enough to succeed. As a coach, you always would like to win. But clearly by making some decisions before the game to either play or not play certain people, that [impacted the result].

    “For example, I needed to see a Dominic Torretti, who transferred here from Providence and went through a total knee reconstruction in the interim. I needed to see him play more than I needed to see Nick Kuiper because I know a lot more about Nick Kuiper than I know about Dominic Torretti. I hadn’t seen him in these situations. Obviously if the ultimate decision was that we needed to win this game, you’d go with the people that you know the most about.

    “So I wasn’t distraught that we got beat. In fact, the loss itself in that context was not really important. However, when I get back to how we performed, I was really disappointed. Really disappointed. Because even though we might have not had some of the most productive people that play for us in the lineup, we had a lot of people that get ice time and were trying to vie for more ice time — power-play time and that sort of thing — and we didn’t perform very well at all.”

    Fortunately, UMass has a nonconference game against UConn before Saturday’s league opener against UMass-Lowell. Lowell, by contrast, defeated the X-Men last Saturday in its only tune-up.

    “Lowell is going to use their game with Xavier as their sole source of preparation,” Cahoon says. “I might not have made the decisions I made on Friday night to put that type of roster on the ice if I didn’t have the [UConn] game this Thursday night to look at some other people.

    “You take it as the schedule plays out. It’s just a coach’s decision and I don’t know if I’ve got a complete handle on it by any means.”

    Even the Hockey East teams that won have to take the victory with a grain of salt.

    “You’re never quite sure,” York says. “The Canadian schools, sometimes they’re very good and sometimes they’re not. It’s hard to [gauge].”

    MacDonald adds, “The exhibitions never quite mirror what you’re going to see when the real games show up because the Canadians play a much different style and it’s more slowed down. Last year we beat Concordia, 7-2. Just pounded them. It gave us a false sense of moxie. This year we played St. X and it was a much different feeling in the locker room after the game. It was a much greater feeling of accomplishment because they were a better team.”

    And of course, there’s always the worry that a meaningless game will come back to haunt you because of a key injury.

    “Who do you play in the games?” MacDonald Says. “Do you play all the new guys and rest your veterans? They need to get some playing time to get their rhythm, too.

    “But you look at what happens in the NFL. These [Canadian] guys are older, physical and wear half shields. All I can think about is, ‘I hope nobody’s walking down to see [trainer] Artie Poitras after the game.'”

    Rivalry Weekend

    UMass is wasting no time this season getting right into its traditional rivalry games. On Thursday, the Minutemen host UConn, its natural rival from other sports. Then on Saturday they take on the River Hawks in the first of three sister-school contests that will decide possession of the Alumni Cup.

    “If anything, it’s hopefully going to get us game-ready,” Cahoon says. “One of my concerns, and I’m sure it’s one of most coaches at this point in the season, is a concern about your players being game-ready and the mentality associated with that. That’s a preparation in itself.

    “I’m fearful, based on what I’ve seen up until now, that we might not be as game-ready as we need to be. This will help us move in that direction for sure.”

    Trivia Contest

    With a grand total of one real game under the Hockey East belts, we’ll wait a week or two before the trivia contest gets going.

    And Finally, Not That It Has Anything To Do With Anything, But…

    It’s wall-to-wall Red Sox, baby.

  • Adrian Brown as a pinch-hitter in Game One? Adrian Brown? Oy!
  • I was fortunate enough to attend Game Three against Oakland (thanks to my brother Paul) and my hat is off to whoever was handling the music. The theme of not giving up and maintaining confidence held throughout with musical styles ranging from the Monkees (“Daydream Believer”) to Eminem (“Lose Yourself”). And after Trot’s home run in the 11th, the traditional “Dirty Water” was followed by Three Dog Night’s “Joy To The World.” You had to love it.
  • At about the time I began bemoaning Manny Ramirez’s .084 batting average and David Ortiz’s .000 number, I saw that Miguel Tejada was a hair worse than Manny and Eric Chavez was matching Ortiz stride for lumbering stride in the oh-fer department. Who would have predicted that?
  • Or that Boston’s two regulars who had no chance of breaking the 20 home run barrier — Johnny Damon and Todd Walker — were the two who hit home runs in Game Four.
  • It was pretty surreal to see all the gaffes Oakland made in Game Three. Four errors and two major baserunning blunders. Has a team ever tried harder to give a key game away? It was almost, well, RedSoxian.
  • If Todd Walker isn’t in the lineup every game the rest of the way, Grady Little should be fired. Or at the very least roasted over the coals. Walker has been the hottest Sox hitter the last month or so. Seeing Damian Jackson’s name for Game Three just made me groan.
  • And taking Walker out in the sixth inning for a defensive replacement? The sixth inning? He’s not Jose Offerman awful and neither is Jackson the second coming of Robbie Alomar in his prime. I don’t care if the score is 4-1 and Pedro is pitching. Taking out your hottest hitter that early makes no sense.
  • How about we let John Kerry resign as senator so he can run for president and by proclamation anoint Derek Lowe as his successor?
  • Unless, of course, he blows it against the Yankees.
  • I’ve decided that I need not get a physical this year. If my heart could survive Game Five’s ninth inning, it can survive anything.
  • I left a friend’s house in a residential area of Waltham right after Game Five and I swear that I could hear in the far, far distance the roar of fans and honking of horns. I can’t imagine the geography of that noise, but it sure is a testament to our addiction to this team. The Oakland fans, as a general whole, don’t deserve their team. This Sox team, though, is a group that our passion is worthy of.
  • I’ll predict that Scott Sauerbeck makes a surprisingly major contribution against the Bronx Bums. Knock on wood, of course.
  • The big losers on Sunday weren’t the Oakland A’s or the Tennessee Titans. And certainly not Boston sports fans, not even ones without two TVs, who could delight in two spectacular wins. No, the big losers were the advertisers. Did Boston sports fans see a single one of the TV ads? With two momentous games going on simultaneously, the instant an ad began it was time to switch stations. Not even the Coors Light commercials could keep this viewer away from the remote.
  • Kudos to the city of Boston for arresting those who flipped over cars following the huge Red Sox win on Monday night. Those aren’t sports fans; those are hoodlums masquerading as sports fans. But I do draw the line, however, at the arrest of the twins who climbed onto a billboard and bared their breasts. Arrested? In The World According to Dave, the twins would have been granted complimentary season tickets.

    • This Week in the ECAC: Oct. 9, 2003

    By Juan Martinez
    -

    Welcome to the first ECAC weekly column of the season. In addition to our usual look at news from around the league, we’re going to continue the tradition of having guest prognosticators. So, e-mail us with your predictions and we’ll pick a new reader to go up against each week. Plus, we’re adding a new feature to the column this year that you will learn more about further down the page. For now, though, let’s launch into the major stories around the league.

    A Dose of Reality

    The college hockey world and those close to the Rensselaer hockey program are still in shock over the death of Bill Cahill. A two-time former men’s assistant under Buddy Powers and Dan Fridgen, Cahill was entering his fourth season as head coach of the women’s team when he died of a heart attack Sunday night. He was 53.

    “We lost a good man,” said Fridgen, head coach of the Engineers’ men’s program. “He was a great communicator and was incredible in the way he dealt with colleagues, administrators, student athletes and parents.

    “He really had a soothing effect when speaking with student athletes about whatever pressures they were facing.”

    Fridgen and Cahill worked together as assistants under Powers. Once Fridgen was named head coach, he hired Cahill to be his assistant, a position he held for six years.

    “We learned from each other,” recalled Fridgen. “It was a give-and-take relationship. As an assistant, he would fulfill any role needed.”

    But what Cahill did working for Fridgen was more than Xs and Os. It included life lessons and a unique approach that reminded all around him that this was sports and nothing more.

    “It didn’t matter how difficult the situation was,” explained Fridgen, “he always put a different spin on it and made you realize that it was just a game and that other things were more important. That somewhere in the world, someone had it worse off.

    “I learned that you could deal with the things you faced in a different way. One that was less stressful and easier for everybody. He never yelled or lashed out at anybody. He had a different way of speaking which was real effective; I always said it came from his years working as a social worker.”

    Behind the gentle touch and caring outlook, Cahill was also a big practical joker and, as Fridgen pointed out with a laugh, no one was ever off limits.

    “We had a lot of fun, a lot of laughs. He liked practical jokes and liked to tease. Sometimes when you have a guy with that kind of humor, he can’t take it. But Bill could give it and take it. Anyone in the room was fair game.”

    And because of that, Fridgen knew he had to be one step ahead of his friend.

    “He recently had his photo taken at Saratoga [Raceway],” Fridgen recalled between laughs, “in the winner’s circle with [Rensselaer President] Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson. A friend of ours had taken the picture and I knew he’d bring it into my office and rub it in. So I called our friend and had him superimpose my face over his.

    “[The photographer] came to our office with the pictures. When I handed the superimposed one to Bill, the look on his face … he was trying to figure out what happened!

    “Of course, he was also trying to figure out what happened to his hair in the picture, since he had more than me. Then he said, ‘Hey Fridge, you have a great body, have you been working out?’ And I said, ‘Bill, you know it’s a good thing I’m married because with a body like that … ‘”

    As Fridgen explained, and as many others know first-hand, that was life around Cahill. It could be serious, it was honest, but, most of all, it was filled with joy.

    “On the personal side, with Bill,” said Fridgen, “he may have been struggling with some things and he’d open up to you. At that moment you realized that you were doing for him what he always did for you … and you learned it from him to begin with.”

    Of all the elements of life that Cahill taught others, his hockey knowledge was top-notch and his abilities as a coach spoke for themselves.

    In his most recent role as head coach of the women’s program, he compiled a 47-28-3 record. He guided Rensselaer to an increasing win total in each campaign, from 12 in 2000-01 to 20 last year.

    “He loved to play hockey,” said Fridgen, chuckling as he approached the punch line to another Cahill moment. “He’d come in after the weekend and tell me about all of his goals and I’d ask, ‘Was there a goalie in the net?’

    “There was always lots of give-and-take, a lot of laughs. He’ll be sorely missed.”

    Viewing hours for Cahill were held this Thursday from 4 to 8 p.m. at Athy Funeral Home in Worcester. The funeral will be held Friday morning at 11 at Blessed Sacrament Church on Pleasant Street in Worcester. In lieu of flowers, gifts can be made payable to “Let’s Go Red — Women’s Hockey” and sent to:

    Let’s Go Red!
    Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
    AS&RC Building
    110 Eighth Street
    Troy, NY 12180-9987

    Saints Earn First Win for ECAC

    St. Lawrence opened the season for all ECAC teams last Friday with a matchup against host Miami at the Lefty McFadden Invitational. Led by the stellar goaltending of junior Kevin Ackley, the Saints defeated Miami 3-1. It was St. Lawrence’s first season-opening victory since capturing eight straight to begin the 1999-2000 campaign.

    “Kevin was just tremendous all night long,” said Saints coach Joe Marsh about the netminder and his 41 stops on the evening. “He made some huge saves and had them shaking their heads. Obviously we’d like to see a little less pressure on him and a few more shots on goal on our part, but the disparity in shots may have been a little misleading. We had some pretty good stretches in their zone, but didn’t get a lot of shots on the net.”

    St. Lawrence was outshot 42-18, including 19-6 in the third period. However, on the scoreboard, where the numbers actually count, the Saints made the most of their limited shots, tallying twice in the final frame while Ackley shut out the RedHawks over the game’s last 35:59.

    Offensively, nine different Saints notched a point, including the game-winning goal by Stace Page, who will be counted on to rediscover his freshman-year scoring touch (9-9–18) after injuries limited him to just four goals in 2002-03.

    “It was a good play all the way around,” said Marsh. “The guys worked the puck down low and Stace made a nice shot on a good angle. It was great to see him score the first time out after all the struggles he had with his back last season.”

    Unfortunately for the Saints, their balanced offense of the previous night was held in check in the championship game against nationally-ranked Denver (No. 12 in this week’s USCHO poll).

    The two programs had met only once in their storied histories, a 12-2 Denver win in the 1961 NCAA championship game. This time, the score was much closer, with the Pioneers skating away with a 3-0 victory. They face off again out West on January 2.

    “Denver used its speed to their advantage and they aren’t a team that you can make turnovers against. I think we minimized our mistakes and Kevin again came up big in key situations to keep us in it right until the end,” said Marsh.

    Outshot 39-24, St. Lawrence once again received excellent goaltending from Ackley. He was the lone Saint named to the all-Tournament team, stopping 77 of 81 pucks fired at him over the two days.

    Despite the split weekend, St. Lawrence’s 19th-year head coach was pleased with his team’s performance.

    “Even though we didn’t win it, I would consider this a good weekend for us,” explained Marsh. “We played two quality teams and we competed well both nights. Even though we didn’t score against Denver, I actually think we played better offensively in a lot of ways than we did on Friday.

    “[It] gives us a good base to work from, and while we know we have a lot of work to do, I think we can build on this and continue to improve. We do need to work on increasing the quality of our shots and getting into good scoring position, but that will come as we get more practice under our belts.”

    Speaking of which, the lack of preseason action makes this weekend even more impressive for the Saints, who had practiced with the coaching staff only four times prior to facing off against the RedHawks.

    “We are allowed ‘captain’s practices’ without the coaches on hand,” explained Marsh, “and the guys had a little more structure in that this year, which helped us. [But] it becomes a question of getting into game condition and coming up with line combinations and special teams groupings that are going to work for you down the road.

    “We will undoubtedly do a lot of juggling and mixing things up early, but we also know how important it is to get off to a good start.”

    The Saints will continue to be tested as they play their traditionally challenging nonconference slate. They open the Appleton Arena portion of their schedule this weekend against defending CHA champion Wayne State. Those contests are followed by games against Massachusetts, Maine and Lake Superior before diving into ECAC play on November 7.

    A New Chapter Begins in Burlington

    The other ECAC team to see action last weekend was Vermont, including new coach Kevin Sneddon. A sold-out Gutterson Fieldhouse had all the splendor of opening night. Boston College was in town, Sneddon launched a new era for UVM hockey and Raymond Bourque dropped the ceremonial first puck.

    The Catamounts, however, were outplayed for the majority of the contest, a 5-3 loss, despite mounting a third-period comeback.

    “We played against a very good BC team,” said Sneddon. “They were well-coached and played a mature game for it being their first.

    “We watched them skate around us for two and a half periods and didn’t play well defensively. It could have been first game jitters and the [team] is still getting used to a new coach and a new system. We just didn’t look comfortable.

    “We gave them a run at the end, but in all honesty, BC was the better team.”

    Despite playing tentative hockey for most of the contest, Vermont battled back from a 4-0 third period deficit with three goals in the last five minutes before Tony Voce notched an empty-netter to seal the victory for the Eagles.

    Why the late push?

    “We challenged the players a little bit between the second and third periods,” explained Sneddon. “The guys were down and hanging their shoulders a bit. We want the mark of Catamount hockey to be that we play 60 minutes and play until the final buzzer.

    “A lot of it is getting them to believe in themselves. The biggest challenge we have [as a new coaching staff] is change. Some people are receptive to change while others are more resistant. Change is difficult.

    “But we’re trying to enhance the Vermont tradition; trying to improve upon the solid foundation that is already here.”

    To create the new environment Sneddon envisions, he and his coaching staff will lean heavily on the playing leadership of the Catamounts — senior co-captains Jeff Miles and Oriel McHugh, as well as the assistant captains, junior Brady Leisenring and sophomore Jaime Sifers.

    “We have tremendous character in our leaders,” said a proud Sneddon. “They are excited about the demands we are placing on them. They’ve been very receptive to new ideas, but we have a long way to go.

    “Miles is one of the elite players in college hockey, but he needs to bring his best game each day and lead by example. Sifers will be a great leader for years to come. They have to accept the change in culture and be willing to carry it to the rest of the team.

    “They’ve been great.”

    Another Catamount who earned that superlative after the season opener was sophomore goaltender Travis Russell.

    “He was phenomenal,” said Sneddon about the performance of his young netminder against a strong BC squad. “We could have been down by much more after the first period if it wasn’t for him. Instead, we were down only 1-0. They jumped all over us, but he’s shown he’s a bit more prepared for this season than last year as a young freshman.

    And, he’s being pushed by the other goaltenders (junior Scott Sortal and sophomore Matt Hanson). That’s a very good thing for us. From an outsider’s perspective, our goaltending is viewed as a question mark, but I see it as a positive. Aside from the inexperience, they are all hungry.”

    Considering Russell’s 36-save performance (including 19 in the first period) against the Eagles, could the Catamounts have already settled on a solution between the pipes?

    Don’t bet on it.

    “We’ve made the decision as a coaching staff,” explained Sneddon, “to make week-to-week evaluations. We don’t want to make a decision on who is starting on Monday; we want practice during the week to be very important. Who starts in goal will be evaluated every week.”

    And next on the horizon is fourth-ranked New Hampshire and a matchup with the Catamounts in Durham. It’ll be the home opener for the Wildcats, runners-up in last year’s NCAA championship game, and another extremely tough test for Vermont. That’s followed up by games against Boston University and Michigan Tech before conference play.

    “My biggest concern,” said Sneddon, “is finding the right combination of lines to play two-way hockey. We need to play much better defensively.

    “We’re getting better. We learned a lot about where we are at as a team. That’s tough to do in practice because you need to be tested in games by good teams. We’re better this week than we were going into the BC game.

    “The schedule is a tremendous challenge for us. We’re not fearful of playing anyone, but we are focused on ourselves. We tell the players not to worry about the past or the future, but to focus on one game. As a coach, you can’t ask for more than that.”

    Tickets? What Tickets?

    The ECAC slate begins November 7. The two teams face each other for the first time since last season’s dramatic league championship on December 12 in Ithaca, N.Y. But it’s a contest in early 2004 that has launched this season’s first salvo in the ever-intense Harvard-Cornell rivalry.

    News surrounding Cornell’s much-anticipated trip to Bright Hockey Center on January 9 began to make waves even before the first Crimson ticket was sold for any game this season. And therein lies the issue.

    Tickets. Or is it “Ticket-Gate?”

    Cornell traditionally packs Harvard’s home rink with loud and enthusiastic fans. Add to it the Big Red’s Pep Band and it makes for a home-away-from-home for many a Cornell player — as many of them remarked after last season’s win in New England.

    Visiting fans have always been able to purchase single-game tickets by simply calling the Harvard box office. It was a method all fans could take advantage of, but, to their credit, Cornell fans did it in droves.

    This season, however, things are a little different. The Crimson have adopted a model that’s become more prevalent in professional sports.

    “Cornell tickets are available as part of the four-game ticket package only,” said Harvard Ticket Manager Erin Hobin-Audet.

    The Crimson will no longer sell single-game tickets to the Cornell matchup. Instead, they have packaged the January contest into a block of four games, which includes dates against Princeton, Rensselaer and Massachusetts. If a fan wants to see Cornell play at Harvard, he or she must buy tickets from among the 100 given to the Cornell ticket office, purchase the full four-game pack or be a Harvard season ticket holder.

    “This is similar to what the Beanpot schools do,” explained Hobin-Audet. “[While] undergraduate students get in free, this protects our fan base. The first priority is to give alumni and season ticket holders first shot at buying tickets for what will be a sellout. At the same time, this gives us a boost for the other games that may not draw as well.”

    Hobin-Audet also pointed out two other options. Harvard sells 100 tickets for this contest each season to the Cornell Club of Boston. The Club purchases the tickets at the Harvard group rate of $8 each and then sells them at a higher price to Cornell alumni.

    Calls and e-mails to Club Programming co-Chair Tom Pasniewski seeking clarification on the cost and how to purchase tickets went unanswered over the last week, as did calls seeking comment from new Cornell Hockey Association President Bob Pochily.

    “The other option would be to wait until after the first game in the package is played (Princeton’s visit in November),” said Hobin-Aubin. “At that point, tickets to the remaining games in the package will be released to Harvard-affiliated individuals only, including faculty, staff and alumni. Then, any extra tickets will go on sale to the general public January 5.”

    It will be interesting to see if Harvard will succeed in keeping Cornell’s turnout lower than last season, but judging by the fan response on the Cornell end of things, this issue is just picking up steam.

    Two Minutes For …

    Each week in this section we are going to give a reader the opportunity to offer an opinion on a relevant ECAC news story. One reader will be selected and will have comments included in the column. All commentary will be edited for grammar, syntax and decency (just in case!), but opinions will not be altered. The fun begins with next week’s column, so feel free to chime in with an e-mail to us after this weekend’s games. Keep in mind that for space reasons, comments should be kept to fewer than 300 words.

    Hitting the Ice

    Opening up play this week in games that count are Union, Colgate and Rensselaer. All contests will be on the road for those clubs as they look to start the 2003-04 season with strong showings. Check out our predictions on the right and let’s see if we can put one in the win column.

    This Week in the CHA: Oct. 9, 2003

    By
    -

    The start of a new CHA season gives us a chance to take a look at the big picture and see where the conference is headed. Last year, the CHA secured its automatic bid, so now the conference sets its sights on more substantive success against the elite of college hockey.

    In a lengthy interview this week, CHA Commissioner Bob Peters outlined his vision for the future of the conference. The young conference could not have a more optimistic man at the helm.

    “This is our fifth year, and we are making major progress,” said Peters. “We’ve had Niagara make it to the NCAA Tournament in 2000 and Wayne State received the automatic bid last year, and in both cases the teams did well.

    “We play a large number of nonconference games and we’ve played every conference without exception. That has been extremely helpful to our members, it helps with our recruiting and with our fan base as well as setting the bar for us.”

    Peters made sure to pass the credit around to each of the programs on his conference’s success.

    “As our programs mature, our coaches have been extremely effective in game tactics and recruiting, along with a financial commitment by the schools and athletic directors.

    Although in most of our nonconference games we have suffered defeat, very seldom have we been beaten by large numbers. We are closing the gap.”

    As part of the effort to close the gap between the CHA and the other major conferences, Peters stated that all of the conference’s programs are on firm footing at their respective schools, then turned to a desire to expand from the league’s current modest membership of six teams.

    “There are about 190 club teams playing hockey on the men’s side and about 20 on the women’s side, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. I can visualize the future when those schools will want to elevate their programs to the varsity level.

    “We are certainly open to expansion. We have a structured committee and we are ready to proceed. We’ve explored every option, although we are not ready to do something immediately. For hockey this is like the 1920s for basketball and football.

    If membership expansion is not imminent, Peters’ focus is on growing the fan base and working on the playoff tournament.

    “We have a television deal in the works,” he said. “Some of our members already have local TV deals and we will get exposure on the college hockey game of the week on CSTV.

    “We are working on our fan base. Air Force and Bemidji have had the most success to date, but since Wayne State made the round of 16, it really put them on the map. Our schedules keep getting better, bringing in top teams that draw fans.

    “Taking the conference tournament to a neutral site in Kearney, Nebraska was a major step for us. The home of the [pro minor-league] Tri-City Storm, they are very new to college hockey, but we’ve had our best attendance ever out there. We are spreading the gospel of college hockey to a new place and we have something to build off there.”

    Peters constantly referred to his conference’s out-of-town schedule, taking pride in the fact that CHA teams will face Denver, Colorado College, Minnesota, North Dakota, Clarkson and St. Lawrence. And that’s not to mention Findlay’s berth in the Michigan State-hosted Ice Breaker Tournament this weekend.

    Rather than outline grandiose plans, Peters emphasized patience as the key to the CHA’s long-term growth.

    “To sum it all up, it is not about today, or even tomorrow. It is about 10 to 15 years from now. We are committed to this project. I’ve seen how far we’ve come and I can visualize our future accomplishments.

    “I’m having a great time doing it.”

    Ice Breaker

    After a few near-meaningless exhibition contests against foes outside of NCAA hockey, CHA teams receive their first litmus tests this weekend. No one has a sterner trial — or better opportunity — than Findlay, playing at Michigan State in the opening game of the Ice Breaker Tournament

    “This whole weekend is a test for us, even though it’s the second or third game of the season,” said Findlay coach Pat Ford. “We can’t worry about Michigan State or whomever we play in the next game. These games will stress our discipline, and will show us just where we are at.”

    After their contest with the Spartans, the Oilers will face either Boston College or Minnsota-Duluth. And make no mistake, the team is excited to join one of college hockey’s new-yet-traditional season-opening tournaments.

    Findlay has had a good first week of the season, defeating the U.S. Under-18 team, 4-1, last Wednesday, and, according to Ford, has had a strong week of practice. With 14 freshmen on the roster, these things count more than normal because Ford has to evaluate his talent. Two particularly have stood out this far: wingers Mike Batovanja and Chris Weller, who had a goal and an assist in Wednesday’s game.

    “Weller had a real nice power-play goal and showed some poise in an assist,” Ford said.

    At the Ice Breaker, Ford will also be looking at his veteran talent, especially junior winger Rigel Shaw, a 6-3, 215-pound power forward who had 21 points a year ago.

    “Shaw has the potential, in my opinion, to be one of our best scorers,” Ford said. “He’s big and what I liked is that he has worked hard to be physical and when he gets down low, he is awfully tough to move.”

    The Oilers have no delusions that they need some work before conference play, but this tournament will show just how much labor is left undone.

    Goin’ North

    Just as you can really discard Findlay’s performance against Team USA, Wayne State’s victory over Windsor is almost as meaningless — except for providing an opportunity to stretch the legs before D-I competition.

    The Warriors face the stiffest competition after the Oilers, traveling to the North Country to play a deuce against St. Lawrence. Underclassmen Mike Forgie and Derek MacKay flanked senior center Chris Vail in an effective combination that produced three goals. The Saints will provide a much stiffer test for the trio.

    This Week in the CCHA: Oct. 9, 2003

    By
    -

    It’s a great opening weekend for college hockey. Don’t want to take my word for it? Maybe Rick Comley can convince you.

    “It’s a great opening weekend for college hockey,” says Comley, whose Spartans host this year’s Ice Breaker.

    In addition to the four-team field in East Lansing, there’s the fourth annual Maverick Stampede, the first round of play for Alaska’s Governor’s Cup, and four great CCHA series.

    In fact, those league pairings are so sublime that, says Comley, “Come Monday morning, there might be something to see.”

    Breaking the Ice

    As Comley enters his second season as head coach at Michigan State, he says he has “much more of a comfort zone,” and adds that now he’s “familiar with everything.”

    Even though Comley spent nearly 30 years building the hockey program at Northern Michigan University and is seventh on the all-time win list for D-I men’s coaches, he still had his share of adjusting to do at MSU, and in many ways — having inherited this program from another legend — he’s in his sophomore season.

    “We have some very good players, and a lot of them were recruited to play a different style of hockey,” says Comley. “You can’t just expect them to make changes overnight.

    “There was an awful lot of human nature last year, an awful lot of transition.”

    In addition to making the change from head coach and now athletic director Ron Mason, the Spartans had to adjust to life in the post-Ryan Miller world.

    “I say this and mean it: there was a tremendous reliance on a goaltender,” says Comley. “Losing him late, not having recruited really to replace him, there was a lot of adjusting to do.”

    The Spartans began 2002-03 on the slow side, but climbed from below the middle of the CCHA pack to finish the season fourth.

    A goaltender “can buy you time, especially at the beginning of a season,” says Comley, and it remains to be seen how solid the Spartans will be in net this year from the get-go. Junior Matt Migliaccio and freshman Dominic Vicari split time in MSU’s 6-0 exhibition win over Windsor last week, but Migliaccio faced just eight shots and Vicari three, so neither was tested.

    Another question for the Spartans right out of the gate is defense — and offense. When you lose your two best blueliners who also happen to be your key players on the other side of the puck, things are more than just a little up in the air.

    Comley is, however, quick to point out that losing key players on the defensive side of things is nothing new, and MSU certainly has guys who can score.

    “Over the past few seasons, I think five or six defensemen have gone on to pro contracts. We need the ability of three freshman defensemen every night.”

    So there’s Migliaccio on the spot, three rookie defenders to shore up the defense, and a program “in transition,” says Comley. And this early in the season, Comley says, “You’re continually assessing your team, the maturity of it — none of us has had a ton of practice time.

    “We have uncertainty because of people in new positions. We all know Jimmy Slater is a tremendous player [and] Mike Lalonde … has taken the steps need toward being a very good player.”

    Everyone coaches differently, and CCHA fans know that Ron Mason was a defensive coach first. “I’m an offensive coach without wanting to sacrifice any defense,” says Comley, laughing. “I guess that’s an oxymoron.”

    The field at this year’s Ice Breaker is interesting. Boston College — “the cream of the field,” says Comley — Minnesota-Duluth, and Findlay round out the tourney.

    Boston College, which opened the season with a 5-3 win over Vermont last weekend, is without question the team to beat in East Lansing this weekend. The Eagles are dangerously deep up front, with the likes of Ben and Patrick Eaves, Tony Voce, Ryan Shannon, and Dave Spina leading the way — familiar names on a squad that is 7-0-1 against CCHA teams in the past three seasons.

    Minnesota-Duluth is the third ranked team of the field, a team that is looking to repeat the success it had last year. The Bulldogs are picked high this season, but — much like their namesakes in the CCHA — they have a lot to prove after returning to the WCHA’s Final Five last season for the first time since 1998.

    Offensive threats for Minnesota-Duluth include Junior Lessard and Tim Stapleton, but like the Spartans, the Bulldogs — backstopped by Isaac Reichmuth — need more consistency in net.

    The fourth team in the field, Findlay, is coached by Pat Ford, who served as an assistant coach under Comley at Northern Michigan from 1992-94. The Oilers return just half their roster from last year, leaving this young squad with some catching up to do in the experience department. Look for sophomore Andrew Radzak to make some noise up front.

    “It’s very exciting for our fans,” says Comley. “They have the opportunity to see teams from three other conferences, and to see some terrific hockey.”

    Games of the Week

    There’s nothing better than jumping into league play right from the start, and within a tough cluster as well.

    No. 3 Michigan (1-0-0, 0-0-0 CCHA) at Miami (0-2-0, 0-2-0 CCHA)
    Friday and Saturday, 7:35 p.m., Goggin Arena, Oxford, Ohio

    “I think our team will be a lot better a month from now than it is now,” says Miami head coach Enrico Blasi. “That’s a matter of getting used to each other and building some confidence.”

    The RedHawks opened their season with two losses in the Lefty McFadden Invitational in Dayton last weekend, dropping the first game to St. Lawrence 3-1 before losing the consolation game to Ohio State Saturday, 5-3. It was the first time the RedHawks have begun a campaign with two losses since 1994-95, under head coach Mark Mazzoleni.

    “Last weekend I saw some things that are very positive and we’re really looking forward to the next couple of months,” says Blasi. “I think a lot of the new guys got a chance to play and contribute and feel their way around in Division I. We played some pretty good opponents, and that was good for us. We now have a reference point.”

    Blasi characterizes his team as young “with some firepower and some solid defensemen.” The RedHawks return eight defensemen and welcome one newcomer, Jon Saunders. This was a blueline that was ranked 11th in the nation in goals allowed per game last season, something upon which the Miami team can build this year.

    Kicking off regular-season play against Michigan is tough enough, but the task is doubly daunting — for both the RedHawks and the Wolverines, really — because Miami and Michigan are clustermates, with Michigan State and Ohio State rounding out the foursome.

    It’s a little early in the season for a point-by-point analysis of the pairing, but here are a few things to consider:

  • 2002-03 goals per game: Michigan 3.96, Miami 3.07
  • 2002-03 goals allowed per game: Michigan 2.97, Miami 2.36
  • 2002-03 power play: Michigan 22.7%, Miami 23.5%
  • 2002-03 penalty kill: Michigan 87.1%, Miami 82.8%

    Last weekend in Michigan’s game against Mercyhurst, Eric Werner, T.J. Hensick, and Andrew Ebbett each had a goal and an assist, and Milan Gajic had two helpers.

    For Miami, Matt Christie had two goals against OSU, Todd Grant had two assists in the contest, and Mike Kompon had one assist in each game in Dayton. Steve Hartley made 39 saves on the weekend.

    Blasi says that his RedHawks are eager to play the team picked to take the league this year. “Any time you play Michigan, you’re going to get better. I know one thing: regardless of the outcome of the games this weekend, we’re going to be a better team come Monday morning.”

    In addition to hosting the Wolverines — an event in itself for every team in the league — it’s Parents Weekend in Oxford. “This place is going to be jammed,” says Blasi.

    Michigan leads this series 58-14-2 all-time, with a 20-12-1 edge at Goggin Arena. The RedHawks have dropped 14 straight to the Wolverines, dating back five seasons, and if history repeats Miami will start its season 0-4-0, its worst opening since the 1979-80 season. That team went on to a 22-13-3 season record.

    Picks: Michigan 4-2, 5-2

    Jumping In, Right Away

    There are three other great CCHA series this weekend. Here’s a quick look at each.

    Bowling Green at Northern Michigan

    The Falcons and Wildcats meet in Marquette to open their league seasons, a familiar scenario; it’s the second time in three years that the teams have met in the Berry Center to begin the CCHA season.

    BGSU leads this series 29-20-5 all-time, and the Falcons swept the Wildcats in Bowling Green last season, 3-2 and 5-3 in mid-January.

    Last weekend, BGSU pummeled Windsor 9-2 in exhibition play, with Ryan Barnett scoring twice and netting an assist, Ryan Minnabarriet registering a goal and a helper, and Mark Wires stealing the show with two unassisted goals.

    Jordan Sigalet, Bob Frazee, and Bobby Pruchnik all saw time in net for the Falcons. Sigalet allowed the two goals.

    In NMU’s 7-2 exhibition win over Waterloo last weekend, Andrew Contois collected the first unfortunately-timed hat trick of the season. The three goals do not count, technically, because of the nature of the game — but they sure looked pretty, the first unassisted on the power play, the second four-on-four, and the third at even strength.

    Jamie Milam also had two goals and an assist of his own. Craig Kowalski and Tuomas Tarrki split time in net, each allowing a goal.

    It’s easy to pick NMU to sweep, given the seeming disparity between the two teams, but I have a hunch that the Falcons have the Wildcats’ number, at least for now.

    Good news alert: the Falcons will be debuting new jerseys this weekend. You know, there was an awful lot to like about Scott Paluch before the sweater change, but this fashion-forward decision will endear him to many previously unmoved CCHA fans.

    No.8 Ferris State vs. Western Michigan

    Western Michigan leads this all-time series 58-31-6, but last year the Bulldogs tamed the Broncos last year, winning three of the four matches between these clustermates.

    Paul Davies collected the second unfortunately-timed hat trick of the exhibition weekend by netting three goals in WMU’s 6-2 exhibition win over Western Ontario — great work for the senior and promising for the season to come, but an accomplishment that doesn’t count at all towards his NCAA stats.

    The Bulldogs kicked off the season with a 6-0 exhibition win over Windsor, a game in which Jeff Legue notched two and added an assist. Legue is one of FSU’s top returning scorers against WMU (3-3–6), along with Derek Nesbitt (4-2–6).

    This is a home-and-home series, and home is the place where the Broncos earned their one win against the Bulldogs last season. Home will also be unfamiliar territory for the Bulldogs in October. FSU will raise a championship banner during the first intermission of Saturday’s game at Ewigleben Arena, the only home game the Bulldogs will play until they host Michigan State Nov. 1.

    Ferris State is anything but the underdog in these games, having captured last year’s regular-season CCHA title, but anything can happen this early in the season. The Bulldogs are faster, more defense-minded, and loaded up front, but the Broncos proved last season that they can score plenty of goals. Even their goaltender likes a little of that action.

    Notre Dame at No. 14 Ohio State

    Here’s your grudge match. The Buckeyes ended the Fighting Irish season last year, defeating Notre Dame, 3-2, in the opening game of the CCHA Super Six. It was OSU sophomore and assistant captain Nate Guenin who had the third-period game winner for the Bucks as a defenseman making his inaugural Super Six appearance.

    The Irish lead this series 20-18-6 all-time, but the Buckeyes are 6-1-3 against Notre Dame in the last 10 meetings.

    It’s a good-news-bad-news scenario for the Irish when they face OSU netminder Mike Betz. The good news for Notre Dame is that Betz was shaky in his opening game last weekend, a 5-2 loss to Denver in the Lefty McFadden Invitational in Dayton. The bad news is that Betz has made a career against Notre Dame, compiling a 6-0-3 all-time record against the Irish.

    Speaking of goaltenders, the Irish will still be without junior Morgan Cey, who is recovering from off-season knee surgery and is expected back Oct. 1. With Cey out, two untested netminders are filling in. Look for sophomore Rory Walsh and rookie David Brown to split time between the pipes.

    Five different players scored for the Irish in their 5-3 exhibition win over Western Ontario last weekend. Brad Wanchulak, Mike Walsh, Tim Wallace, Rob Globke, and T.J. Lindra each found the net; Walsh, Aaron Gill, and Brett Lebda each had two-point games.

    Ohio State netted five goals against Miami in the Lefty McFadden consolation game, the first time the Buckeyes have scored four or more since a 6-1 win over Bowling Green on Jan. 17, 2003.

    A Stampede without a Bullpen

    There will be something old and something new at the fourth annual Maverick Stampede. I can’t vouch for the something borrowed, but the Black Bears will be in attendance, which means that someone, somewhere, will be wearing blue.

    What a lineup for this year’s tournament. Two-time defending NCAA champion Minnesota takes on Maine during Friday’s first game, followed by host UNO vs. Wisconsin in the closer Friday night.

    The Gophers bring to Omaha an experienced and poised team, led by the incredible Thomas Vanek, but face uncertainty in net with the departure of Travis Weber, and … oh, who are we kidding here? This team is loaded, returning 17 of the 20 players who won a championship in Buffalo last season.

    Maine’s four top scorers from a season ago or gone, but Colin Shields — terrific two years ago, but plagued by injury last season — and Todd Jackson are back. Jimmy Howard and Frank Doyle constitute a one-two punch in the Black Bear net.

    Wisconsin suffered through a tough 2002-03, finishing 10th in the WCHA. Rebuilding — a word not often associated with Badger hockey — is the priority this year, beginning with a strong showing in Omaha. Be on the lookout for rookie defenseman Ryan Suter, a first-round draft pick of the Nashville Predators.

    The Mavericks opened their season last weekend with a 5-2 loss to Manitoba in exhibition play last weekend. That was the unfortunate christening of the Qwest Center, UNO’s new home in Omaha. The Mavs may rethink any future plans for playing the Manitoba Bisons; Manitoba defeated UNO in the program’s first game as a Division I team, way back in 1997.

    The Defending Cup Champions

    It’s not named for Lord Stanley, but it’s a big deal in the Land of the Midnight Sun. The Alaska-Fairbanks Nanooks open their D-I season by defending the Governor’s Cup, awarded to the Alaska D-I team with the best in-state record.

    (For those of you playing at home, there are only two D-I hockey programs in Alaska.)

    Last year, the Nanooks dropped the opening game to the Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves, and that was the only game the hapless ‘Wolves won all season. UAF won the closer of the season’s inaugural series, then took the two games in the series that traditionally closes the season for each team.

    The Governor’s Cup was introduced in 1993-94, and each team has won the trophy five times.

    In last week’s season-opening exhibition game against Northern Alberta, six different Nanooks accounted for the team’s total goals in the 6-2 win — Paul Austin, Jared Sylvestre, Ryan Lang, Kelly Czuy, Aaron Voros, and Ryan Campbell. Voros is returning from surgery to remove a bone tumor in his left leg.

    Ryan Comeau and last year’s feel-good-story player Keith Bartusch split time in net, each allowing a goal. Goaltender Preston McKay didn’t dress for the game, sidelined with a high ankle sprain suffered in practice the previous week. Also sitting out with an injury was Tom Herman (back), who is probable for this weekend.

    One other note of interest about UAF’s exhibition win over Northern Alberta: senior defenseman David Keough was benched because he was out of shape.

    UAF head coach Guy Gadowsky told the Fairbanks News-Miner that Keough didn’t meet conditioning standards at the start of the season, and will sit out until he does. Said Gadowsky, “He has work to be done in reaching the off-ice conditioning and the commitment needed for our team.” Keough had four goals and 11 assists for 15 points in 35 games last year.

    • The Crown Jewel

    By Brian Brashaw
    -

    Clean, modern lines accentuate the exterior. Inside, the industrial colors, the grays and the metals beam to its congregation the style and work ethic it took to erect the $291 million chapel. The arena is like nothing this city has ever seen — a 14,700-seat marvel that leaves the beholder in awe.

    Quite simply, it’s the Omaha Civic Auditorium on steroids.

    The Qwest Center Omaha opened in September.

    The Qwest Center Omaha opened in September.

    “What an amazing facility, not only for the Mavericks, but for the city of Omaha,” Manitoba coach Mike Sirant said after his team’s exhibition game at the new building. “They should be proud of having a place like this. The vision that Omaha has not only for the convention but for the area around it, its great to have that vision.”

    And don’t think the city won’t exploit the place for what it is: a marketing magnet. The stylish architecture and the city’s efforts to rebuild a once run-down northern downtown district is expected to attract marquee events of all kinds.

    One act will remain a staple of the Center: Nebraska-Omaha hockey.

    On Oct. 5, nearly 10,000 flocked to this new Mecca of hockey’s heartland to see their Mavericks in a new light — the spotlight.

    On the million-dollar screen hovering above center ice, the fans watched as the Mavericks walked through the tunnel. Music blared and emotions soared. A new era had dawned for the University of Nebraska at Omaha hockey program.

    The Qwest Era.

    “Anytime you walk into a building like that, you are wowed by the amenities, the glitz, the glitter,” UNO head coach Mike Kemp said. “I think it will take a long time for all of us to get used to the fact that it’s new, ultra-modern and very high-tech, and we haven’t had anything like that.

    “It doesn’t always seem like it’s little old Omaha.”

    The arena had a strange opening. After news crews showed local residents what a pristine palace it would be, organizers at the Metropolitan Entertainment and Convention Authority (MECA) called for a few dozen tons of dirt to be dumped right onto the arena floor. This was the layout for the opening event, the River City Roundup, an annual rodeo and agriculture exposition.

    Fittingly, Omaha had opened a palace by showcasing its roots.

    Now hockey season has come and the Mavericks have the challenge to make the Qwest Center home. Kemp said that after playing at the Civic Auditorium for the first six years of the program’s history, the transition might take some time.

    “We have to make our own history and traditions,” Kemp said. “Things will happen there in that building that will make it a shrine. We haven’t had time to build any memories like the play-in with Bowling Green (March 14, 2000) and the longest game in Maverick history against Ohio State (March 11, 2001) to go to the Joe.”

    colorscans/20032004/qwest_center_1.jpg

    Some things didn’t change at the Oct. 5 exhibition with Manitoba. When the Mavericks got their first goal, UNO uber-fan Fishman still tossed his trout onto the ice, a “tradition” started last year. And the old section 96 crew from the Civic, game-in game-out the loudest section at the Aud, was still the loudest section in the new building at their new home in the third deck, section 213.

    “Those people are the cornerstones,” Kemp said. “You have to have those people, they are so valuable, it’s really immeasurable.”

    The fans will also have to get used to the feeling of a new barn. After the first game, the reviews posted on Maverick hockey fan site Mavpuck.com were mixed. Most said it was a glorious place, but that it may be too big and didn’t have the same “homey” feel that the Civic Auditorium did.

    The six straight years of sellouts at the 8,314 capacity Civic Auditorium are most likely over, but as Kemp points out, there were nearly 10,000 at the exhibition, and he expects an 11,000 average on the year.

    “There’s a reality to where were at — the reality is 11,000 with 3,000 empty seats will be better for the athletic department. I mean, there are a lot of NHL teams that average 11,000 people. We have moved forward to another era.”

    UNO and the fans will grow into the Qwest, especially the first time the Mavericks host a playoff game and 14,000 pack in to see it and blow the roof off the Qwest like they did the Civic. It will be a marvel to watch in an arena that is a pleasure to be in. A new era has dawned, and the Mavericks now must collect jewels to place in the crown.

    When they have accomplished something to be as proud of as the arena itself, then it will feel like home.

    Leavitt Sues Eaves, Others at Wisconsin

    USCHO Staff Report
    -

    Former Wisconsin forward Alex Leavitt has sued Wisconsin coach Mike Eaves and three others over the fallout of his dismissal from the team last season.

    Leavitt claims that his hockey career has been derailed by the situation, and is asking for $250,000 in damages each from four defendents, including Eaves, Wisconsin athletic director Pat Richter, senior associate athletic director Cheryl Marra and the Wisconsin athletic department.

    Leavitt is also asking that Eaves retract what he calls “defamatory statements.”

    Eaves threw Leavitt off the team in February last season, six days after a three-month old incident came to light, an incident for which Eaves was reprimanded. The incident took place last season at a Grand Forks hotel room following a game on Nov. 23, 2002. Leavitt was cited by Eaves for violating unspecified team rules.

    Leavitt says that his girlfriend brought him dinner, and soon thereafter, Eaves asked her to leave. Leavitt says that later, Eaves came back and stormed into his room, looking for the girlfriend and not believing she was gone. Leavitt says the coach then confronted him, poked his face, grabbed him by his shirt and threw him across the room.

    Leavitt says he did nothing wrong in the incident, and claims to have suffered mental injuries from the incident. He also says Eaves should have been fired, and not just reprimanded by the school, because Richter was “presented with overwhelming evidence that … Eaves frequently engages in violent, destructive and otherwise inappropriate behavior on a regular basis.”

    Eaves could not be reached for comment.

    Leavitt says his playing time was then reduced, and eventually he was dismissed from the team, despite telling Wisconsin officials he wanted to remain.

    “I don’t care if I play another game this season. I was having difficulty playing,” said Leavitt at the time to the Capital Times. “I wasn’t comfortable playing. So playing was sometimes the last thing I wanted to do. Ice time was not a factor; it’s that I was isolated from the team and get a negative feeling from being on the team.”

    The incident came to light in February following an internal investigation, at which time Eaves admitted he was wrong to confront Leavitt so soon after the game. Richter reprimanded Eaves, but took no further action. Six days later, Leavitt was dismissed from the team.

    “Obviously, it’s wrong. And I admitted that in that incident,” Eaves said in February. “That was part of our meeting. It was wrong. There’s a letter of reprimand in my file, and that’s duly documented. We know that.”

    The Edmonton, Alberta, native is playing this season with Swift Current of the Western Hockey League, part of Canada’s major junior system.

    Powers Leaves Wesleyan

    USCHO Staff Report
    -

    Buddy Powers has left his position as men’s coach at Wesleyan due to family reasons.

    headshots/wesl_powers.jpg

    Powers took the job in May, succeeding 32-year head coach Dave Snyder, who retired at the end of the 2002-03 season.

    Powers, a 1975 graduate of Boston University, has also served as head coach at RIT, Rensselaer and Bowling Green. He has a career record of 255-220-41.

    Wesleyan has begun an immediate search to find Powers’ replacement. The Cardinals open their season Nov. 21 at Salem State.

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