With news Thursday that the WCHA women’s league won’t use the result of shootouts to determine tiebreakers in the league standings, everyone is in agreement.
The CCHA and the Hockey East women’s league already made that same determination, and it only seems to make sense.
Those leagues are awarding shootout winners an extra point on top of the one they receive for the 65-minute tie. If a team with a shootout victory gets into a tiebreaker, it already has the shootout partially to thank. So asking the shootout to count again would be a little much.
I went asking about this earlier this week because of the upcoming women’s series between Wisconsin and Minnesota, which is expected to decide the league’s regular season champion. The teams are tied for first with six games to play, but with the tiebreakers clarified, Wisconsin goes into the series owning the advantage. The Badgers went 1-0-1 against the Gophers at the Kohl Center earlier this season, but Minnesota won the shootout after the tie.
A good call by all to take shootouts only so far.
