Paula C. WestonCongratulations, Notre Dame … And Now You’ve Done It Sure, the Fighting Irish have won their second regular-season title in three years, but does anyone else see the real evil lurking for Notre Dame because of this? In 2007, the fourth-place Michigan State Spartans beat Boston College for a national championship. In 2008, the Fighting … Read more
The Honeymoon Is Over Last week’s column was my nine-page valentine to you, dear reader. This week is different. When my Mott Community College students complained about the single class in which they received chocolate this week, I told them, “I only love you enough to buy you half-priced, post-Valentine’s Day candy once, not twice.” … Read more
For the second game in a row, a match between Ohio State and Michigan State threatened to end tied in regulation, but Jeff Petry’s game winning, power-play five-hole goal at 16:13 in the third period lifted the Spartans over the Buckeyes, 2-1. The win extended the Spartans unbeaten streak to four games and it was … Read more
For the Michigan State Spartans this season, no points come easy. Up 1-0 on No. 16 Ohio State with just over 10 seconds to go, the Spartans saw their best chance at their first back-to-back wins since late October evaporate when Buckeye Hunter Bishop finally beat MSU goaltender Jeff Lerg at 19:49 with the net … Read more
Accentuating the Positive Not exactly how you’d expect the annual Valentine’s Day column to begin, is it? After all, this holiday is a middle-aged, bitter, divorced, hockey-loving girl reporter’s dream. Underperforming flagship programs portending gate issues at Joe Louis Arena next month, key injuries to players for the league’s top team, a general sense of … Read more
And Now Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Program First off, I want to thank all of you for your responses to last week’s column. I received a lot of feedback — in person at Yost Ice Arena last Saturday, from colleagues on the campus at Mott Community College this week, by email — much of … Read more
Rashomon Hockey In director Akira Kurosawa’s 1950 masterpiece Rashomon, the story of a violent crime unfolds in flashback from the perspective of four different characters. A notorious bandit overcomes a husband and wife, killing him and raping her, but at the bandit’s trial, four different versions of the story emerge from four different witnesses — … Read more
Even though the Michigan Wolverines beat the Michigan State Spartans 6-2 in the home of the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings tonight, UM head coach Red Berenson thought his squad was as cohesive as pond hockey — at times. “We played a lot of sloppy, shinny hockey tonight at times, and they made us,” said Berenson. … Read more
Seemed Like Old Times Bryan Hogan, a victim of Mercury retrograde. In Ann Arbor last Friday, Hogan felt a little bit of the love that senior goaltender Billy Sauer was feeling for the first half of the season when he provided solid goaltending for the Wolverines with absolutely no support from the offense. Hogan, a … Read more
Even I Get It Right Sometimes As I return to teaching at Mott Community College this week, I’m faced with how wrong I am about everything, and how often. Don’t I know that no one gives homework in the first week of class? Why should I expect anyone to come to a writing class with … Read more
Back to School As the second half of the regular season begins, there is one undeniable truth: the top four teams in the CCHA are from states other than Michigan — some very far away from Michigan. With all due respect to the teams in my new home state, this continued non-Michigan dominance of the … Read more
With three unanswered goals in the second period, the Michigan Wolverines captured their second consecutive Great Lakes Invitational title and their 13th overall, beating the Michigan State Spartans 5-1 to capture the MacInnes Cup. It was the first time that UM beat MSU for the championship since 1995. “I thought that both teams came out … Read more
As an early Christmas present to ourselves, one of my hockey-loving girlfriends from Mott, Liz, and I made the trip from Flint to Detroit on Monday, Dec. 15, to see the Red Wings take on the Avalanche. It was the first NHL game I would attend as a fan – no press box, no laptop, … Read more
As an early Christmas present to ourselves, one of my hockey-loving girlfriends from Mott, Liz, and I made the trip from Flint to Detroit on Monday, Dec. 15, to see the Red Wings take on the Avalanche. It was the first NHL game I would attend as a fan – no press box, no laptop, … Read more
Was It a Dream, or Not? The other night, I drifted off while watching my favorite cinematic adaptation of the Charles Dickens’ novel A Christmas Carol, the 1951 version entitled Scrooge, adapted by Noel Langley, directed by Brian Desmond Hurst and starring Alatair Sim in the most definitive performance ever of the title role. Although … Read more
It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas…Circa 1981 There are six inches of snow on the ground in Flint, Mich., and the weather reports call for uninterrupted cold for the foreseeable future. When the snows first fell two weeks ago in my new hometown, I grumbled as though I’d moved north from the deep … Read more
The Sky Is Falling! I suppose I should be writing some sort of feel-good Thanksgiving column about what each team should be thankful for, as I have attempted with little success in years past. I’m sure that there are plenty of CCHA-related things for which to be grateful, but I’ve seen so much mediocre hockey … Read more
Sunday was the three-month anniversary of my move from Columbus, Ohio, to Flint, Mich. Three short months, and yet I feel as though I’ve been here forever. Perhaps that’s a side effect of moving from one state to another to begin a job immediately. Of course, one glance around my apartment lets any visitor know … Read more
Sunday was the three-month anniversary of my move from Columbus, Ohio, to Flint, Mich. Three short months, and yet I feel as though I’ve been here forever. Perhaps that’s a side effect of moving from one state to another to begin a job immediately. Of course, one glance around my apartment lets any visitor know … Read more
Sometimes, when one team has another’s number there’s nothing the dominating team can do to lose. Outshot 41-21 on the road and down a goal before the game was a minute old, the Alaska Nanooks scored two quirky third period goals to beat Ferris State, 3-2, to extend their unbeaten streak against the Bulldogs to … Read more