This Week in … columns; weekly columns on a league, region or gender-division
It’s tough to call this last month “the stretch run,” even though it is undeniably crunch time for every team in the league. After all, there are still eight games remaining on everyone’s schedule (outside of Rensselaer and Harvard, which have seven remaining), and that’s more than a third of the ECAC season. And yet, … Read more
A Tale of One and Two No. 2 Michigan travels to No. 1 Miami this week, the match that many CCHA fans have anticipated eagerly for much of the season. The teams are just one point apart in the league standings, are Nos. 1 and 2 nationally in both scoring offense and defense, and their … Read more
This conference can’t ever be nice and predictable, can it? Six teams remain separated by three points and the Fighting Sioux are edging the Colorado duo for league superiority. Red Baron Pizza WCHA Players of the Week Red Baron WCHA Co-Offensive Players of the Week: Jimmy Kerr, MTU and Jason Wiley, MSU-M. Why: Kerr had … Read more
View from the Middle If you want to get the scoop on what makes a baseball team click, as a catcher. He sees it all. Likewise, if you want to know what makes a hockey line click, ask the gal in the middle. The good ones seem to have eyes in the back of their … Read more
Niagara may be peaking at just the right time. Just a week after sweeping Wayne State, the Purple Eagles roared into Quinnipiac and swept the then-12th-ranked Bobcats out of their own rink. And rather convincingly, too, in busting the nation’s longest unbeaten streak at 10 games. QU hadn’t lost since Nov. 30. NU took a … Read more
Six? Yes, you have to account for the tournament champions in the six conferences so being in the PairWise’s top 16 isn’t good enough. That only puts you on the bubble. Even so, what were the odds when the season started that Hockey East would have six teams in the top 16… and those six … Read more
“Although Thy Breath Be Rude” For much of the geographic area of the CCHA, Tuesday and Wednesday were extraordinarily windy days. Many folks throughout Michigan and Ohio were left without power, nearly 60,000 in Detroit alone. A rare January tornado ripped through Indiana. There are several theories to explain what happened midweek throughout the Midwest. … Read more
With the end of January upon us, the beginning of February signals the start of the home stretch run in Division III women’s hockey. For teams like Elmira, Amherst, Trinity, Superior, RIT, and St. Thomas it’s time to make their best pitch for an NCAA tournament bid if they fail to win an automatic bid. … Read more
Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics: Goalie Edition As promised last week, some goalie love … in a roundabout sort of way. Many of you will recall my prodigious praise for Brown’s Dan Rosen last season, as he went all brick-wall on us for a few months in a row to start his collegiate career. He … Read more
It’s a Goaltender’s League Atlantic Hockey is a goaltender’s league. It’s a key to the conference’s parity, the reason why any team can (and has) beaten every other, the reason why the standings are so close. The loss of Eric Ehn, either until the playoffs or for the rest of his college hockey career, removes … Read more
Victory at Last The Chatham Cougars have been playing Division III women’s hockey for six seasons now. Their record before Sunday’s game against Oswego State was 0-96-1. Then, even if only for a brief moment, Chatham was at the center of the women’s hockey world. Head coach Phoebe Manchester and her team were sitting in … Read more
Good News, Bad News Air Force had a rollercoaster weekend, earning one of the biggest wins in the history of its program on Friday, and then losing its top player on Saturday. Let’s talk about the positives first. On Friday, the Falcons ended an 0-19 drought against state rival Denver, defeating the fourth-ranked Pioneers 5-2 … Read more
We’re starting the stretch run of the season here and it is going to be a wild and crazy race to the finish line. As I type this, six teams are separated by seven points, making it a virtual guarantee that nothing will be decided until the final weekend of play. Though it looked like … Read more
Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics There are a lot of great scorers in this league, true snipers who could tear a gnat right off a goalie’s earhole. There are playmakers: athletes with the vision, skill, and sense of anticipation to put the puck right where it needs to be, right when it’s got to be … Read more
Assumptions? You know the old chestnut concerning assumptions. “When you assume, you make an…†Yeah, yeah, yeah. And yet coming into the current season, and perhaps even halfway through it there were reasonable assumptions to be made concerning the eight teams that will make up this year’s NCAA tournament. That seven spots will come from … Read more
How to Announce Your Presence with Authority in One Easy Step So, you’re playing in a league that some people call fluffy because the conference name doesn’t begin with a “W” and you rarely play regular-season games in New England. Even though your fourth-place team from a year ago took the national championship. Even though … Read more
Five Teams When the season opened with a mayday-mayday weekend, Hockey East’s chances of a second straight year with five teams in the NCAA tournament didn’t look promising. Only Merrimack escaped with a win back on that Friday the 12th that felt like a 13th. Not to worry. If the season ended today, New Hampshire, … Read more
Wayne State has never had a true home rink and last weekend added to the list of places it has called home with a game at the Palace of Auburn Hills. Located 45 minutes north of Detroit, the Palace houses the NBA’s Detroit Pistons and WNBA’s Detroit Shock and is more of a concert venue … Read more
[EDITOR’S NOTE: We apologize for the significant tardiness with which the column was posted. The delay was due to a combination of technical and human error.] Separation Weekend In college basketball they have Separation Saturday. This weekend, Division-III women’s hockey will have their version of the popular ESPN-promoted day of games with three important series … Read more
If Wayne State wants to go out with a bang, then maybe last weekend was the fuse being lit. Making the trip to Northern Michigan for a nonconference in-state series with the Wildcats, most saw the series as two notches in the win column for NMU, this writer included. But as we all know, games … Read more