{"id":1631,"date":"2014-12-01T08:32:56","date_gmt":"2014-12-01T14:32:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/atlantic-hockey-blog\/?p=1631"},"modified":"2014-12-01T08:32:56","modified_gmt":"2014-12-01T14:32:56","slug":"three-things-december-1-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/2014\/12\/01\/three-things-december-1-2014\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Things: December 1, 2014"},"content":{"rendered":"
Three things (four, actually, but they’re small) from the weekend that was in Atlantic Hockey:
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There were only seven games involving Atlantic Hockey teams this past Thanksgiving weekend, including a pair of conference series that both ended in splits.<\/p>\n
That’s been the story more often than not so far, as evidenced by the logjam in the standings<\/a>.<\/p>\n Bentley<\/a> and Army<\/a> each took two points from the other, as did Canisius<\/a> and Air Force<\/a>. The Golden Griffins are examples of the volatility teams have seen from night to night – they are 4-1-2 so far on Fridays, but just 1-5-2 on Saturdays. <\/p>\n Ditto Rochester Institute of Technology, which is 3-1-2 on Fridays and 1-6 on Saturdays following a 2-0 loss at Yale last weekend. Bentley? 4-2-1 on Fridays; 2-4 on Saturdays.<\/p>\n On the other hand, Mercyhurst is a better team on Saturday this season, going 4-1-1 vs. just 1-3-1 on Fridays. Air Force is also better the second night of the weekend, currently 4-3-1 on Saturdays vs. 1-5-1 on Fridays.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Atlantic Hockey teams are still struggling in non-conference play, currently 11-33-2 (.261). That’s a higher winning percentage than last season, however (.215). I think that’s due to AHA rinks hosting more non-conference games this season. <\/p>\n With the Big Ten and Hockey East having only 20 and 22 conference games, respectively, teams from those leagues can’t afford to be choosy when lining up non-conference opponents, including being more open to playing them on the road. Couple that with a tweak to the PWR formula that gives greater weight to road wins, and you have schools more willing to play in AHA barns.<\/p>\n So far this season, Atlantic Hockey teams have hosted 20 of the 43 non-conference games they’ve played. The results are dramatic: the league is 8-11-2 at home and just 3-20 on the road.<\/p>\n <\/p>\nHome cooking makes a difference<\/h4>\n
Getting the hang of this college hockey thing<\/h4>\n