College Hockey Unload

This season has been a terrible one for me. I've been a season ticket holder for the Denver Pioneers hockey team. I've never rooted for another team other than WI or CC and from everything I see going on at Magness, I'm shocked that Gwozdecky was fired. Attendance has been minor, with one sellout.....ONE! I mean this is a 7 time national championship team. They sold out against Brown. Needless to say I won't be attending any more games next season as a Pioneer fan.

I'm not impressed with this edition of the Colorado College Tigers. Unless Scott Owens has been taking a few years off the recruiting pipeline, things don't appear to be getting much better. My hope is that after this year, the remaining athletes can take the summer to re-group and come back firing for next season. I don't know that they won't run the NCHC tourney, but this season has been a debacle.

Miami of Ohio is probably the most disappointing team in the NCHC right now. Some might call me clueless, but for a team picked to win the conference this is a very poor showing. Rico Blasi has some work to do, but I have no idea where he needs to pick up. I think a second season in the NCHC will show the league what type of team we get to see on the weekends.

Duluth has become a stronger team one year after having a sub-par performance. They look stronger and I think they are about 2 years away from a solid national championship team. However this is not a set sport, so let's hope they play hard every game.

This is the first time in about 8 years that the University of North Dakota has not had a premier goalie. They don't look horrid, but I think this is the dip in Dave Hakstol's career that he will look back on. Pretty good teams every year. Never the less, I always have faith in the nickname removed Fighting Sioux. They play good in the second half of the year and are always a potential snake bite in the post season.

I'm truly impressed with SCSU. They have been solid for two straight years now. A great showing last year and this year has been nothing short of greatness.


Prior the start of this year, I have been extremely pessimistic about the B1G conference. I was angry with the formation of this conference as it removed Minnesota and Wisconsin from yearly visits to Colorado. It also took the money out of the WCHA, and forced a great conference in the CCHA to fold. However after some time watching, I can say that I am a fan. I've only really picked up on the B1G network games recently, so I'll have more to say next year than now. However I have noticed the rise of Penn State, Ohio State, and Michigan State in the collegiate level. Aside from Penn State just starting, the B1G gave these three schools a bigger platform than they had before.

Hockey East always seems foreign to people from the western side of the states. That's because roughly 1/4 of their teams play inside of Boston. The addition of Notre Dame has been a disaster in my mind. They are so distant from any other team in hockey east, but their payroll with NBC will always benefit them.

Atlantic Hockey has always been an also ran conference. While I do love these smaller schools competing night in and night out, they just don't command the recruiting that upper echelon conferences do. Unless they pick up a new team with money, I don't see their status changing anytime soon.

Once upon a time, the ECAC was another also ran conference. Then we got this influx of playoff runs from Yale, Quinnipiac, and Union. This year Clarkson has proved better, combined with the return to Lake Placid makes for a stunning conference.

The WCHA will take time. Ferris State is 2 years removed from a title loss, and Minnesota State is not the team they were last year. I think the next two years will prove to be difficult for a conference stretched from Alaska to Alabama. Let's hope that these teams can retain the glory they once basked in prior to the hockey shakeup.