Stack

Friday: Knight Saturday: Nelson

Rumor mill has it that Forbort blew his knee when he went awkwardly into the boards when he was checked from behind and will not play the rest of the year. Hopefully we'll know more in the next couple of weeks. Tough month coming up with Minnesota, at St Cloud, Wisconsin and then at Duluth. We at least need Knight and Lammy during that stretch.

I like you wish Miller would have lived up to his commitment. it wasn't so much that he backed out but the timing of it being so late we couldn't even pick up another forward.Shows a lack of class in my mind. I can root for him to do well when he plays for the US but I cannot wish him well otherwise because of his lack of integrity. I guess he didn't think he would get the proper nuturing by playing at a US college that has recently produced Toews, Parise, Oshie, Stafford, Greene, Porter, Zajac, Frattin, etc. Oh and I forgot how annoying the Canadians are when they constantly boo our boys. This is their super bowl and 99% of the US doesn't even know it's going on. Here's hoping they don't medal.

Kristo

Kristo

Knight

Knight

Saturday tickets are sold. Still have two tickets for Friday's game. $25 each.

I have two tickets for sale for the Icebreaker tourney for both days. Tickets are in section 112 Row K seats 5-6. Paid $50 each, would like to get my money back. Let me know if you are interested in one or both days.

Frattin

We need to beat RPI first. Last year we didn't show up for the first two periods against Yale. We can't let that happen this year. Then we can worry about the Denver/Western Michigan winner. I think Denver is going to have a tough game too so it's not a given that they will make it to the championship either,

When I checked out ESPNU yesterday the Saturday games were NOT on ESPNU. Based upon the initial schedule they were listed as "ESPN Syndication" which means that ESPN would be producing the games but they are not on TV yet. I have read though where UND is negotiating to try to get the games on TV locally. ESPNU DOES show the Sunday games being broadcast on ESPNU though.

I agree. Once we hit the regionals the Fourth line doesn't need to play much. With all of the TV timeouts you don't need 4 lines. The idea of rolling four lines doesn't work unelss the game is full of penalties and you need to give your top line players a break. I say we roll four lines at the Final Five to try to keep everyone fresh but once we hit the regionals we go to to three lines using Lammy on the penalty kill and in other strategic spots. Of course this is in the hope that Kristo can come back and play like he did before he got hurt.

This would be perfect if they swapped Merrimack and Duluth. Makes Yale actually beat someone to get out of their region.

Eades yesterday at Boosters said MacWilliam will play this weekend. He also said Kristo is skating but not practicing with the team.

You have to remember that Maine and Dartmouth are currently tied with BU for the 15th spot. How would you feel if we had to play Maine in the frst round of the playoffs which could easily happen?

Sorry I don't agree. My take is that the Number 1 seed wll play Friday night and the Number 2 seed will play Friday afternoon. The flexibility comes into play if Minnesota is one of the top 2 seeds. If they were either Number 1 or Number 2 they would play the Friday night game as they have in the past. This year they are most likely to play on Thursday assuming they make it to the Final Five so that leaves the Friday games already set up.

I realize this but my first bracketing was simply to put the Number 1 seeds closest to home. Since that put New Hampshire in St Louis I swapped the Michigan bracket with the BC bracket. I just didn't show it changed on the final version but I did state that I swapped them.

Sorry I forgot about that . I was looking at the Pairwise on College Hockey News and their version has Dartmouth ahead of BU for the final spot. USCHO is using the RPI as a tie breaker even though Dartmouth wins the individual comparisons with both BU and Maine. But if we go with what USCHO has: The first group is 1 Yale, 2 North Dakota, 3 BC, 4 Michigan Second group is 5 Denver, 6 Union, 7 Merrimack, 8 Omaha Third group is 9 Notre Dame, 10 Miami, 11 Duluth, 12 UNH Fourth Group is 13 RPI, 14 CC, 15 BU, 16 TBD Since Yale and UNH are hosts they have to be placed in Bridgeport (Yale) and Manchester (UNH). But for the first go round I will place the Number 1 seeds closest to their regional. So we're back to Bridgeport 1 Yale vs 16 Atlantic hockey 8 Omaha vs 9 Notre Dame Green Bay 2 UND vs 15 BU 7 Merrimack vs 10 Miami Manchester 3 BC vs 14 CC 6 Union vs 11 Duluth St Louis 4 Michigan vs 13 RPI 5 Denver vs 12 UNH Why not just put the Michigan bracket in Manchester and the BC bracket in St Louis? Hey I'm done. Who knew that when Yale beat CC early this year that common opponent criteria keeps Yale ahead of North Dakota.

Not sure if you are predicting these regionals but if we bracketed today with the current Pairwise you would have: East (Bridgeport) Yale is the host: #1 Yale vs #16 RIT/Atlantic Champ #8 Nebraska Omaha vs #9 Notre Dame Midwest: (Green Bay) (Michigan Tech is the host) #2 North Dakota vs #15 Dartmouth Unless they only use the RPI as a tie breaker and then BU would oust Dartmouth here #7 Merrimack vs #10 Miami Northeast (Manchester) UNH is the host: #3 Boston College vs #14 Colorado College #6 Union vs #11 New Hampshire (Duluth is tied with UNH with Duluth getting the tie breaker but they can put UNH in here) West (St Louis) Host is actually the CCHA no real team. #4 Michigan vs # 13 Rensselaer # 5 Denver vs #12 Duluth (we can't have this so now what?) Why not just swap Rensselaer and Duluth so no first round conference match up). so we'd end up with #4 Michigan vs #12 Duluth #5 Denver vs #13 Rensselaer So would these brackets be so bad? Maybe for attendance you swap the entire Midwest and West Brackets to put Michigan and Duluth close to Green Bay but that's about it. Of course a lot of these will be decided based upon the tie breaker they use.

Hextall for Sunday.

Saturday: Gregoire

Trupp for Saturday.

Frattin for Friday.

Gregoire