82SiouxGuy

So does Barry Trotz.

Hakstol isn't a pro hockey coach, he's a college hockey coach. Different situations. And there isn't a comparable coaching record, so you don't know that for sure. It would probably depend on the franchise.

Lucia won his 2nd championship 2 years before Hakstol was hired. Gwoz won his 2nd against UND in Hak's first year. Neither has done anything more than Hak since. As a matter of fact, both have missed the national tournament multiple times during that period, and Hak has never missed the tournament.

Everyone knows that hockey isn't among the highest priority sports at Ohio State, or just about any other school. That isn't exactly breaking news. And I never made a claim that they did. You keep trying to make a straight line from the simple fact that they played one series in their small arena to some imagined fact that Ohio State places very little value on their hockey program, and another imagined fact that they never will place any value on that program. There is no logical way to assume that straight line unless you know more facts. As to your question about how many other schools has this happened to, I don't know and don't really care. But how many other programs actually have practice facilities that have seating for 1,000? I would guess that only a limited number of schools even have that capability.

Most other schools aren't making a profit on their athletic department. Most schools have to supplement their athletic departments. Ohio State is among a small group of schools that is totally self-sufficient, and they still make a large profit. That is why Ohio State (and Penn State and Michigan and Wisconsin) is able to expand their hockey programs IF THAT IS WHAT THEY DECIDE THEY WANT TO DO. We don't know if that is what they will want to do. But they have the capability and the capacity if they decide to go in that direction.

We don't know if Ohio State will get more serious or not. Competing exclusively against other Big 10 teams in conference may give them more incentive. Only time will tell. It may also encourage more fan interest because of the fact that they are competing for a Big 10 conference title versus some no name conference. The reference to the collective Big 10 ego refers to the fact that the conference as a whole will not want to look bad against "lesser" schools. So they will encourage the member schools to be competitive.

How about this, do you think that the collective ego of the Big 10 and its' member schools are going to allow a conference of nobody schools like the NCHC to dominate them? The Big 10 is going to be a good conference. Yes, they need more teams. But they are going to have multiple programs that are competitive nationally on a regular basis.

How about http://forum.siouxsports.com/topic/18269-know-we-know-the-price-to-lose/page__st__60#entry621468. We don't know when the contracts for the tournament were signed. We don't know when the hockey schedule was put together for the NCAA, CCHA and Ohio State. The playoffs were later in March than normal. If the basketball contract was signed well ahead of the hockey schedule being put together, or if the hockey schedule was changed, than it would have nothing to do with what Ohio States priorities may or may not be. That is my point, which you obviously missed.

I'm not making any assumptions. And I'm not on any side, I really don't have a dog in this contest. I'm saying that you have very few facts, and you are trying to prove some kind of a point with those limited facts. That is just stupid. I don't know how long ago the contracts were signed, but I do know that there is an excellent chance that they weren't signed in the past year. Contracts for events like that are signed multiple years in advance. I don't know if Ohio has longer contracts for their state tournaments than North Dakota, and it really doesn't matter. My point, that you have obviously missed, is that you can't just assume that Ohio State doesn't care about their hockey program just because of the location they used for their playoff series. You don't know what ACTUAL FACTS were part of that decision. You don't know what contracts were involved, or when those were signed. You don't know how much the league office was involved in the decision. I don't know any of those facts either, and I admit it. Therefore I don't assume that I know what is happening within the department, something that you and some others are obviously ready to do.

Consider hockey a loss leader for them. They don't need to make a profit on hockey, they are already making $26,000,000 in profits. Pretty soon the University (or the state) are going to want to take money away from them. So they support other sports that might lose money. They don't need to make money on hockey like UND does. They can spend as much money as they want without hurting anything. The point is that Ohio State has the ability to have a great hockey program, and the Big Ten Conference might be the incentive they need to improve the program. I'm not really a big Buckeye fan (although I like them better than Michigan). I do respect their athletic department capabilities. But you really do seem to have a problem with them.

The Ohio State athletic department is making so much money that Urban Meyer wouldn't even notice if they doubled (or quadrupled) the hockey program budget. The football team gets everything they want, they aren't taking things away from football to give to hockey. They made a PROFIT of $26,000,000 on athletics in 2011-2012. This isn't a program like UND where they have to fight over precious resources.

The new Sax opened a few weeks ago. Looks like a really nice facility. It's about a mile north of I 94 on Hwy 22 and then east less than a block. Go east at the traffic lights south of the new Wally World (21st Street maybe?). Players is right east of Sax. Pretty decent food but a little pricey, it looks like they are going for a little more upscale than basic sports bar. Plenty of big screens. You are going to notice plenty of other changes in the last couple of years.

Well, OSU is already half way to those numbers. They averaged 4,004 per game this year. That ranked 19th in Division I. And it's a little bit more than what they averaged in the playoffs, which makes me think there is more to the story. Having more games at home against more well known schools is not going to hurt them. Maybe it will help push them to 5,000+ next year. The Ohio State athletic department has more money than any school other than Texas. Hockey isn't ever going to be their number 1 priority, but they can be successful without putting any stress on the department. They may be the weakest, or second weakest program in the new Big 10 hockey conference, but even in their current condition they are stronger than more than half of the other hockey programs in the country. Imagine what they could be if they start to care even a little bit.

The UND women's team has been forced to play in the practice facility because of conflicts with ND state hockey and UND men's hockey. And at UND they didn't have to worry about changeover to basketball. You don't know how long ago those contracts were signed, it could be a 10 year contract. Did the CCHA have their schedule set that far out? Did they change their schedule? Also, it was a conference event. How much did the league get involved in the decision? You are making assumptions without a lot of information.

The fact that their facility was scheduled to host a girls basketball tournament doesn't prove anything about their hockey program. Changing from basketball to hockey takes quite a while, at the Ralph it takes at least 4-6 hours each way. So it would be almost impossible to host a basketball tournament and 2 or 3 hockey games in the same weekend. My guess is that the choice then became use the practice facility that holds 1,000 people, or use a professional arena that holds 18,000. Using 25-30% of the seating would make for a very sterile atmosphere. My guess is that they chose the better atmosphere. And is it possible that the big arena wasn't available for all 3 potential games? The league may want them to use the same facility for all games for consistency, so if the big arena had something scheduled for one of the days the league might have told them not to use it. You are jumping to conclusions if you are basing your opinions on the simple fact that they were displaced from their arena for a weekend.

UND has had to move hockey games around in the REA to host the North Dakota state hockey tournament. The contract was probably signed many years ago. Hosting the girls basketball tournament doesn't prove anything.

The chart that started this thread is absolutely meaningless, because it doesn't provide any real information. tSic mentions one of the factors that needs to be considered. The chart also doesn't tell us what is being paid for using those taxes, what other taxes are being levied, the amounts of other taxes, what other sources of income the entity has available, what do these other taxes and other sources of income pay for, etc. A real discussion of taxation has to include all money coming into the government, and all spending. A lot of governmental entities use a variety of fees to replace taxes. Taxes have been levied on almost everything over the years. But a discussion about the tax rate alone is meaningless and impossible to compare with other states or entities. A discussion about whether property taxes should be used is a viable topic. One of the main reasons that the measure failed last fall was because there was no plan to replace the tax revenue. It was written very vaguely to say that the legislature would figure it out. As we can see with this legislative session, that probably isn't a good plan. It also left most of the decision making power in Bismarck, largely removing the local entities from the process. The local entities depend on property taxes, those are the only taxes available to some local entities. Making them go to the legislature to ask for every dime isn't an effective way to run a government. If someone came up with a plan that replaced property taxes with other revenue sources, and still gave the local entities some control over those revenue sources, then they would have something that would have a good chance of passing.

ESPN controls television for all games the rest of the season. The Big 10 Network would only have a chance to broadcast something if ESPN decided to sell the rights. They probably would have shown a lot of hockey this past weekend, basketball was on CBS and their affiliate networks. The weekend of the Big 10 BB tourney they would probably show mainly basketball, that's where the money comes from.

I never said that college hockey would be popular across the country. I have no clue where you got that from my post. It doesn't have to for the Big 10 to be successful. The Big 10 is in hockey country. The Big 10 Network is centered on hockey country. They aren't too concerned about whether college hockey is selling in Arizona or Mississippi. They are making money off Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and other states where hockey is part of the lifestyle. The Big 10 has 3 of the most successful programs in college hockey history. Do you think that they are going to fall apart? I don't think so. Michigan State is part of a group just below that. They are probably a top 10-12 program all time in college hockey, certainly over the past 20 years. So they have 4 programs, 2/3 of their conference, that have had great success in college hockey. There is nothing that would suggest that any of these programs are going to lose ground. And they have one of the largest athletic programs in the country that has added hockey, with the financial ability to back it up. Even if they only have 3 teams in the tournament every year, that would be better than most conferences and would mean that 1/2 the conference was in the national tournament each year. That sounds like a successful conference to me.

In 2010-2011, 4 of the Big 10 hockey schools ranked in the top 10 in athletic department spending. Ohio State was #2, Michigan #3, Penn State #6 and Wisconsin #9. They all made a profit on their athletic departments. Their income has increased since then because of the Big 10 network. Money is not a problem for them or their hockey programs. Minnesota will continue to spend on their hockey program. Michigan State has had success in the past and will continue to have success. The new Big 10 hockey conference will be successful. Hockey may not be the top priority for all of the schools (probably not the top priority for any of the schools), but they have the resources and the interest to be successful. It isn't hard to believe that putting Big 10 schools in the same conference would spur interest at some of those schools. When Michigan meets Ohio State in any competition the interest increases substantially. It makes sense that it would happen in hockey, and it makes sense that the same thing could happen between other schools in the Big 10, probably to a lesser degree. Other programs will also be successful. UND, Denver and others in the NCHC will continue to be successful along with BC and other Hockey East schools. Some smaller schools, including some of the schools in the new WCHA may have trouble competing. Some of these schools have trouble competing right now. Like it or not, the Big 10 is currently the most powerful overall conference in the country at this time, and their foray into hockey is not going to change that. It is time to get over the whole thing and help all of these schools make college hockey more successful.

You are correct on all of these factors. You also need to add a couple of more issues that UND was dealing with at the time. The Flood of 1997 was hard on UND. It cost money and students. In addition, UND was preparing to open 2 new facilities, which created a lot of extra work for the Athletic Department. UND had a lot of issues to deal with at the time NDSU wanted to move up, and UND made the decision to get its' house in order before moving up. That was the right decision for UND. NDSU took more of a leap of faith. They had fewer distractions and outside issues to deal with, so they could take a little more of a risk. The move worked out well for them. In just a few years it will be unimportant who moved up when.

Not seeing East Coast bias in the committee as a whole. Both Quinnipiac and Notre Dame signing off on brackets that aren't necessarily in their favor.

The selection committees are always made public. They are usually on the NCAA web site somewhere. They are usually made up of Athletic Directors and other officials from the member schools.

Everyone seems to think that this was a huge injustice done to UND. According to Pairwise UND was an 8 seed, and Minnesota a 2 seed. The 2 seed should have the 7 seed in its bracket. The 7 seed is New Hampshire, and they are hosting their own regional, so they couldn't be in the same bracket as Minnesota. So switching the 7 and 8 seeds is not a big injustice. It is unfortunate that UND and Minnesota end up in the same regional again instead of having the chance to meet in the Frozen Four. But it isn't a huge injustice to either school based on their Pairwise ranking. The biggest injustice was probably done to Quinnipiac, and Boston College got the biggest advantage. Quinnipiac was ranked number 1 because they won the games they needed to win to get that ranking. They end up playing in the same bracket as Boston College, less than 1 hour from the BC campus. That isn't an advantage for Quinnipiac. It gives BC more of an advantage than they earned this season. That is the bracket with the biggest injustices. UND and Minnesota in the same bracket is just unfortunate.

Looks like it worked fine for me. Thanks for putting it up.