nodakvindy

What I'd like to see is avoid intraconference matchups for as far as possible. If you have four teams from a conference, they should be separated one to each region. This year, four of the five CCHA teams were in one half of the draw. Use the ratings to establish the 16 teams, but to so slavishly stick to ranking for seeding is idiotic. The teams are generally close anyway, and with the minimal non-conference play, there is some question to the validity of various rankings. I think this would have been an ideal bracket, in terms of spreading out the teams and also staying Worcester -- Boston College-Michigan St. Ferris St.- Denver Green Bay -- UND-Mass-Lowell, Miami-Cornell St. Paul - Michigan-Air Force, Minnesota-Boston U. Bridgeport - Union-W. Michigan, Minnesota-Duluth-Maine All four brackets have one Hockey East, one WCHA and at least one CCHA team, with the two ECAC clubs on opposite halves of the bracket. Attendance would be decent, although would have been nice to get another eastern team into Worcester.

Jeff Lerg and Michigan State say hi. Union and Ferris State are playing with house money at this point, and whoever wins that semi should not be discounted in the final.

And wait until next year with western regionals in Grand Rapids and Toledo. With the attendance being what it is, UND should bid for a regional in Fargo (if we are every able to be a host again).

UND moves on and also claims the inaugural NCHC tournament of champions.

Back in the day, the tourneys existed to get the two eastern and two western teams for the Frozen Four. So the WCHA just played off enough to get those teams. The champion of the league was the regular season champion.

It also didn't hurt that all most of our non conference opponents did extremely well in their conference tourneys, benefitting us in the common opponents category and further upping our RPI.

They can't. ESPN has exclusive rights.

I don't really see it going this way, but I think this bracket would be the best attendance wise and still maintain the best bracket integrity. Unless you literally put people in their own backyard (think BC and BU in Worcester), the only legit travelling fan base is the Green and White. UND still makes Green Bay a winner with no Bucky in the field. With all the flights between Minneapolis and Detroit, Michigan's fans probably turn out better at St. Paul than Green Bay. What Should Happen Worcester 1 Boston College 4 Michigan State 2 Minnesota-Duluth 3 Boston University St. Paul 1 Michigan 4 Air Force 2 Minnesota vs 3 Maine Bridgeport 1 Union 4 Western Michigan 2 Ferris State 3 Massachusetts-Lowell Green Bay 1 North Dakota 4 Cornell 2 Miami 3 Denver What probably will happen Worcester 1 Boston College 4 Air Force 2 Minnesota-Duluth 3 Boston University St. Paul 1 North Dakota 4 Western Michigan 2 Minnesota vs 3 Maine Bridgeport 1 Union 4 Michigan State 2 Miami 3 Massachusetts-Lowell Green Bay 1 Michigan 4 Cornell 2 Ferris State 3 Denver

I'd say if we win it next year, we should keep it permanently. No one else will have ever held it.

Dominating the all tourney team Forbert MacWilliam Lamoureux Nelson Dell - MVP Along with Zucker from DU

I think that's a real sharp looking sweater. The off white/cream color makes all the difference. My only suggestion would be to go with interlocking ND on one shoulder and an outline map of the state on the other, possibly with a small star marking Grand Forks.

ESPN Gamecast also available. Scores from other CIT games show up at the bottom. http://scores.espn.go.com/ncb/gamecast?gameId=320742181

Yes to webcast http://www.b2livetv.com/partner_home.asp All the tourney games are available for free. If you signed up for it last year, it will still be there. I just found it on my account. The quality was decent last year (streaming wise, the video was from the Air Force jumbotron, so you saw replays rather than live action at times), and it has a PIP feature, so you can watch three other games simultaneously.

playoffstatus.com It's a cool site. They seem to use their own ratings on determining if teams are sure things or not. It doesn't always match PairWise.

Here is the bracket. UND got no love in the seeding, probably due to the general weakness of the Great West. http://www.womensbasketballinvitational.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/2012Bracket.pdf On the tourney web site it says higher seeds always host, so I'm not sure a bid was even possible. Looking at the bracket, it would be awesome to see a North Dakota-Minnesota final.

I was surprised Weber didn't make the NIT. I would say they have to be one of the favorites in the CIT.

I see us taking out St. Cloud, Minnesota, and Duluth in order to win another Broadmoor, and coupled with the sweep of the Beavers, the DQ Cup as well.

The following CIT games have been announced online by schools or local media, but won't be official until tomorrow night. There could be a change or two, but I'd guess most will happen. North Dakota at Drake Yale at Fairfield Manhattan at Albany Tennessee Tech at Georgia State Rice at Louisiana Coastal Carolina at Old Dominion Kent State at South Carolina Upstate Tennessee State at Mercer Robert Morris at Indiana State No Western matchups yet - A few of the teams that might be in the mix are Portland State, Utah State, Cal Poly, UC Santa Barbara, Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Wyoming, Idaho and San Francisco.

Sioux to play Drake on either Tuesday or Wednesday. Hope the Sioux faithful can show up in decent numbers in Des Moines.

Need to lay off the threes.

In this conference tourney I'd say about as close to 100% as possible.

UND didn't change it's name to remove the word Agriculture, trying to hide the true mission of the school. If that's not ashamed, I'm not sure what is. Just sayin'

I think regionalism played a part, but I wonder also if BU got a little extra consideration now that Poulin is back. They are a completely different team with her in the lineup, as shown by how they finished the season.

First Round - March 10 1 Wisconsin 7 pm Mercyhurst 4 Boston College Noon St. Lawrence 2 Minnesota 4 pm North Dakota 3 Cornell 1 pm Boston University UND gets a chance to quickly avenge Friday night's loss. They can certainly get this done and do some damage in the tourney.

There needs to be more interleague play in the women's game. The WCHA should cut back to 24 league games. That would allow for more games against eastern teams and help improve the pairwise. But I would never expect the WCHA to do something that would make sense.