stickboy1956

anyone have a link?

One of the team's chasing UMTC lost tonight as well - Notre Dame. Not much movement after game 1. I'm not convinced the Gophers drop below 14 even if they lose tommorow, barring some upsets.

Looking at the pwr after tonight, there was not much movement. Notre Dame loss killed them trying to catch UMTC and Wisco. Ferris State just became a tuc after that win, not good for us (see bracketology thread).

Ferris State win hurt us tonight - they moved ahead of NE in RPI and dropped them out as a TUC. We may need that extra TUC win to stay ahead of Miami. After tonight games, here are the pwr. 1 CO College (WC) 23 .5907 2 Michigan (CC) 23 .5904 3 New Hampshire (HE) 22 .5754 4 North Dakota (WC) 21 .5878 5 Miami (CC) 21 .5820 6 Denver U (WC) 18 .5601 7 Mich State (CC) 18 .5595 8 Clarkson (EC) 17 .5461 9 Boston Coll (HE) 15 .5402 10 St Cloud (WC) 14 .5426 11 MSU-Mankato (WC) 13 .5356 12 Wisconsin (WC) 12 .5281 13 Minnesota (WC) 12 .5237 14 Notre Dame (CC) 9 .5319 15 Harvard (EC) 9 .5210 16 Ferris State (CC) 7 .5080 17 Boston Univ (HE) 7 .5259 18 Vermont (HE) 7 .5204 19 Minn-Duluth (WC) 7 .5178 20 Mass-Amherst (HE) 6 .5109 21 Michigan Tech (WC) 5 .5082 22 Princeton (EC) 5 .5254 23 Cornell (EC) 3 .5153 24 Quinnipiac (EC) 3 .5081 25 Providence (HE) 3 .5072

Watkins

Fairchild looked tired on that last goal - still feeling the effects of the WJT

The one advantage all the WCHA bubble teams have is that all the teams chasing them in the PWR are playing non TUCs, which won't help their RPI. Even if WI and UMTC lose their series this weekend, because they lose to top 10 teams, they shouldn't move very much in the PWR. The biggest killer for the 13/14 PWR team will be conf upsets. ECAC is ripe for this, maybe Hockey East as well.

During the first intermssion of the Wild radio broadcast last night, JP Parise was interviewed, talking mainly about Zach. He was asked a question about SSM, where he talked about what the SSM program focuses on - skill development and team building. He specifically mentioned Kyle Okposo when discussing character, hard work and being a good teammate. By all accounts he has been a good teammate in Lowell, as well as with Team USA/WJT. We'll probably never really know what went on at UMTC that caused Kyle to leave mid-season. Maybe he had a bad, shelfish attitude. Or maybe he felt he had to leave because "the program" was not what he anticipated/was led to believe. On the surface it looks like he bailed on his teammates. Maybe. Or maybe he was the one misled/bailed. None of us know. None of us.

It is accurate - but incomplete.

Adam Wodon at CHN has better "what-if's" than Moy. http://www.collegehockeynews.com/news/2008...atournament.php It's easy to look at the current PWR and create a hypothetical bracket. The items in question (Jason Moy's guess is as good as mine/yours) are how the committee will juggle the bracket to avoid 1st round conf match ups and how many 1st round WCHA match ups will be avoided by adjusting the natural bracket (1 v 16 etc)

They will probably stay a TUC even if we sweep them - that is the good news. There is no advantage for us dropping a game to them, which is the way it should be.

Do you have a source/link? This revlelation would be big news and I believe more people would have heard about it.

You assumed a Fri afternoon game with the Gophers would draw only 16k - it would stand to reason the Gophers would outdraw UND/SCSU.

Unfair to play-in winner - very short turnaround from Thur nite. In ideal world of course. However because of the Minn rule, it has happened before - see 2005. We won the play-in game but had to turn around and play Denver Fri afternoon (the Paukovich game), because UMTC was seeded 3 behind CC and DU.

It may have been in another thread but someone posted if it would be better if the Sioux lost one of the games to MTU to keep them a TUC. On USCHO, someone posted a link to a PWR calculator - its very cool. You can run different scenarios - only bad is you have to enter results one by one. Anyway - I ran this scenario: the Sioux win both games and there are no upsets in the other conf. MTU ends up 23 in RPI. Some teams out east are nipping their heals though - Quinnipiac, Providence, Cornell and Northeastern. They are all underdogs and if 2-3 win their series, MTU could drop as a TUC. It would be great to have both MTU and NE as TUC. http://www.slack.net/~whelan/tbrw/2008/rankings.diy.shtml

Attendance from last year's Fri afternoon game: Fri., March 16 (North Dakota vs. St. Cloud State) 17,511 http://wcha.cstv.com/sports/m-hockey/spec-rel/031707aaf.html I would assume that if UMTC played Fri afternoon the crowd would as big if not bigger. The point is moot however, because UMTC does not play Fri afternoon F5 games, at least for now.

Didn't we just sweep Denver a few weeks ago?

The TV contract is worth more with the "rule" - a Friday afternoon Gopher game would be packed as usual so the gate would not be affected.

It's been that way at least since the games have been at the X - I would like to see a link to article saying it has changed. Here's an example from 2005 F5 http://wcha.cstv.com/sports/m-hockey/spec-rel/031305aac.html 2005 Red Baron WCHA Final Five - March 17-19 - Xcel Energy Center - St. Paul MN Games for Thursday, March 17: #5 North Dakota vs #4 Wisconsin, 7:37 pm CT (TV: FSN North). Games for Friday, March 18: North Dakota/Wisconsin winner vs #1 Denver, 2:37 pm CT (TV: FSN North); #3 Minnesota vs #2 Colorado College, 7:37 pm CT (TV: FSN North).

It's in the TV contract between FSN and WCHA that if the Gophers are playing on Friday, that game will be the evening game.

Contrary to many posters on this board, I believe Chorney is the most valuable D for the Sioux this year, even though he probably has not played to his full potential this year. He logs a lot of pp and pk time, as well as time against the opposition top line. This allows the coaches to pair Genoway and Finley, giving Genoway a chance to use his speed with Finley backing him up. I also think Taylor has had to cover up a lot of miscues from his partner this year. He has had his share of mistakes as well, but I can't think of another D in the league/nation I would want on the ice with the game on the line. I'm sure the coaches feel the same way too.

Vs. SCSU, Lapoint > Marto, no question about it.

Did you see anything published about the "Minn Rule" going away? I didn't. It would highly unlikely the #7 team could move up to 3rd after round one, which is what would need to happen to push the 2 vs 3 game on Friday to the evening instead of the afternoon. I still think there is a "Minn Rule" at the F5 - it just won't be needed this year. We will be playing Denver or MSUM or SCSU on Friday afternoon.

Bowling Green is not a TUC - the only teams in the CCHA that are +25 in RPI right now are Mich, Miami, Mich St. and NDame. They won't play a TUC untill the CCHA tournament.

As I said in another thread, with the new CBA, players can "opt out" from their drafted team if they are not signed after their senior year. I don't think PHX will let Wheeler play-out his senior year - it wouldn't make sense.