PCM

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, but I was. The ESPN crew spoke of Minnesota losing Hirsch, but no mention was made of UND's situation with Bina. Adam Wodon mentioned Brady Murray being "in and out of the lineup," but made no mention of the injuries to Bina and Prpich. To me, one of the big stories heading into the NCAA playoffs is the illegal hit on Bina, the WCHA's response to its impact on the Sioux team.

On the ESPN2 NCAA selection show, they spoke as if Hirsch was done for the season. Anyone know?

Is this game being televised?

March 28, 1999 - BC 3, UND 1 April 8, 2000 - UND 4, BC 2 April 7, 2001 - BC 3, UND 2 (OT) I'm thinking that it's our turn to win in the BC-UND NCAA playoff matchup.

For the first period and a half, I thought the players were just going through the motions. Their heads didn't seem to be in the game, and understandably so. Then came Spirko's shorthanded goal and it was as if the fuse was lit. (Note: Woog pronounces Sparky's first name as "RAT-i-slav." I can't complain too much about that because Greg Lotysz says it the same way. It's RAST-i-slav guys.) After the Spirko goal, it was as if the entire team suddenly woke up and thought, "Hey, we can win this. We must win it for Robbie!" From there on, it was a new game.

But that would have meant Harrington would have to sit out the first game of the NCAA playoffs, and the WCHA can't have that. I heard that crowd reaction and saw Stafford down on the ice, but I wasn't sure what happened. Curiously, Frank and Doug didn't mention it.

You must be really old if you know that song.

Guess which team averaged the most goals per game in the tournament? Congratulations to Rastislav Spirko and Nick Fuher on making the WCHA Final Five all-tournament team.

I believe I read on USCHO that while replacing the officials for the third game of a series often happens, it isn't always done. I'll see if I can find a source.

I voted for Denver because I just saw the poll and I know Denver won.

My solution would be to make boarding an automatic 5-minute major with a game disqualification, just as spearing, butt-ending and fighting are. With those penalties, the referee has no discretion as to whether it's a two-minute minor or a 5-minute major. I think it's absolutely ludicrous that players are given escalating game DQs for fighting while boarding, which is far more dangerous, is treated as a minor penalty with the discretion to call it as a major. Players rarely get seriously hurt in fights, but boarding is a potentially career-ending, life-threatening offense. The reason that you don't see much spearing, butt-ending and fighting is because the cost of engaging in them is severe. Boarding should be no different.

That's a good question. Woog said yesterday that Bina was banged up during the Wisconsin game and that Hakstol considered not dressing him against Denver. That being said, after watching the replay of the hit, even if Bina had been in perfect shape, I believe the end result would have been the same.

To quote Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, that's pure bovine scatolgy. I watched the replay in slow-motion, stop-action. Adam is looking directly up the boards right at the play when Bina got crunched from behind.

That's what I figured.

You beat me to it!

What a great win and gutty performance by the Sioux. I'm very proud of the way our guys and the coaching staff have responded to adversity. Goaltending was the difference. Parise was sharp and Briggs was not.

Todd Milewski's and Tim Brule's recap on USCHO of the UND-DU game mentions another way that Don Adam's officiating affected the game's outcome. Read "Try, Try Again" under the sidebar on the right. In OT, Gauthier should have been in the box for holding and/or interfering with Schneider. Instead, he was given the opportunity for a clean shot on Lamoureux and was then on the ice to score the game winning goal.

I don't despise Vanek. Zach made it clear that he wasn't talking about officiating only for himself, but for how it affected all plalyers in the league, including Vanek.

Right. The outcome was affected because it forced the Sioux to do even more juggling of their lines for the entire game with an already depleted roster. For the Pioneers, it resulted in a temporary two-minute inconvenience of playing 4-on-4 without the services of Mr. Paukovich. Denver didn't even have to kill a penalty. The Pioneers came out of it smelling like a rose when, in fact, they should have been severely penalized. Denver might well have won the game anyway. If Adam had made the correct call, it might have affected the outcome in UND's favor. That would have been justice. As it stands, DU wasn't punished for its player's flagrant and dangerous penalty during the game. The WCHA's after-the-fact suspension of Paukovich is half a punishment and a travesty.

I need to mention something in fairness to USCHO. In rejecting the article I posted above, they did say that I could write a more general opinion-based article on how clutching and grabbing hurts college hockey and how officiating needs to be tightened up. I actually started planning how to do the article. But then something happened that made me see the futility of it. Cornell coach Mike Schafer bluntly experessed his feelings about ECAC officiating following a Jan. 17, 2004 loss to RPI in which two of his players were injured. (Read the recap and compare what happened there with what happened in UND's game with DU on Friday.) So what happened? Schcafer was suspened for a game by the ECAC and had to apologize for his comments. I knew right then that no coach would say a word to me on how he truly felt about officiatintg. It would simply be another article in which players and coaches self-censored their true feelings and league officials like Greg Shepherd could spew the usual drivel about what a wonderful job they do. I wanted no part of that. If I couldn't express my opinion on the subject honestly and openly, then I would play no part in helping others cover up the serious problems with college hockey officiating.

The rest of the story I interviewed Zach Parise about his World Juniors experience the day after the Jan. 10, 2004, UAA game. He spoke candidly and on the record about the state of officiating in the WCHA. But he was afraid that if I printed what he said, he'd get in trouble with the league. That why I instead wrote an opinion piece that reflected his point of view, which confirmed what I'd believed for years. Now that Zach is no longer in college hockey, I have no problem releasing the transcript of his comments regarding the state of WCHA officiating. Jan. 11, 2004 PCM: After Saturday night

I'm some sort of sudo-reporter.

That's pretty weird. I wonder what the story is?