Dave Berger

I don't think that sounds harsh, and I appreciate the comments. The intent would be to find new ways to reach members of SiouxSports.com, with some tweets providing links to content I generate for the website and other tweets sharing information/analysis in a more succint, timely fashion. The poll is a helpful measure of how many SiouxSports.com members use Twitter already. I actually didn't expect to have a thread/comments/conversation about the topic (I expected votes but very few posts), but this is helpful, too. Dave

I understand where you're coming from, and sorry I misunderstood what you were saying earlier. I think it's a difference between the president/faculty members faction and the group which includes the athletic director/departments/coaches. But that's just my read, I could be wrong. Dave

St. Cloud State athletics had no choice but to put UND on the hockey schedule - they were (are) both members of the WCHA for men's and women's hockey. Dave

That's what I came up with, IF the NCHC decides to designate schedule partners (which I think they will). If they don't, we'll get everyone at home six years out of seven. Dave

I will disagree with the phrase "man crush". What I have is a respect and admiration for the SCSU Center Ice Club and their members who have been the most hospitable fans in the league for the past ten seasons. I am not making an argument for or against any particular pair. I think some make more sense than others from a geographical standpoint. I guess I would rather hear which of these options you would be for, rather than simply what you're against. Dave

All of the talk in another thread about the last season of the WCHA rotating schedule got me thinking about future schedules and road trips.... Here's what we know about the NCHC schedule, beginning in 2013-2014. There are eight teams: Colorado College Denver Miami Nebraska-Omaha North Dakota Minnesota-Duluth St. Cloud State Western Michigan The teams have agreed to play a rotating schedule of 24 conference games, leaving room for 10 non-conference games. Link So that means that each school will play home-and-home with five other league members (20 games), host one league member for two games, and travel to another league member for two games. The question is: Will the schools simply rotate through all seven opponents, or will schedule partners be implemented like we've grown accustomed to in the WCHA? If there are schedule partners, the first obvious choice is Denver and Colorado College. After that, it's speculation. Will Miami and Western Michigan be partnered up as the only two league members from the fomer CCHA? If that's the case, then we are left with four: North Dakota, Duluth, St. Cloud, and Nebraska-Omaha. I'm torn here. I like the partnership with St. Cloud State but I think UND and UMD have a great rivalry also. Aside from the Dean Blais connection, I'm not sure there's much with Nebraska-Omaha yet. It may come down to travel. The pairings that add up to the least total travel for the schools involved is: North Dakota/Nebraska-Omaha (500 miles) + St. Cloud State/Duluth (145 miles) = 645 miles This next arrangement is very close: North Dakota/Duluth (267 miles) + St. Cloud State/Omaha (380 miles) = 647 miles Forcing Nebraska-Omaha and Duluth to travel to each other every year (533 miles) seems a bit much, but it would preserve North Dakota/St. Cloud State and the Challenge Cup. Sorry this got long. Thoughts? Dave

Great, thanks for the info! Dave

I really think it's the other way around. The NCAA needs to line up schools/venues in advance to host the tournament games. The incentive for teams to bid and host is that, should they advance, they are guaranteed to be placed in that regional. From the NCAA perspective, it would be plain silly for them not to place host schools at their "own" regional. It guarantees them a local fan base, and allows them to sell tickets in advanceto fans hoping that their team will receive a bid to the tournament. Dave

Two game total goals... ugh. Dave

Just curious if any of you would be interested in signing up for random musings, predictions, and thoughts about the world of college hockey... Dave

Can we add a tag line for Aaron and Andrew to please stay as well? I'm getting the feeling that all five will be in a North Dakota uniform next season. Dave

The three pairs that we could get in our pod next season would be Denver/Colorado College, Duluth/Michigan Tech, or Anchorage/Mankato. I can't pick up any sort of pattern from the last two seasons that would lead me in one direction or another. The tidbit about already making our last trip to Anchorage sounds familiar to me, too. So that leaves Denver/Colorado College or Duluth/Michigan Tech. Unless there is some other information, I would lean toward Duluth/Michigan Tech in our pod since the Colorado schools will both be in the NCHC with North Dakota beginning in 2013-14. Anyone else have information on this? Dave

Thank you for the kind words, and I will definitely be back at it next year. Teaser alert: watch for my "Top Ten Sioux Hockey Moments from 2011-2012" coming later this week. And to your kids: tell them the Hamburger says hello! Dave

And remarkably, if UND wins today, they will advance at least as far in the NCAA tournament as last year's squad. Of course, the 2010-11 team also won the MacNaughton, but I never would have guessed that we would be in this position when this season started. And that's before injuries/defections/etc. Dave

NCAA West Regional Preview: UND vs. Minnesota Discuss. Dave

Air Force showing some signs of life late in the first, but it's 1-0 Boston College after one period. Dave

My initial reaction was that the net was off. After replay, though, I think what sealed the deal for the refs is that it did look like the puck was batted out of the air with a hand. It might be one of those weird calls where it went like this: it was waved off by the on-ice official, it may have been played with a hand or shoulder, and the net may have been dislodged. A sort of perfect storm of reasonable doubt. My non-biased gut feeling about the play is that it was not a goal. But it was very close. Dave

I feel pretty good about my earlier prediction. The game basically played out as a 3-2 game either way, just that UND got a fortunate bounce on the Knight goal and WMU had one waved off (correctly, but it's a game of inches..) And I really do believe that Minnesota advances from the late game. It could take 4 overtimes, though.. Dave

BC up 1-0 over Air Force late in the first period. And my goodness, those are not nice-looking alternate home jerseys for the Eagles. Dave

SiouxHockeyPrint.com, iirc Dave

I find it odd that ESPNU calls it "Sudden Victory", not "Sudden Death"... Dave

And of course it's overtime for Johns Hopkins and Virginia lax on ESPNU. I'm getting Lacrosse flashbacks... Dave

NCAA West Regional Preview: UND vs. Western Michigan Discuss. Dave

It's objective, yes, but for the reasons I've summarized above, the numbers don't always add up. For example, if Team A has a 4-0 record against Team B and meets Team B in a best-of-3 playoff format, Team A may not want to sweep Team B if Team B's record is perliously close to the Teams Under Consideration "cliff". If Team A wins Game 1 , Team A may benefit from losing Game 2 and then winning Game 3. Any system which rewards a team for losing a game has serious flaws. Furthermore, Head-to-Head and Record vs. Common Opponents are often restricted to a game or two throughout the whole season. I would argue for using KRACH to rank the teams (or RPI, if you're held to that, but KRACH is better mathematically and does a better job, imho, of handling strength-of-schedule issues) and saving the other critera (Head-to-head and Common Opponents) if the KRACH is very close (say, within 5 points...) I want to say for the record that I like the fact that the Pairwise is objective, and that's a good thing, but there are more mathematically sound ways to be objective. Dave

Yes. The following was posted by "Rich" in one of the USCHO forums regarding the ranking systems, and gives a point-by-point argument for embracing KRACH... 1. If a team wins a game, they always increase their rating in KRACH. PWR can drop a team for winning, and it can happen in RPI too. 2. A team's rating always increases more for beating a higher-ranked team than beating a lower-ranked team. That's not always true for PWR. 3. A team's KRACH rating always drops if they lose, and by more if they lose to a lower-rated team. Losing to the No. 1 team cannot increase a team's KRACH rating. If KRACH rewarded SoS somehow, then this wouldn't be true. KRACH does not reward losses to good teams. Period. 4. Tying a better team increases a team's KRACH rating, and tying a worse team decreases it. This makes perfect sense, but is not always true with PWR. 5. A .500 team's KRACH rating is exactly equal to their strength of schedule. 6. If two teams have the same record, the team who has played the toughest schedule is always ranked higher. If two teams have played the same schedule, the team with the better record is ranked higher. 7. If a hypothetical team goes .500 against teams in a given place in the rankings (say, 1-5), they will be ranked within that group (assuming those are the only games that team has played). Neither RPI nor PWR guarantee this. And most importantly: 8. Given every team's KRACH ratings and the schedule they have played, you can calculate the team's record exactly! If the strength of schedule component was exaggerated in any way, this wouldn't work. This is the most convincing evidence that SoS is properly weighted in KRACH. You sure can't say that about PWR or RPI! If you look at all of those reasons, you can see that they are exactly what one would hope a rating system would do. I find it amazing that you can take all of the given KRACH ratings and the schedule any given team has played and work out what their winning percentage is. Well, amazing until I understood how it's calculated. I hope this helps. Dave