krangodance

you're right. these brackets will never happen since the ncaa seems to try and avoid setting up a potential all one conference frozen four. i just think it makes the most sense to split teams from the same conference up during the regionals but the ncaa does not care what i think.

my opinion is that all conferences should have the best possible chance to send as many teams to the frozen four as possible. this opinion is based on the fact that the frozen four is supposed to be comprised of the best d1 college hockey teams in the nation so it doesn't make sense to put teams from the same conference in the same regional whenever there's another option. by allowing multiple teams from one conference to be in one regional while other regionals have no teams from that conference, the tournament essentially allows teams from better conferences to knock each other off before the frozen four, which is counter to the idea of the frozen four as mentioned above. if more than four teams from one conference make the ncaa tournament then obviously there would have to be at least one regional with two teams from the same conference. in this scenario, whenever possible, the two teams from the same conference in one regional should be seeded as low as possible to protect the better teams from that conference. if this rule were implemented (and i realize the ncaa won't implement this but just humor me here) this is how it might play out based on the current pairwise: east regional: (1) yale vs (16) rit (7) nebraska-omaha vs (9) miami west regional (4) michigan vs (15) colorado college (8) merrimack vs (11) minnesota-duluth midwest regional (3) north dakota vs (14) western michigan (6) union vs (12) new hampshire northeast regional: (2) boston college vs (13) dartmouth (5) denver vs (10) notre dame this way: the three hea teams are in three different regionals the three ecac teams are in three different regionals the four ccha teams are in four different regionals the five wcha teams are in four different regionals with the lowest two seeded wcha teams in the same regional the one aha team is in one regional the idea here being that if one conference is better than rankings might suggest, then the teams from that conference have an opportunity to prove that by beating teams from all the other conferences rather than by beating themselves.

One thing that would help would be to stop giving an automatic BCS berth to the Big East champion. The teams in the Big East may excel in basketball but football is not their thing. Nobody wanted to go watch Oklahoma destroy UConn. If a Big East team has a good season then they can get in as an at large team but the auto-bid has to go.

Does anybody know the format of the AHA tournament? I couldn't find a clear source anywhere. I went to several AHA team websites and I was able to figure out the following: March 5 (AHA First Round): (8) Canisius at (4) Niagara (7) Mercyhurst at (5) Robert Morris (12) American International at (9) Army None of this makes any sense to me. What about #6 Connecticut? Why does the #5 seed have to play the #7 seed while the #9 seed gets to play the #12 seed? The other four conference tournaments make perfect sense but I'm confused by this AHA tournament. If anybody can shed some light on what's going on here I'd appreciate it. Thanks

i hope nobody is buying this. clearly a blatant lie.

Anybody have a clip of the double check on that UAA player when he tried to split the defense?

"I wish our students were as enthusiastic. Just image, students who know what's going on during the game and really getting into it with chants and dances. We would have an awesome student section." The old Ralph was like this. The new Ralph owners are so concerned with creating a family atmosphere that they've gone way overboard on the censoring. As my buddy said, "the school song goes 'stand up and cheer' but at the new Ralph it should be 'sit down and be compliant'"

spot on. this is what i was talking about when the haters were accusing us all of only supporting the ncaa deadline because it buys more time and that we would just support another date in the future if nothing happened by the ncaa deadline (i'm sure we all remember those individuals referring to the date as aribtrary, as if the date was just pulled out of the air by members of this board and not agreed upon between the ncaa and und; hey, yababy, wasn't it mplsbison and yourself leading that smear campaign? i guess i forget now) well, they can all eat crow now because the general sentiment i've seen on this message board since the standing rock council vote is that the fight is lost and it's time to move on. i'm sure some very small minority will still try to fight against the change, but standing rock has spoken (or at least the few that are going to be allowed to speak) and they don't support keeping the nickname and/or logo. since that decision does not satisfy the ncaa requirement to get rid of the name, there's nothing more that can be done. i'm okay with it though (as much as i can be anyways). sure, i'd rather have seen standing rock hold a tribe-wide vote, but i feel the same way about a lot of bills that are passed by the u.s. senate and house, but just as the u.s. constitution allows for elected officials to decide on such matters independent of what their constituents may want, so does the standing rock tribal constitution allow for the tribal leadership to make this decision without consulting the rest of the tribe. so be it.

yeah, it does always come down to money and it's hard to fault an organization for trying to do what's best for them. however, it seems short-sighted. sure, the big ten network would make money in the short run, but long term i think this would hurt college hockey. i suppose the big ten net doesn't care that much as long as they suck how ever much money they can from college hockey before the results turn sour, but i'd hope another organization, such as the ncaa would step in and do what's best for college hockey. this is probably a moot point anyways.

as far as und getting invited to a potential big ten hockey conference: why is that so far fetched? i mean, the big ten hockey conference itself is pretty far fetched, at least in the short term, but if that conference came to be, it would seem that inviting north dakota would be a no-brainer. what are they gonna just run with minnesota, wisconsin, michigan, ohio state, and notre dame? really? a five team conference? i have a hard time believing that minnesota and wisconsin would give up playing denver, cc, und, and duluth just to play michigan (ohio state and notre dame don't offer much in the way of swaying anybody's decision on this matter). they have rpi to think about. i suppose with only five teams, they could do two series each against the other four teams for a total of 16 games, which leaves them with 20 more games they could schedule against anybody they wanted. that would allow them to schedule the teams who are historically the best in each of the other conferences. that's kind of a kick in the teeth to the teams who are trying to establish themselves though. teams like st cloud, bemidji, and uno would end up like aha teams who rarely get to hone their skills with some quality competition. the same would go for pretty much the entirety of the ccha if michigan left. i just see this five team btc as a catalyst to a weaker overall d1 college hockey landscape, which will only hurt viewership. that isn't good for anybody involved. i think expansion and realignment would be nice. i'd like to see five conferences of 12 teams each with a more even distribution of talented teams. that would eventually have the effect of making all teams better and, therefore, make for a more exciting season all around. the big ten hockey conference seems like a mistake to me. with or without north dakota.

i bought a set of five. i need to find a place that can make a quality wooden stand with this painted onto the front and back:

a guy is laying in bed with his wife at 3am when he hears a knock at their front door. annoyed, he goes to the door to see who in hell would be knocking at this hour. when he opens the door, he finds an obviously intoxicated man swaying back and forth. the man asks, "hey friend, do you think you could give me a push?". to this, the guy replies, "are you crazy! it's 3am, go away!". when the guy gets back to bed his wife asks who was at the door. the man tells her the story and she says, "remember when our car broke down on that counrtry road in the middle of the night that one time? how much worse would our night have been had that nice man whose door you knocked on not helped us?". to this the guy replies, "that was different, i wasn't drunk". his wife then says, "that doesn't matter, you should treat all people with a basic level of respect". the guy sighs, then walks back to his door and opens it. he doesn't see the man anywhere so he yells, "hey! you still there?". in the distance he hears, "yes". the guy then yells, "do you still need a push?". in the distance he again hears "yes". the guy then yells, "well, where are you?". in the distance he hears, "over here on your swing".

a guy stumbles piss drunk out of the bar at 2am. almost as soon as he's outside, he sprints across the street, tackles a nun that was walking along the sidewalk, and proceeds to pummel her horribly. once he feels he's done enough damage to the poor woman, he stands up over her and says, "not so tough now, are ya batman!".

dangit! it happened again. i read a quote not knowing it was from mb. at least this time she was quoted so as to simply ask her to leave. it was a ridiculous quote (of course). considering donations are anonymous and voluntary, nobody has to make excuses not to donate nor to discontinue donations. if somebody really was withholding donations because they were "cheap" nobody would ever have to know, so why make up an excuse for doing so? just another illogical conjecture by the master of illogical conjectures.

well, ya know, 63% of all statistics are made up.

exactly. the optinum phrase being: "at least for the time being". pocketbooks are the best place to hit an organization and force a change. i don't hold anything against a nickname supporter who continues to donate even while the current administration is in power; that's their choice and i can respect others choices, even if i don't necessarily agree with them. at the same time, i fully understand the message being sent to the university by withholding donations: "get rid of these clowns and let's get some fair-minded, rational folks in charge to replace these panicky, fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants sheep who are currently running the show. once you do that, i'll continue donating". und isn't going to collapse because of a year of declined donations (the hockey team alone can generate enough income to maintain the status quo). they will, however, be forced to re-evaluate their leadership and tell them to either shape up or their gone. withholding donations is time-tested method of forcing change. i challenge anybody to come up with a method that would work better toward the end of forcing change?

ugh. why does anybody give mplsbison any attention still? when somebody replies to her bs, i start reading the quote not knowing who left the post. every time that happens i think, what is this person talking about? then i think to look at the name in the quote metadata and once i figure it out i can't help but wonder why others are even giving her the time of day. ray77 - she did the same thing to you that she's done to me several times. she asked you a question, you gave a perfectly logical answer, then she asks the same question again as if you never replied. dealing with mplsbison is an exercise in futility. you can keep presenting your logic on the donations issue, which is perfectly sound in my opinion, but she's going to keep asking the same question over and over and over again. you need to realize, she's not really trying to engage you in healthy debate. she's behaving like a mischievous child who cares nothing about extracting real information, but rather sits in the back seat of the car with an evil little smile on her face, knowing full well that she's driving you nuts and loving it. you need to treat her like you treat a child in that situation: ignore her so that she doesn't get the satisfaction of knowing you're getting frustrated. don't believe that she doesn't understand what you're saying; she does. by making you believe she still doesn't follow, she is simply doing her best to get under your skin. i know what you're going through: "man, what the heck is going on here? i've already covered this. perhaps she simply disagrees with me, but what's with this same dang question over and over again? is she daft or am i just not being clear? here, let me try again." well, stop trying again. let it go and the child will eventually get bored.

yeah, apparently. where did that comment of hers even come from? not only was it completely unprovoked, it was a terribly lame attempt at a burn. is it possible that iamhockey08 = mplsbison?

i'll admin, i like the cardinal (for stanford, not for und). for some reason that nickname creates an aura of prestige every time i hear it. the tree mascot sucks though.

you nailed it. it has been my observation for many years that the most intelligent among us are smart enough to realize that they don't know everything and that intelligence comes in many forms. it's the pseudo-intellects, as i like to call them, who decide how the world works, then bury their heads in the sand, refusing to hear any angle that might contradict their stubborn beliefs. this behavior is then justified under the assumption that, "hey, i belong to the minority of the enlightened and, therefore, do not have to subject myself to the babblings of the rest of these troglodytes who comprise the vast majority of the population". a stint in the military would be good for such folks. it would force them to actually have to work with people from all walks of life, then perhaps they'll realize that the average person isn't so dumb afterall and they, themselves, didn't have it all figured out as they once assumed.

is this really necessary?: on another note, anybody see the irony in this post?: like most, i think it's lame to correct spelling or grammar on a message board, but when in the context of insulting another's intelligence, i would think one would be more careful. you are all so dumm, wearaz, im smrt.

hey, stop presenting arguments backed by facts, that destroys the while anit-nickname platform. try arguing with misplaced emotions next time, then they'll understand you.

fetch - i don't always agree with you (usually, but not always), but i have to hand it to you: you always argue your point with sound logic, a fact for which i have great respect.