Non-UND College Hockey 2023-24

[cberkas]

14 to 16 I feel will all be taken by team outside the top 16 PWR that wins the conference tournaments. 

[siouxfaninseattle]

42 minutes ago, cberkas said:

14 to 16 I feel will all be taken by team outside the top 16 PWR that wins the conference tournaments. 

15 and 16 for sure, and 14 is puckering up.

[gfhockey]

3 hours ago, farce poobah said:

Anyone who is bored on Sunday afternoon, or who wants to watch the nation's #1 goaltender, Jakob Hellsten, can watch U Conn vs New Hampshire on espn plus.  (Or NESN for the New Enlglanders.)

We didn’t want him

[BusinessSiouxt]

1 hour ago, brianvf said:

I wonder if any suspensions will come of that...possibly DU a little short-handed next weekend?

DU shorthanded? No way…

[The Sicatoka]

A brawl in the NCHC and neither team wore green? That's inconceivable!  

[The Sicatoka]

Personally, I don't believe you are PWR safe unless you are locked in at 12 or better before conference tourney play. 

AHA, and then get surprise winners in CCHA, ECAC, and B1G, and 16-13 are in trouble. 

[jk]

1 hour ago, The Sicatoka said:

Personally, I don't believe you are PWR safe unless you are locked in at 12 or better before conference tourney play. 

AHA, and then get surprise winners in CCHA, ECAC, and B1G, and 16-13 are in trouble. 

The CCHA is in the same boat with AHA this year, so 15 and 16 are out for sure.

[brianvf]

This is a pretty poor rebuttal to Schloss' article IMO by CHN / Wodon:

https://www.collegehockeynews.com/news/2024/01/21_Commentary-Keep-Neutral-.php

I think Schloss made some very good points and had excellent reasoning for the argument of moving to campus sites.
Wodon just says we should improve the current format, but only offers one suggestion on a way to do that:

Quote

What we should be doing, instead, is making improvements to current format.

Let's make it so that a host school only gets to play at that Regional if it's a 1 or 2 seed.

Let's stop the Committee from giving 4 seeds de facto home games at nearby Regionals just to help attendance, when there are other options. I don't mind making tweaks to help attendance, but not ones that are unfair to other teams.

The rest of his arguments are kind of nonsense. 
Trust the PWR to pick the field, but don't trust it enough to pick home sites?  What?

[cberkas]

 

[nodakvindy]

16 hours ago, The Sicatoka said:

Personally, I don't believe you are PWR safe unless you are locked in at 12 or better before conference tourney play. 

AHA, and then get surprise winners in CCHA, ECAC, and B1G, and 16-13 are in trouble. 

No CCHA team will get close to top 16. That league is below AHA this year. ECAC always seems to have an upset, so if Q doesn't win, top 13 seems almost a certain requirement  Would really need an unlikely Cinderella run in Big10 or HEA, but can't rule out a Duluth or possibly CC with their goaltending. 

Should be an interesting second half. 

[Kevin G]

On 1/22/2024 at 3:58 PM, brianvf said:

This is a pretty poor rebuttal to Schloss' article IMO by CHN / Wodon:

https://www.collegehockeynews.com/news/2024/01/21_Commentary-Keep-Neutral-.php

I think Schloss made some very good points and had excellent reasoning for the argument of moving to campus sites.
Wodon just says we should improve the current format, but only offers one suggestion on a way to do that:

The rest of his arguments are kind of nonsense. 
Trust the PWR to pick the field, but don't trust it enough to pick home sites?  What?

I tried to read Wodon’s piece but couldn’t get past the fourth paragraph. It’s just word salad in defense of the status quo—with the absurd suggestion that host schools only play in the regional that they’re hosting if they are a #1 or #2 seed. 
 

Schlossman on the other hand is doing yeoman’s work on this topic.

[jk]

2 hours ago, Kevin G said:

 ... with the absurd suggestion that host schools only play in the regional that they’re hosting if they are a #1 or #2 seed. 

Who would bid?  Even in a sport such as men's hockey, the NCAA likes money.

[nodakvindy]

One thing that Brad has left out, is that with the neutral site regionals, they have usually tried to then seed the tournament as completely as possible, with every regional seeded 1-4 based on PWR, so effectively the tourney is seed 1-16.  I think if they went to a seeds hosting, it would be like FCS or any of the other sports, where only the top 8 get seeded, and then it's regionalized from there, so depending on who is close by to minimize travel among the unseeded teams that's who'll you get.  I don't think  there would end up being many east-west matchups, which would be a real shame.  And with the games over spring break, I'm not sure that even home rinks would necessarily get the great attendance Brad predicts, especially when tickets are at NCAA prices.  Part of the problem is everyone would rather go to the Frozen Four, hoping their team gets that far.  Not sure there is any easy solution to this "problem".

 

[brianvf]

Another bracketology from USCHO:

https://www.uscho.com/2024/01/24/bracketology-week-1-with-a-couple-of-regional-hosts-in-the-picture-seeding-teams-for-ncaa-regionals-might-not-be-easy/

One issue:

Quote

We can look at the field and notice we have two regional host teams in the field: North Dakota which hosts in Sioux Falls and Massachusetts which hosts in Springfield. Both of those teams are required to play in the regions they host.

UND isn't hosting Sioux Falls this year, UNO is.

Current bracket would have us playing Michigan first round followed by a DU/Prov winner if we got past the Wolverines. 

[nodak651]

41 minutes ago, nodakvindy said:

One thing that Brad has left out, is that with the neutral site regionals, they have usually tried to then seed the tournament as completely as possible, with every regional seeded 1-4 based on PWR, so effectively the tourney is seed 1-16.  I think if they went to a seeds hosting, it would be like FCS or any of the other sports, where only the top 8 get seeded, and then it's regionalized from there, so depending on who is close by to minimize travel among the unseeded teams that's who'll you get.  I don't think  there would end up being many east-west matchups, which would be a real shame.  And with the games over spring break, I'm not sure that even home rinks would necessarily get the great attendance Brad predicts, especially when tickets are at NCAA prices.  Part of the problem is everyone would rather go to the Frozen Four, hoping their team gets that far.  Not sure there is any easy solution to this "problem".

 

But FCS playoffs lose money don't they?  Football teams are probably much more expensive to fly, and fcs is supposedly going to 16 seeded teams nextvyear.  I think I read or heard somewhere that a Penn State staffer crunched the numbers and this system would generate an extra million or so a year, on average, as well.  I think there's a strong argument to seed 1-16.  

[burd]

Interesting weekend in the B1G

[brianvf]

UMN must have brought the home refs with them to MSU.
UMN with only one penalty...MSU with five.

Doesn't matter, MSU overcomes a 2-0 deficit and scores with 4sec left to win 3-2.

[LuvHockey]

Just looking back on Harvard pre season high ranking. So far 3-11-3 and 52 in pairwise. Just how much bias went into that early ranking?

[burd]

I don't think Harvard benefits from a lot of hockey bias, does it?

[Kevin G]

#2 BC beats #1 BU 4-1. 

[cberkas]

That was quick, CC beat Western Michigan 2-1 OT 

[AlphaMikeFoxtrot]

Our non conference opponents are having a rough night. Purple Cows down 2-1 at home to NMU.

[Kevin G]

SCSU and Omaha combine for eight goals in the second period tonight. 

[cberkas]

Goaltending optional in St. Cloud 5-4 St. Cloud after 2

[ToDaClub]

I just love how the entire game is "who's offense is better".