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For three years I've seen it time and time again. I'd venture to say 90 percent of tweets or posts sent out in regards to the realignment and Big Ten hockey are met with negativity far and wide. People are still angry and still long for the days of college hockey past. It's affected nearly every Big Ten team's fan base, but the biggest resentment seems to be reserved for Minnesota fans.
Trust me, I get it. A State of Hockey native, I'll be the first to admit that my heart is with the Gopher Hockey team each and every season. It has been since I can remember. It's the team that I grew up following, every successful and unsuccessful tournament run.
B1G Hockey kicks off with familiar rivals, as former CCHA
foes Ohio State and Michigan duke it out in Ann Arbor on Nov. 29 and WCHA and
longtime hockey rivals Wisconsin and Minnesota face a border battle at Mariucci
the same night.
One of the biggest things to note on the Big Ten schedule is
it deviates from the typical Friday/Saturday series games. Right off the bat,
the opening Michigan and Ohio State matchup is played on Friday with the second
game not played until Monday (Dec. 2 at Ohio State for a home-and-home series).
As many would have guessed this of course is to better accommodate
the Big Ten Network T.V. schedule (clearly football gets precedence for
Saturday primetime action). While I personally can never get enough college
hockey, splitting a series to go Friday/Sunday or even Friday/Monday I am not
particularly crazy about. Should be interesting to see what players and coaches
think about it.
Having only six teams, there will be plenty of rotation
between all of the programs and you can bet it won’t take too long for bad
blood to form when facing eachother that often. Think about it. It’s also nice to see that teams are still able to schedule
games with some former opponents prior to jumping into Big Ten season. Minnesota
has games with Bemidji, Boston College, Notre Dame, Mankato and Duluth before
Big Ten play.
So what do you think of the scheduling? And are you ready
for the season to hit?
Ok, I'll admit. Total homer status on picking Minnesota as this year's tourny champs, but come on, did you really expect anything less? The Gophers and Wisconsin are the only two Big Ten teams in the tourny, with the Gophers taking the No. 1 spot in the west (played in Grand Rapids, Mich.) and Wisconsin coming in with the 4-seed in the Northeast (in New Hampshire).
Both teams play Friday, Gophers at 2 p.m. on ESPNU and Badgers at 4:30 on ESPN3. Will they advance? Who do you have taking it all in Pittsburgh?
By Jessi Pierce Minnesota Women's team wins NCAA championship and 41 straight wins -- Remember this year's hype over the Miami Heat's win streak and the Chicago Blackhawks point streak? Well the Gopher women's hockey team shattered that value of impressiveness by winning back-to-back national championships this past weekend, capping off a perfect 41-0 season. The women beat Boston University at home and extended their win streak to 49 games. In doing so, the Gophers became the first Division I hockey team — men’s or women’s —
to complete an undefeated NCAA championship season since the Cornell
men’s team went 29-0 in 1970. Leave it to women to get the job done right...Congrats ladies!
Woah, Wisconsin -- At the end of November, I had all but counted Wisconsin out from a winning record, let alone a WCHA Final Five appearance. It might have been the Gopher fan in me, championing for them to fail; shame on me. Not only did the Badgers prove me wrong, they captured the WCHA conference tournament with a 3-2 win over Colorado College. Wisconsin has done a complete 180 and again look to be a potential national contender.
Two Big Ten teams make NCAA tourny -- Minnesota and Wisconsin are expected to be two of the most dominate programs in the Big Ten conference next year (no surprise) and both teams got the nod for the NCAA tournament, kicking off this weekend. The Gophers earned the No. 1 seed in the western regional taking place in Grand Rapids, Mich., and Wisconsin the No. 4 in the Northeast regional in New Hampshire. Despite Michigan making the CCHA tournament championship (falling to Notre Dame), they missed the cut along with Michigan State, Ohio State and Penn State. Minnesota plays at 2 p.m. on Friday against Yale (on ESPNU) and Wisconsin squares off against No. 1 UMass-Lowell at 4:30 p.m. on Friday (on ESPN3).
Don Lucia named 2014 U.S. World Junior coach -- Minnesota head coach Don Lucia adds a boost to his coaching resume, announced as the the 2014 head coach of the U.S. World Junior Championship team. Lucia will be joined behind the bench by Greg Brown, Boston College associate
head coach; Bob Motzko, head coach at St. Cloud State; David Lassonde,
assistant coach at the University of Denver, and Dan Muse, assistant
coach at Yale University, will serve as a video coach.
