College season is starting up. Also want a place to discuss minor league hockey if anyone is interested so thought this might be a good place for that. Lot of minor league guys who were familiar to college fans just a year prior.

CCHA is changing their point structure for this year:
3 points for regulation or overtime win.
2 points for shootout win.
1 point for shootout loss.

I like it. More emphasis and reward on winning the game in the overtime. All teams get access to the same number of points. Wish the NHL and minor leagues would consider this system.

CCHA is fairly fresh off their denial to Alabama-Huntsville to join their league. Not THAT far off geographically especially for teams like Miami and Ohio State and also especially considering that Alaska-Fairbanks is in the league. They've had a history for bringing in teams to give them a chance to make it just trying to help out the good of the sport overall I guess. But now they are telling UAH that they just don't want to go that direction as much anymore.

Nebraska-Omaha and Bemidji State join the WCHA. Bemidji has gotten so much better pretty quickly and made that semi-miracle run to the Frozen Four last year. Will be interesting to see how they do playing non-stop with the big boys now. I do think that programs from their old conference like Robert Morris and Ala-Huntsville have more talent than many people think.


College teams playing their exhibition games with the various Canadian universities this weekend.

Regular season starts next week. I'm digging the Superior Showcase thing they're doing featuring all 3 teams from the U.P. of Michigan (Lake St, Northern Mich and Mich Tech) as well as Minn-Duluth coming over.

Michigan Wolverines open in Anchorage with games against Alaska-Fairbanks and Alaska-Anchorage.

Miami hosting St. Cloud State for two and Denver hosting Vermont for a couple could be interesting inter-conference matchups.

Couple of Washington Capitals affiliates defending their league crowns this year:
Hershey Bears in the AHL
South Carolina Stingrays in the ECHL


If you're a fan of minor league hockey then join in with your thoughts as well. I do the radio broadcasts for Wheeling, WV of the ECHL so will be traveling around a lot to places like Trenton NJ, Elmira NY, Charlotte NC and all places in-between.

Pre-season games on Oct 7 and 10 to start off my fun. Then the regular season opener at South Carolina on Fri, Oct 16 to watch them raise their championship banner (and I'm also going to attend the Pittsburgh Penguins banner-raising opening night this Friday)

Toledo comes back to the ECHL after a 2 year hiatus they took to build a nice, new arena which is reported to be fantastic. Pretty excited to see it. They'll have a lot of enthusiasm and big crowds in that place. Kalamazoo comes to the ECHL for the first time ever too.

For those who don't know, the teams that play out west like the Las Vegas Wranglers (at the Orleans Arena) or Stockton, Bakersfield, Utah or Idaho are also part of the ECHL. But they're in a different conference. The East and West don't meet until the championship series (last year South Carolina beat Alaska in 7 games).

Great idea, Bob. Hopefully this thread picks up some steam before the NCAA playdowns begin. Playoff college hockey is friggin' epic.



Red Berenson's 25th season at the helm in Ann Arbor, 19 straight NCAA tournament appearances, awesome stuff.

GO BLUE

Just finished watching the ultimate minor league hockey movie, Slapshot. Nice inspiration perfectly timed by Versus putting that on the tube.

Filmed in Johnstown, PA which are the rivals of the team I'm with. I'll be calling from the very same booth as the announcer in the movie in a couple Saturdays. I don't wear a toupee though.

"Everybody is just on their feet, screaming 'KILL! KILL! KILL!'...this is HOCKEY!!!"

omg geddy lee is a michigan hockey fan??

When I played minor hockey, kids talked about the OHL as their dream destination...I wanted to play for Red Berenson at Michigan. I always thought the opportunity to play collegiate hockey would be too cool to pass up.

I gotta get down to a game this year...maybe I'll go to the Joe if they go deep in the CCHA's, which they should.

Louie Caporusso for Hobey Baker, ONE TIME

Oh this young man has had a very trying rookie season, with the litigation, the notoriety, his subsequent deportation to Canada and that country's refusal to accept him, well, I guess that's more than most 21-year-olds can handle... Ogie Ogilthorpe!

My 4th season as a Michigan Season hockey ticket holder. Can't wait for the opener this year.

GO BLUE

Don't go to the Joe. Games at Yost are just so much better than games at the Joe.

I don't doubt this, but isn't it much harder to get tickets for a game at Yost? At least at the Joe, there's 20,000 seats and I know for sure I can score face-value seats with a few of my buddies.

No doubt the atmosphere's better in a college-specific rink; my high school team took a trip to Cornell back in the day and we saw Cornell-Princeton and Cornell-Quinnipiac in Lynah Ice Rink. Amazing.

Have to read up on my Redhawks squad this year. I see that they're ranked 1 or 2 in most polls. Maybe this will be the year we can get it done.

It's kinda difficult to get tickets for Yost, but it's definitely doable. I'm in a group with like 12 people who have student tickets, if you ever pick a date and want to come down for a game, let me know a few weeks in advance and I'm sure I can get you a ticket at a very reasonable price.

Edit: Multiple tickets would be tougher, but if you look early I think you can probably find some.

They finally got a new name and logo as well!

Up until 2005, they used this:

That's right... a team in 2005 was using a logo made in MSPaint by an 8 year old.

In 2005/06, they didn't do any better:


Even if the team name "Walleye" is horrible, at least they have a clean looking logo for the first time:


I was hoping the Sharks would make a deal with the Stockton Thunder, but it looks like they signed with Kalamazoo.

I know no one here cares about the ECAC, but harvard apparently has a pretty sick freshman class, hopefully they can start performing early! let us gogogogo

Windsor Spitfires make their only trip to Ottawa tomorrow night, and I gotta miss it. :/

Should get out for a 67's game or two fairly soon, but would have liked to have seen Hall and Ellis and co.

Harvard always has highly-touted recruiting classes.

Harvard still never wins an NCAA game. Or a Beanpot.

LET'S GO RED!

we're pretty good at beating cornell though lolz

also, really really close games in the beanpot against future national champions two years in a row!

Marshall Everson is a good player, I watched him play a couple games in high school. I assume the players from Shattuck-St. Mary's are going to be good just considering their pedigree/resume. Shattuck is a prep (high) school in Minnesota that doesn't play under the Minnesota High School League. They get players from all over the world and travel all over the world to play high tier teams (Sidney Crosby and Zack Parise went there, for example).

Might want to check your numbers.

In the last couple of years, yes. In the 15 year Schafer era, no, AINEC.

Hopefully this guy has a big year!

Anyone else follow atlantic hockey division? I don't follow RIT as close as I used to, but I think this is our first year with all D1 recruits, hopefully it's also the year we finally get past air force

I have a feeling the ECAC semifinals are going to be Cornell, Yale, Harvard, and Princeton. Hopefully Princeton puts up a better showing during the postseason than they did last year, as the two collapses were horrific, and the NCAA game against Minnesota-Duluth was probably my all-time worst moment as a sports fan, which is saying something, because I root for the Mets & Jets.

Hopefully Harvard's highly touted freshman class isn't all that it's advertised, because if it is, there could be a changing of the guard in a few years. Both Kalemba and Scrivens are seniors, so this is a key year for both Princeton and Cornell, because backup goaltenders are always unknowns.

If any of you happen to randomly be around Champaign when the Illini club team is playing, I highly suggest going. It's one of the most 'interesting' atmospheres in sports

Get fired up for some Alaska Fairbanks hockeyyyy