10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

[Chris]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

huskyfan unloaded. huskyfan comes alive. huskyfan: wanted dead or alive.

Colorado is a state of newcomers. Denver is very much a bandwagon town. When you are the hot ticket - great! if not - nobody turns out to see you. Look at the Avs - Denver did invent hockey, didn't it? that whole Patrick Roy, Stanley Cup thing? - a couple of bad seasons and the team could be moving. How 'bout them Broncos? - without Tim Tebow, there'd be no one in the stadium. Rockoctober - not this season, there wasn't even a RockJuly. move on to the next thing, be it skiing, boarding, mountain biking, kayaking, ice climbing.
I think its hard for you to understand how rooted in a culture a sport can be. Canada, Minnesota, Michigan, Massachusetts. we grew up with it. our fathers and brothers played it. we played it. we skated before we walked. we played street hockey. we skated on frozen lakes and ponds. we had to be forced to come in from outside. we worshipped Gordie Howe and Bobby Hull and Bobby Orr. we stop if we see a pick up game going in the park. and yes, the hockey sweater mattered. "he's in, he shoots, he scores" - we knew that on the radio and TV long long before we believed in miracles. we stuck with our teams. sure, its a sport, entertainment. but it a little more to us. it's woven into our culture. someday, DU will regret having thrown away a league they help found over 60 years ago. I think they will regret having thrown away a historic trophy for some personal egos. I think those "arduous road trips" - which go both ways, BTW - will mean something to them. perhaps the history will mean something. that big TV deal may not materialize. and it will come down to butts in the seats. but hey, if not, you'll always have heli-rafting.

sorry F2B&G. guess I am still bitter.

Without Tim Tebow, no one would go to Broncos games? They've had a packed stadium for 40+ consecutive seasons.

The WCHA is not 60 years old. The WIHL was the conference during the '50s, then it disbanded for a season ('59-60, I believe). After the season without a conference, the WCHA was formed just over 50 years ago.

DU isn't going to regret anything. The regret should lie with Tech, for providing an inferior team for 30 years.

I am a Colorado native and I have never heard of anyone here going heli-rafting. Ever.

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

In the last 4 (2007-08 to 2010-11) seasons the order of average attendance for WCHA opponents at DU is as follows:
Colorado College (6071)
North Dakota (6037)
Minnesota (6035)
Michigan Tech (5723)
Alaska-Anchorage (5607)
Minnesota State (5581)
Minnesota-Duluth (5560)
St. Cloud State (5333)
Nebraska-Omaha (5250)*
Bemidji State (5047)
Tell me again why you'd rather have UNO, UMD, SCSU than MTU?
Explain to me why your WCHA tournament games are so pathetically attended (4426)? That average is less than the average for all the exhibition games over that time.
For comparison the Denver Cup average: 5614

*Only one game, not really a fair comparison

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

Without Tim Tebow, no one would go to Broncos games? They've had a packed stadium for 40+ consecutive seasons.

The WCHA is not 60 years old. The WIHL was the conference during the '50s, then it disbanded for a season ('59-60, I believe). After the season without a conference, the WCHA was formed just over 50 years ago.

DU isn't going to regret anything. The regret should lie with Tech, for providing an inferior team for 30 years.

I am a Colorado native and I have never heard of anyone here going heli-rafting. Ever.

So all we needed to do was win the national championship last year and we're in...hell it looks like all we had to do was make the NCAAs last year and we're in. You don't think they've been trying to right the ship? ~60 years of history under whatever name it was is still ~60 years of history.

[bunt_q]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

just for the record, bunt. I am a resident of Colorado. I can sit and watch you climb Quandary from my living room. (its a candy *** 14er for appleknockers)
permanent shelters? I'll bet you a tricked out ice house over Silt or Basalt or Montezuma or Hartsel any day.

Oh excellent. Yep, it is candy****, that's the point... sort of an easy welcome-to-winter jaunt. More party than climb (although with the forecast, it might be more whiteout than party). You should come - we can argue hockey conferences the whole way up, and all the non-hockey folks can stare at us like we are crazy. Which we are, by the way. Not a sane person on this forum, I don't think.

I wonder what DOW/Aurora would do if I plopped a Grumpy Old Men-esque ice house on Antero.

How 'bout them Broncos? - without Tim Tebow, there'd be no one in the stadium.

This is a bit much. The Broncos haven't not sold out a game since the Carter administration. The normal Colorado rules don't apply for the Broncos. Denver's still a football town, first and foremost.

Rockoctober - not this season, there wasn't even a RockJuly. move on to the next thing, be it skiing, boarding, mountain biking, kayaking, ice climbing.

It's sort of shocking, all things considered, that the Rockies still managed 12th (out of 30) in MLB for attendance this year. They were an atrocious ball club. I wouldn't call that a bandwagon town, though. The Rockies are always 10th-12th in MLB attendance. This season they were about the same as the Dodgers and Texas, and higher than the Mets, Detroit, Atlanta, and a lot of other teams you wouldn't expect.

a couple of bad seasons and the team could be moving.

Where do you get this? You must be reading a different paper than I am. The Avs attendance only dipped for two seasons. About 100k from its peak, which is huge... but talk of moving? Hardly. At their worst, they were still averaging 2,000/game more than Phoenix, and for some reason the NHL seems pretty committed to them. As bad as the Avs were last year, there were still 6 teams with lower attendance than them. (New Jersey? Odd.) I think we do pretty well for a medium-sized market with so much going on.

But generally speaking, you're right about Colorado. The only place in Colorado with the sort of hockey tradition you're describing is Colorado Springs. I was a little late - I didn't skate until I was 4 (and I'm more Brett Hull-era than Bobby Hull), but everything else you described is part of hockey culture down there. We had to drive to Green Mountain Falls for a reliably frozen pond, but we did, all the time. Denver still doesn't have that and probably never will.

I still think you're wrong about DU someday regretting the decision, though. I guess we'll see.

[uaafanblog]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

In the last 4 (2007-08 to 2010-11) seasons the order of average attendance for WCHA opponents at DU is as follows:
Colorado College (6071)
North Dakota (6037)
Minnesota (6035)
Michigan Tech (5723)
Alaska-Anchorage (5607)
Minnesota State (5581)
Minnesota-Duluth (5560)
St. Cloud State (5333)
Nebraska-Omaha (5250)*
Bemidji State (5047)
Tell me again why you'd rather have UNO, UMD, SCSU than MTU?
Explain to me why your WCHA tournament games are so pathetically attended (4426)? That average is less than the average for all the exhibition games over that time.
For comparison the Denver Cup average: 5614

*Only one game, not really a fair comparison

Did this a couple of years ago when DG first started in with the lie that DU attendance suffered from non-marquis opponents. A fair average shows about 500-700 less fans show up. Insignificant. Far less loss of revenue than NOT HAVING two extra home games every year.

Go ask GM Gwoz what he's doing to replace the revenue from two lost home games eh?

[bunt_q]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

FYI - I have no personal beef with DU fans or fans of any other team in the NaCHo Bowl. I do however take issue with folks who try to defend this whole college hockey mess as "what was best" or "needed to be done" or "wasn't about money". You would have an easier time convincing me that the original pioneers were doing "what was best" for Native Americans when they settled the West...

Funny, when we say it's about the money, you tell us it's a huge mistake and the money won't pan out. But when we say it isn't about the money, and that we don't really expect there to be much of a financial upside, you lambast us for that too. I, for one, don't think it will make more money. I still think it was a good decision. And even if the decision was about money, that wouldn't bother me, because, well, sports need money. Not to mention, if a program is bringing in more money, I'd say that's a sign something is going right.

I don't know that it "needed" to be done. But it certainly could be done. And it is what is best for the programs that are moving to the NCHC. I'm not sure I'd call that "defending" anything. It's just our opinion of a decision you really had no say in.

Colorado Symphony? Are we really going to go there? That's like discussing the best vintage of wine from Idaho.
Yes, it appears we are in two different worlds - Denver and Reality.

We don't have to go there. But have you ever had to tell you wife/girlfriend you'd rather go to the hockey game than the Central Wisconsin symphony? Happens to me all the time. And occasionally I don't win. We were talking about attendance. I was telling you why DU needs to maximize the appeal of its product - because there are a lot of other options. That's all. If the Avalanche and DU are playing on the same night, which should I go to in order to be the best fan I can be, since it appears our decisions on how we run our athletics programs in Colorado need prior approval from Houghton.

EDIT: We're also not talking about a lot of room for improvement here. If DU is drawing 5,600, and the max is 6,000 or so, then it doesn't take much improvement on the margin. Once you're full, it makes sense to me to then start focusing on the quality. But no need to open that can of worms, about which bunch of teams plays better hockey. Suffice it to say, I'm happy, I think most of the NCHC programs are optimistic...that sounds like a good decision was made, if you ask me. It's important to have a positive outlook.

[mtu_huskies]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

Way too much talk about the opponent that DU is playing drawing in fans. Shouldn't people on campus and in the area be going to Magness to see a good product on the ice that DU is producing? I've been to 1 game at Magness against the Gophs and I was amazed at how empty the place was, and DU was a top five team at that time. Bunt is out in left field on this one.


I'm amazed at how the NCHC fans have just jumped on the bandwagon instead of saying that this NCHC simply sucks for college hockey.

[Flashy Man]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

We don't have to go there. But have you ever had to tell you wife/girlfriend you'd rather go to the hockey game than the Central Wisconsin symphony? Happens to me all the time. And occasionally I don't win. We were talking about attendance. I was telling you why DU needs to maximize the appeal of its product - because there are a lot of other options. That's all. If the Avalanche and DU are playing on the same night, which should I go to in order to be the best fan I can be, since it appears our decisions on how we run our athletics programs in Colorado need prior approval from Houghton.

Central Wisconsin doesn't have a symphony, just saying. Also, his wife is a St. Clouud Hockey fan.

[bunt_q]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

Way too much talk about the opponent that DU is playing drawing in fans. Shouldn't people on campus and in the area be going to Magness to see a good product on the ice that DU is producing? I've been to 1 game at Magness against the Gophs and I was amazed at how empty the place was, and DU was a top five team at that time. Bunt is out in left field on this one.

I'm amazed at how the NCHC fans have just jumped on the bandwagon instead of saying that this NCHC simply sucks for college hockey.

I'm calling bull**** on this one. How long ago was your enlightening one-time experience?

According to Shirtless below, DU's average attendance against Minnesota over the last 4 years was 6,035. Magness Arena's capacity on paper is 6,026. That's sounds pretty full. Now, I'm no mathematician, but you can't average to "full" if any single game was "empty" (unless another game was magically over-full to offset that).

Now, if folks are buying tickets and not showing up, I'm not sure what we can do about that... subsidize craigslist for easier resale, I suppose. Implement one of those programs that allow folks to make their seats available for resale when they know they can't show, like the pros do. But I have to imagine those are a pain/expensive.

[bunt_q]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

Question - why the double standard here?

Why can the Minnesota folks over in their thread talk about how much of a "snoozer" playing UAA is. Ho-hum. Only two more years. Etc. etc... and nobody is jumping on them.

But when any NCHC school says the same thing (how much of a snoozer Tech is, for example), it's on.

Is it just because the Tech fans are the most rabid forumers on here?

Or does Minnesota get a pass because they were "forced" into the BTHC?

[Chris]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

So all we needed to do was win the national championship last year and we're in...hell it looks like all we had to do was make the NCAAs last year and we're in. You don't think they've been trying to right the ship? ~60 years of history under whatever name it was is still ~60 years of history.

All this history didn't stop Tech from once upon a time leaving the WCHA.

Every team schedules a cupcake or 2 every season, we'll throw you into the rotation. For history's sake... Then if you win, you can claim a victory over the Super Conference.

[huskyfan]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

I am a Colorado native and I have never heard of anyone here going heli-rafting. Ever.

and they have no sense of humor ...

[huskyfan]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

sold tickets and filled seats are not the same.

DU, MTU, UND and CC formed this league. yah, we've been doormats for 30 years, but Denver has had some doormat decades itself. when is the last time CC lifted an NCAA championship banner? St Cloud? Western? Miami? doesn't history and tradition count for something? and we really weren't total doormats - we occasionally pulled out a few games. remembering beating CC in the WCHA playoffs in CC. twice. sweeping UND at UND. we were more of an "any given Sunday team". granted Sunday didn't come often.

for me what this really is about - the underhanded way this was done. scheming, lying. if DU and UND wanted Bruce Macleod gone why didn't they approach the league? why were none of the "problems" with the league brought up? truly the DU team and fans deserve better. you give up Tech, the trophy, the tradition ... for what ... Western????? good luck with that. I'd rather play a program with integrity.

[bunt_q]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

and they have no sense of humor ...

Well, if we're going to drape a curtain over 6 miles of river, then heli-rafting can't be far behind.

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: 10/28-10/29 Michigan Tech vs. Denver - Don't Leave without your Ice Cream

Question - why the double standard here?

Why can the Minnesota folks over in their thread talk about how much of a "snoozer" playing UAA is. Ho-hum. Only two more years. Etc. etc... and nobody is jumping on them.

But when any NCHC school says the same thing (how much of a snoozer Tech is, for example), it's on.

Is it just because the Tech fans are the most rabid forumers on here?

Or does Minnesota get a pass because they were "forced" into the BTHC?

What double standard? I will argue with a Minnesota fan if they say they are happy to not have to play MTU anymore or go to Houghton ever again. If you find one let me know. Every gopher fan I know personally is not happy with the situation and hates the fact that Minnesota will not be making the trip to Houghton again. As for the program itself, Minnesota didn't really have a choice, the Penn State, Ohio State and Wisconsin wanted the B1GHC, Michigan & Michigan State were probably slightly on the fence but ultimately, Minnesota was the only program that didn't want it. Thats why I hold no ill will towards Minnesota directly...the rest of them...F them. UND and DU get the majority of my hatred because they actively sought this new conference and without them, this new conference doesn't make even a tiny bit of sense and it never happens. The administration at UND gets the brunt of it because I expected more from a program that has closer ties to more of the teams left behind.