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BU 2021-22: Albie's Great Adventure

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brassbonanza said:
Completely untrue. Bob Brown made the final call on the hire.

And, as far as I understand, he continues to be the ultimate decision maker on who the head coach is. Drew Marrochello does not have unilateral authority to fire Albie, not renew his contract, or hire a new head coach.

That said, BU must move on from Albie. No short-term "prove it" deals - Albie cannot lead this program to success, period. His contract is up after this year, they can respectfully not renew it so they won't have to "fire" him. Whatever needs to occur - he cannot be behind the bench this fall.

Who replaces him?
Most realistic option - Jay and make a hard run at Joe Pereira.
Click to expand...

BU cannot have the next coach learn on the job. It must hire someone outside the program with a proven winning record and lets forget the idea that it needs to be an alum!
 
So does everybody think Umass had a much greater season than us this year? They have essentially the same record. They are number 11 in the pairwise and we are number 19. Can anybody figure out if we had lost four games to Minnesota state and Michigan instead of two games to northern Michigan and pick 2 other losses where our ranking would be now? Seems like a big bump for umass in pairwise by playing (but losing 4 times) to 2 of the top 3 in the nation
 
Turning the season around proved to be a false dawn.
When it counted most, three losses in the last four games - one against a struggling BC, one embarrassing loss to a bad Maine team, and then losing at the first post-season hurdle against a middling team that you have already beaten twice in their own building who were much more up for the game that you were.

Albie said that he expected BU to be the best team in HE this season. How'd that work out?
That should be Drew Marrochello's first question in Albie's post-season review.

Did BU meet expectations this season? Obviously no.

Has BU met expectations during Albie's four seasons in charge? Is BU hockey in as strong a position now as it as was four years ago?
If the Terriers are just spinning their wheels, why continue with the current set-up?

Given the resources that BU hockey has, the program should be a lot better. There has been some extenuating circumstances, like COVID and the transfer portal ... but everyone has faced those circumstances.

Attendances are down, interest is down, expectations are slipping.

What does BU want from its hockey program?

Is it satisfied with mediocrity?
That is the question that BU must answer, before it charts a direction moving forward.

If not Albie ...
Does David Quinn want to come back, or take another shot in the NHL?
Does BU want to roll the dice on Jay Pandolfo, who offers no more of a guarantee than Albie did four years ago?
Is BU willing to look outside of the hockey alumni for a job that should be of prime interest across the country?

BU did win the Beanpot. And they did show what they could have been, before the terrible start and finish.

Steve Cedorchuk coached BC to a Beanpot title during a time when that was a novelty in Chestnut Hill. And he was fired after nine more games.
Two non-league games in early February should be kept in perspective.
 
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Harry Cleverly said:
So who was the best team in Hockey East during January and February?
Click to expand...

Do they award the Hockey East regular season title based on the best team in January and February? (During which they lost to the literal last-place team in the nation)

Who was the worst Hockey East team in October, November, December, and March?

You still think Albie is a candidate for HE COY too?

No wonder this program has wound up in the crap hole if these are the rose-colored glasses takes going around this program.

They had a great run for 8 weeks or so but once again choked when it mattered most and dug themselves an enormous hole in the first three months of the season.

A 14-1-1 stretch - the best since 08-09 - STILL could not yield better than a 5th place conference finish and outside the tournament. Shows you how bad they were outside of that stretch, and why they were not a league title contender and why Albie is not COY candidate.
 
Harry Cleverly said:
So who was the best team in Hockey East during January and February?
Click to expand...

Not us. We just happened to play teams in the 20's and 30's (and 50's, too) PWR. I said it while it was happening and will do so again now - our record during those months was largely due to who we were playing.

Also, HE is down. The west is up. HE is not my current barometer to what we need to aspire to nationally.

We need to think critically of where BU hockey has been at for the past handful of years and then act boldly to bring in a proven head coach.

We have the legacy, the facilities, and the university-wide and alumni-wide support. If the right coach is not brought in, those aspects will mean less and less (see Indiana University basketball).

If the BU hockey coach position was a research professor, Dean, etc appointment, we wouldn't require the new/next one to have been within the program.
 
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Harry Cleverly said:
Turning the season around proved to be a false dawn.
When it counted most, three losses in the last four games - one against a struggling BC, one embarrassing loss to a bad Maine team, and then losing at the first post-season hurdle against a middling team that you have already beaten twice in their own building who were much more up for the game that you were.

Albie said that he expected BU to be the best team in HE this season. How'd that work out?
That should be Drew Marrochello's first question in Albie's post-season review.

Did BU meet expectations this season? Obviously no.

Has BU met expectations during Albie's four seasons in charge? Is BU hockey in as strong a position now as it as was four years ago?
If the Terriers are just spinning their wheels, why continue with the current set-up?

Given the resources that BU hockey has, the program should be a lot better. There has been some extenuating circumstances, like COVID and the transfer portal ... but everyone has faced those circumstances.

Attendances are down, interest is down, expectations are slipping.

What does BU want from its hockey program?

Is it satisfied with mediocrity?
That is the question that BU must answer, before it charts a direction moving forward.

If not Albie ...
Does David Quinn want to come back, or take another shot in the NHL?
Does BU want to roll the dice on Jay Pandolfo, who offers no more of a guarantee than Albie did four years ago?
Is BU willing to look outside of the hockey alumni for a job that should be of prime interest across the country?

BU did win the Beanpot. And they did show what they could have been, before the terrible start and finish.

Steve Cedorchuk coached BC to a Beanpot title during a time when that was a novelty in Chestnut Hill. And he was fired after nine more games.
Two non-league games in early February should be kept in perspective.
Click to expand...
That middling BC team then went on to beat that powerhouse UMASS twice the next weekend costing Umass the regular season championship.
 
brassbonanza said:
Do they award the Hockey East regular season title based on the best team in January and February? (During which they lost to the literal last-place team in the nation)

Who was the worst Hockey East team in October, November, December, and March?

You still think Albie is a candidate for HE COY too?

No wonder this program has wound up in the crap hole if these are the rose-colored glasses takes going around this program.

They had a great run for 8 weeks or so but once again choked when it mattered most and dug themselves an enormous hole in the first three months of the season.

A 14-1-1 stretch - the best since 08-09 - STILL could not yield better than a 5th place conference finish and outside the tournament. Shows you how bad they were outside of that stretch, and why they were not a league title contender and why Albie is not COY candidate.
Click to expand...

Once again, you don't answer the question because you have no answer.

You have no trouble recognizing bad. But can't acknowledge good.

If BU had finished strongly, Albie would have been in the discussion for the CotY. You remain clueless how it works. I seriously doubt that you have voted in one, and certainly have never won one.
BU's poor finish took him out of any consideration. And likely put his job back in jeopardy.
 
brassbonanza said:
They had a great run for 8 weeks

A 14-1-1 stretch - the best since 08-09
Click to expand...

Harry Cleverly said:
Once again, you don't answer the question because you have no answer.

You have no trouble recognizing bad. But can't acknowledge good.

If BU had finished strongly, Albie would have been in the discussion for the CotY. You remain clueless how it works. I seriously doubt that you have voted in one, and certainly have never won one.
BU's poor finish took him out of any consideration. And likely put his job back in jeopardy.
Click to expand...

See above in response to your question - and the acknowledgement of the good.

The only clueless thoughts here are those which start with "if BU had finished strongly..." Your arguments continue to be based on hypotheticals and "if this didn't happen, then I'd be right!" Not to mention, the team was picked to finish 2nd. You don't win COY by meeting that original pick. Nor is the season an overall success if you need an all-time hot streak to get yourself back to the NCAA tournament bubble.

Albie deserves credit for turning them around after the new year to avoid a disastrous season and get them back in contention for the NCAAs. He coached a solid Beanpot final and deserves the credit for getting the W.

But the season must be judged as a whole. The first three months were awful. The last four games were awful, and continued the trend of Albie's teams poor performance in March.

The reason there isn't much acknowledgement of good is...there isn't much good. Four seasons:

- 0 20-win seasons
- 0 Hockey East RS/Tournament titles
- 0 Hockey East victories at the Garden
- 0 NCAA Tournament victories
- 1 NCAA Tournament appearance
- 1 Beanpot and .500 overall Beanpot record
- 1 full season over .500
- 5-8-1 overall record in the month of March
- 0-6-1 overall record against the NCHC and WCHA/CCHA (no B1G games played)
- 2-4 overall record in the Hockey East Tournament and one total round victory. And there's no indication the 19-20 team would've won at Lowell.

What good is there to acknowledge in the last 4 years beyond this year's Beanpot and hot streak against 0 teams currently in the top 10 of PWR?

This must end.
 
J.D. said:
Picked to WIN the league
Click to expand...

Nope. Preseason Coaches Poll on HE Online:

UMass (9 first place) 107
BU (1) 95
BC (2) 89
Northeastern 86
PC 75
UConn 66
UML 58
UNH 46
Merrimack 37
Maine 32
Vermont 24

Maybe you are confusing with Albie's comments that he thought we should win the league? Or a different poll?
 
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