How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

[Puck Swami]

Recently, College Hockey Inc took its road show to California to pitch top prospective up-and-coming California teenage players on the college hockey option. This was a strategic move, since a lot of top Californinans have been choosing the WHL junior route lately.

Listening to the pitch by College Hockey Inc. staff (and some current college coaches) gives you an inside listen as to how college hockey currently positioning itself against major junior, and how they "sell" kids on the benefits of college hockey. If you are interested in our game and recruiting, you should set aside 30 minutes and give it a listen. I found it full of interesting statistics and insights....

Here are the people on the recording:

•Jeff Dwyer, Director of Education and Recruitment for College Hockey Inc.
•George Gwozdecky, Head Coach of the University of Denver
•Mike Gibbons, Assistant Coach, St. Cloud State University
•Brett Larson, Assistant Coach, University of Minnesota-Duluth
•Tim Army, Head Coach, Providence
•Brett Henning, former hockey player turned hockey author

A blogger captured this presentation on audio link here:

http://www.anaheimcalling.com/2010/6/22/1527625/dwcpc-2010-coaches-forum-and

 

[4four4]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

Nice to see them selling college hockey. IMO, in the many, many years ahead it would really be a huge win if a California school decided to enter the icebox. It surely would give kids in California an alternative to major junior.

 

[Ralph Baer]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

Most interesting. Hopefully, they continue to spread the word around north America.

I agree with 444 that it would be great for the game if a college hockey presence was established in California (or should I say reestablished since Cal once had a team), but I don't see it happening in the forseeable future.

 

[Wicked Slappaahs]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

Recently, College Hockey Inc took its road show to California to pitch top prospective up-and-coming California teenage players on the college hockey option. This was a strategic move, since a lot of top Californinans have been choosing the WHL junior route lately.

Listening to the pitch by College Hockey Inc. staff (and some current college coaches) gives you an inside listen as to how college hockey currently positioning itself against major junior, and how they "sell" kids on the benefits of college hockey. If you are interested in our game and recruiting, you should set aside 30 minutes and give it a listen. I found it full of interesting statistics and insights....

Here are the people on the recording:

•Jeff Dwyer, Director of Education and Recruitment for College Hockey Inc.
•George Gwozdecky, Head Coach of the University of Denver
•Mike Gibbons, Assistant Coach, St. Cloud State University
•Brett Larson, Assistant Coach, University of Minnesota-Duluth
•Tim Army, Head Coach, Providence
•Brett Henning, former hockey player turned hockey author

A blogger captured this presentation on audio link here:

http://www.anaheimcalling.com/2010/6/22/1527625/dwcpc-2010-coaches-forum-and

I think this was a great move. I do think that for future efforts they may want to include a few more coaches from schools the kids might actually have heard of -- at least geographically -- Michigan, Harvard, Maine, etc.

A kid from Cali. likely knows more about the cities in Mexico than he does about Duluth, or St. Cloud...and I'm NOT bashing those squads so don't flame me -- I'm just saying from the perspective of opening a kids' eyes to the college route, a few more high profile names might help them focus on it as an option.

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

I think this was a great move. I do think that for future efforts they may want to include a few more coaches from schools the kids might actually have heard of -- at least geographically -- Michigan, Harvard, Maine, etc.

A kid from Cali. likely knows more about the cities in Mexico than he does about Duluth, or St. Cloud...and I'm NOT bashing those squads so don't flame me -- I'm just saying from the perspective of opening a kids' eyes to the college route, a few more high profile names might help them focus on it as an option.

You could probably also include the 3 colleges in Colorado as part of the list of current opportunity (even if one of them is a military academy); perhaps Puck Swami could enlighten us on how many Calfornia players CC or DU generally attempts to recruit. Granted, expansion to California would likely mean we'd have to reinstate the CHA, and unless we have at least 4 more new teams, I don't foresee that happening anytime soon.

 

[MaizeRage]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

I think this was a great move. I do think that for future efforts they may want to include a few more coaches from schools the kids might actually have heard of -- at least geographically -- Michigan, Harvard, Maine, etc.

They weren't hand-picked. Those were just the schools scouting at that event.

 

[aallenpollreisz]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

College = women = fun!

I am sold! Too bad I'm about to graduate.

 

[solovsfett]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

Nice to see them selling college hockey. IMO, in the many, many years ahead it would really be a huge win if a California school decided to enter the icebox. It surely would give kids in California an alternative to major junior.

agreed.


and it would be nice if they could get Joe Pavelski/Dany Heatley (san jose) and some other San Jose/L.A. Kings ex-NCAA guys to help out by taking a few mins to do a video/audio or both. or show some highlights of these players from college days...

 

[CHFAN222]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

agreed.


and it would be nice if they could get Joe Pavelski/Dany Heatley (san jose) and some other San Jose/L.A. Kings ex-NCAA guys to help out by taking a few mins to do a video/audio or both. or show some highlights of these players from college days...

2 Ideas on how to start some teams up out west.

1. Form up a conference with the two Alaska schools, UBC and maybe another Canadian school joining the NCAA.

2. Start a cali/west league as a cost containment league. Regulate the number of scholarships the first couple of seasons. After that schools would be eligible to gradually increase the scholarship totals if they want to.

 

[Puck Swami]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

perhaps Puck Swami could enlighten us on how many Calfornia players CC or DU generally attempts to recruit. .

It's a source of players, but by no means a dominant one (in comparison to Canada, Minnesota or even Colorado)

Some DU Californians off the top of my head...

Peter MacNab (San Diego- Born in BC)
Andy Hilliard (Santa Rosa)
Anders Eisner (Beverly Hills)
Gabe Gauthier - Buena Park
Rhett Rhakshani - Orange County
Beau Bennett - Gardena
Jason Zucker - From Nev but played youth hockey in LA

CC has had some luck with Californians, too (off the top of my head)

Brett Sterling
Noah Clarke
Brian Salcido
Andreas Vlassoupolous
Justin Morrison
Dakota Eveland

The Hockey is definitely getting better and better there since Gretzky went there in 1988...

 

[SCSU Euro]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

I think this was a great move. I do think that for future efforts they may want to include a few more coaches from schools the kids might actually have heard of -- at least geographically -- Michigan, Harvard, Maine, etc.

A kid from Cali. likely knows more about the cities in Mexico than he does about Duluth, or St. Cloud

And yet without knowing where the hell St. Cloud was, two kids from California were on SCSU's roster last year, while the three schools you mentioned had a combined one. Kids from California will start to learn where Duluth, St. Cloud, Bemidji and other D-1 hockey towns are soon enough.

Anybody know of any schools with more than 2 kids from Cali last year?

 

[First Time Long Time]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

Technically St. Cloud had three. Eddy went to high school in Minnesota but was born and grew up in California and knew Lasch which is one of the reasons he came to Cloud

 

[moose97]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

And yet without knowing where the hell St. Cloud was, two kids from California were on SCSU's roster last year, while the three schools you mentioned had a combined one. Kids from California will start to learn where Duluth, St. Cloud, Bemidji and other D-1 hockey towns are soon enough.

BSU had Orlando Alamano (G) from Fresno and Brandon Marino (F) from Riverside - both seniors on the '09 Frozen Four team. Plus they had Andrew Martens ('06 - D) from Friendswood, Texas.

 

[dggoddard]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

"Jonathan Toews is the poster child for College Hockey Inc." - Jeff Dwyer, Director of Education and Recruitment for College Hockey Inc.

Why not Powerpoint a college photo of Toews to drive home the point to the kids that college is REALLY fun?

 

[Rich]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

And yet without knowing where the hell St. Cloud was, two kids from California were on SCSU's roster last year, while the three schools you mentioned had a combined one. Kids from California will start to learn where Duluth, St. Cloud, Bemidji and other D-1 hockey towns are soon enough.

Anybody know of any schools with more than 2 kids from Cali last year?

CC had 3 last year - Vlassopolous, Marciano, Quilico

I would bet that California kids know a lot more about teams like SCSU and UMD than people are giving them credit for. CC and DU have both had quite a few California kids on the roster, and I know that many of them followed the WCHA before they arrived on campus. Many of the more recent kids CC picked up knew or looked up to some of the older California kids who played at CC and they watched their games on satellite or followed the stats online. Starting with PuckSwami's list, CC has had the following California kids in the last ~10 years:

Brett Sterling
Noah Clarke
Brian Salcido
Andreas Vlassoupolous
Justin Morrison
Dakota Eveland
Dan Quilico
Joe Marciano
Alex Kim
Nick Tsiantar
Justin Morrison
Berk Nelson

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

RPI's current Californians (minus recruits, as I do not recall where they are from) include forward Josh Rabbani and 3rd string goaltender Joe Harkenrider. It may be possible an incoming recruit is from California which would make 3; perhaps RB could shed some light on this.

Not only California, but there's likely also a decent influx of players from Florida as well. I believe this coming up year, RPI will have 2 players from Boca Raton. Perhaps one of these schools would be willing to get a team together, especially if there is a college in Tampa; there's already the Lightning Classic tournament there.

 

[Ralph Baer]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

RPI's current Californians (minus recruits, as I do not recall where they are from) include forward Josh Rabbani and 3rd string goaltender Joe Harkenrider. It may be possible an incoming recruit is from California which would make 3; perhaps RB could shed some light on this.

Not only California, but there's likely also a decent influx of players from Florida as well. I believe this coming up year, RPI will have 2 players from Boca Raton. Perhaps one of these schools would be willing to get a team together, especially if there is a college in Tampa; there's already the Lightning Classic tournament there.

None of the recruits are from California. I am probably forgetting someone, but the only previous player from CA that I recall is Keith MCWilliams.

 

[Puck Swami]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

The one stat in the presentation that really jumped out at me was that if you take the 16% of CHL players who get a college degree, and you add in the 5% of of CHL players who eventually see the NHL and add them together, there are still 79-80% of of CHL players who don't get to the NHL and don't get a degree, either. That's a huge number of players.

In the NCAA, 84% get a degreee and 5% get to the NHL, so there is only about 10% who don't get one or the other.

 

[CHFAN222]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

The one stat in the presentation that really jumped out at me was that if you take the 16% of CHL players who get a college degree, and you add in the 5% of of CHL players who eventually see the NHL and add them together, there are still 79-80% of of CHL players who don't get to the NHL and don't get a degree, either. That's a huge number of players.

In the NCAA, 84% get a degreee and 5% get to the NHL, so there is only about 10% who don't get one or the other.

A more interesting stat would be the $. For example how much does the average CHL player make over the course of their career including hockey compared to an NCAA player.

 

[bothman]

Re: How College Hockey Inc. sells our game vs Major Junior...

A more interesting stat would be the $. For example how much does the average CHL player make over the course of their career including hockey compared to an NCAA player.

This would be fascinating - you could then normalize by taking out all of the NHL salaries (for both NCAA and Major Junior) since the great majority never see the show.

The Result = The Average Lifetime Revenue a hockey player can expect to realize by choosing the NCAA vs Major Junior.

It would be very tough to get this data, but I would bet that it would drastically slant the stats to the college route.

You could back into the data by using averages (what is the average salary in each Canada and the USA for those with and without a college degree and then it becomes a simple multiplication exercise).