Save Uah Hockey!

[joecct]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

I agree!! Hopefully guys like Paul Kelly of College Hockey Inc. can help out with finding some southern schools.

Lacrosse will be added before hockey. Lax is a lot cheaper and you have unused facilities that can be used while an ice rink costs beaucoup $$ and what can you use it for in the off season???

 

[CHFAN222]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Lacrosse will be added before hockey. Lax is a lot cheaper and you have unused facilities that can be used while an ice rink costs beaucoup $$ and what can you use it for in the off season???

Simple you can use it for either hockey training camps with locals, summer hockey leagues, Disney ice shows, or even cover the ice and and host large events such as banquets conferences or what else.

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Lacrosse will be added before hockey. Lax is a lot cheaper and you have unused facilities that can be used while an ice rink costs beaucoup $$ and what can you use it for in the off season???

What can you use a basketball arena for in the offseason?

 

[ithacat]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

What can you use a basketball arena for in the offseason?

Football and lax where you come from.

 

[4four4]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Lacrosse will be added before hockey. Lax is a lot cheaper and you have unused facilities that can be used while an ice rink costs beaucoup $$ and what can you use it for in the off season???

So you are saying neither will grow. Lets be honest the only people playing LAX are Long Island and D.C. kids. It is nearly impossible to add any sports in this day and age.

 

[AMC]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

So you are saying neither will grow. Lets be honest the only people playing LAX are Long Island and D.C. kids. It is nearly impossible to add any sports in this day and age.

Spreading like wildfire in New England. I'm seeing baseball and softball programs at Southern Maine high schools with 16 kids, total varsity/jv/freshman. Meanwhile, lax is full of boys and girls programs with 80 kids. It's frustrating as a baseball coach, can't field a jv team, can't cut kids with terrible attitudes/no skills, have to hope and pray enough people show up to field a team. We had 22 sign up to play at our large high school. Whittled down to 16 before day 1 of practice. Two are "on" the team but show up when they feel like it. The kids all want to play lax. Our town used to have 16 little league baseball teams every spring. Down to three.

 

[Patman]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Spreading like wildfire in New England. I'm seeing baseball and softball programs at Southern Maine high schools with 16 kids, total varsity/jv/freshman. Meanwhile, lax is full of boys and girls programs with 80 kids. It's frustrating as a baseball coach, can't field a jv team, can't cut kids with terrible attitudes/no skills, have to hope and pray enough people show up to field a team. We had 22 sign up to play at our large high school. Whittled down to 16 before day 1 of practice. Two are "on" the team but show up when they feel like it. The kids all want to play lax. Our town used to have 16 little league baseball teams every spring. Down to three.

It sorta makes me wonder how soccer would be if it were a spring sport in the northeast... I have to imagine nobody honestly thought lax would be a threat to baseball.

Lacrosse will be added before hockey. Lax is a lot cheaper and you have unused facilities that can be used while an ice rink costs beaucoup $$ and what can you use it for in the off season???

add to that all the big boys are already playing lax... very little D2-D3 minnows... sports culture is what it is... they only want to compete with each other.

 

[4four4]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

It sorta makes me wonder how soccer would be if it were a spring sport in the northeast... I have to imagine nobody honestly thought lax would be a threat to baseball.



add to that all the big boys are already playing lax... very little D2-D3 minnows... sports culture is what it is... they only want to compete with each other.

Around the world football is a Fall through Spring sport.

 

[Patman]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Around the world football is a Fall through Spring sport.

and in the US football is the only sport... i always found it interesting that the good soccer [high] schools were the ones that were bad in football and vice versa.

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Football and lax where you come from.

You have a point. But hey, what better way to watch a college hockey game than to be skating on the studio rink at the same time?

 

[davyd83]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

With the formation of the B10 UAH will get more opponents. The B10 schools want to have a short conference schedule and I would not be surprised to see UAH play one-two B10 schools a year. I also think the CCHA should give UAH a second chance. The loss of four prominent members should be seen as a reason to add UAH and maybe one or two Atlantic Hockey teams.

Who is paying the additional travel expenses in these days of declining revenues and reduced state funding to Universities?

 

[Back check]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Who is paying the additional travel expenses in these days of declining revenues and reduced state funding to Universities?

When UAH applied to CCHA they offered significant $$ to offset travel costs.

 

[aparch]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

When UAH spplied to CCHA they offered significant $$ to offset travel costs.

The "significant $$" offered was much less than what teams spent to make the trip to Omaha.

Most (if not all) CCHA teams would have jumped at the chance to add UAH had it been an "Alaska" sized deal (minus the exemption which the NCAA would never grant).

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Does Air Force provide any sort of compensation to the other Atlantic teams? How does it compare to the other deals already in discussion?

 

[moose97]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

The "significant $$" offered was much less than what teams spent to make the trip to Omaha.

Most (if not all) CCHA teams would have jumped at the chance to add UAH had it been an "Alaska" sized deal (minus the exemption which the NCAA would never grant).

Let's not kid ourselves here - Of course they would have "jumped" at a deal that would have mostly or completely paid for the trip (or even made it profitable to go down there). What they did offer was, IIRC $8-10,000 a team, meaning that a trip to Huntsville would be slightly more expensive than a trip to any other "long" trip in conference, rather than significantly more expensive.

In other words, the CCHA as a whole would rather completely save the cost of one "long trip" than save UAH. Just plucking LSSU's schedule from last year (and ignoring UA_'s impact on travel), they took 4 "long" trips to the Ohio or Indiana schools last year. Compare that to 2 trips in '09-'10 plus a trip to UNO, 3 in '08-'09, 2 plus UNO in '07-'08, 3 in '06-'07, and 2 plus UNO in '05-'06. Huh, looks like a complete fail to me if I'm LSSU. They went from a system where they took ~ 3 "long" trips a year to one where they took 4. They could have maintained the old scheduling format (pair UA_ with UAH), visited Huntsville ~ every other year and gotten a $10,000 subsidy to do so. Instead, they travel further, more often and don't get any travel assistance (outside Alaska). How's that working for ya, CCHA?

 

[Back check]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

The "significant $$" offered was much less than what teams spent to make the trip to Omaha.

Most (if not all) CCHA teams would have jumped at the chance to add UAH had it been an "Alaska" sized deal (minus the exemption which the NCAA would never grant).

aparch - If what Moose says is true, is $10 000 per trip far less than what teams spent to go to Omaha?

 

[aparch]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

aparch - If what Moose says is true, is $10 000 per trip far less than what teams spent to go to Omaha?

Moose's numbers are right. NMU's last trip to UNO was January 2009. I don't know specifics, but the lump cost was in the ballpark of $16,000 and involved an overnight stay halfway though the trip TO Omaha.

While I don't know what the other teams were spending, I WAS told that what NMU was paying was in line with what other universities spent to make the trip. The ~$6,000 difference (UNO trip versus reimbursement from UAH) is roughly one semesters tuition for NMU. And (I presume) close to the same for FSU, BGSU, LSSU, and maybe WMU.



My take on it is that the schools all needed to take a step back and evaluate their travel budgets. The reprieve granted by not making a trip to Omaha was welcomed. There is a lot of turbulent water right now, and throwing UAH into the mix is just going to create more waves. In order for the CCHA to take on UAH, they need to:
1) Evaluate current members and the health of a CCHA without the B1G schools.
2) Confirm and commit to x years of CCHA hockey without the B1G schools.
3) Evaluate if B1G-less CCHA needs to expand footprint
4) Evaluate just how to place footprint. Does Pennsylvania fit better than Alabama?


The CCHA isn't just going to add UAH for the sake of adding UAH. What happens if in 2013-14, the CCHA loses Notre Dame and Miami? Does UAH feel they can compete at a national level playing their conference games against NMU, FSU, LSSU, BGSU, WMU, and UAf? That's a seven team conference. If BGSU and LSSU decide that they don't want to sink money into their programs, you're down to five schools. Hello CHA. Goodbye auto-bids.

 

[moose97]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

Moose's numbers are right. NMU's last trip to UNO was January 2009. I don't know specifics, but the lump cost was in the ballpark of $16,000 and involved an overnight stay halfway though the trip TO Omaha.

While I don't know what the other teams were spending, I WAS told that what NMU was paying was in line with what other universities spent to make the trip. The ~$6,000 difference (UNO trip versus reimbursement from UAH) is roughly one semesters tuition for NMU. And (I presume) close to the same for FSU, BGSU, LSSU, and maybe WMU.

And I think that a fair point remains that while LSSU didn't make a trip to UNO last year, they did make 4 trips to Ohio/Indiana, something they hadn't done in the previous 5 seasons. So they saved $6,000, right? Big whoop. And I also don't buy the, "the CCHA knew that Penn State would be starting varsity hockey, so they waited," argument. You know why? Follow the timeline:

UAH was denied entry to the CCHA - August 2009
Terry Pegula sells Northern Tier to Royal Dutch Schell for $4.7 billion (setting the stage for PSU hockey) - May 2010
PSU meets with Pegula - August 2010
PSU adds hockey - September, 2010

As of August 2009, PSU was still a bad message board joke.

My take on it is that the schools all needed to take a step back and evaluate their travel budgets. The reprieve granted by not making a trip to Omaha was welcomed. There is a lot of turbulent water right now, and throwing UAH into the mix is just going to create more waves. In order for the CCHA to take on UAH, they need to:
1) Evaluate current members and the health of a CCHA without the B1G schools.
2) Confirm and commit to x years of CCHA hockey without the B1G schools.
3) Evaluate if B1G-less CCHA needs to expand footprint
4) Evaluate just how to place footprint. Does Pennsylvania fit better than Alabama?


The CCHA isn't just going to add UAH for the sake of adding UAH. What happens if in 2013-14, the CCHA loses Notre Dame and Miami? Does UAH feel they can compete at a national level playing their conference games against NMU, FSU, LSSU, BGSU, WMU, and UAf? That's a seven team conference. If BGSU and LSSU decide that they don't want to sink money into their programs, you're down to five schools. Hello CHA. Goodbye auto-bids.

Now this is hard to argue with. There are still a ton of questions, IMHO, at UAH (new AD and Pres level of support) in addition to conference stability. My comments in my previous post were more directed at the 2009 decision (which, again, had nothing to do with PSU, although I'll admit that the BTHC was a possibility if you look back at what Wisconsin was considering).


And as a personal note aparch - isn't it time to "let it go" in regard to your "keep it at 11" signature? It might have been funny 2 summers ago, but at this point, UAH is in serious peril, as is the CCHA.

 

[aparch]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

In other words, the CCHA as a whole would rather completely save the cost of one "long trip" than save UAH. Just plucking LSSU's schedule from last year (and ignoring UA_'s impact on travel), they took 4 "long" trips to the Ohio or Indiana schools last year. Compare that to 2 trips in '09-'10 plus a trip to UNO,...

I'm just going to throw completely baseless numbers against a wall here. To make my math easy, I figure 30 people on each trip. Figure in a group rate of $80 for hotel rooms (15 rooms), and $4.00 per gallon for diesel to bus (round trip mileage). Throw on a per-Diem of $20 per person (for a team meal each day). There are a bunch of other costs that still would need to be factored in.

LSSU 2010-11 road schedule / costs
South Bend - Weds through Friday. 800 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $3200 fuel = $7400
Oxford - Thursday through Saturday. 1100 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $4400 fuel = $8600
Ann Arbor - Thursday through Saturday. 700 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $2800 fuel = $7000
Denver - I'm going to take the easy way out of this one and claim that the payout for being part of the tourney is a wash and covers the cost of travel. = $0
Kalamazoo - Thursday through Saturday. 700 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $2800 fuel = $7000
Bowling Green - Thurs through Saturday. 800 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $3200 fuel = $7400
Marquette - Friday and Saturday. 340 miles. $1200 hotel, $1200 meals, $1360 fuel = $3760
Columbus - Thurs through Saturday. 1040 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $4160 fuel = $8360

Rough guestimate MINIMUM travel budget for 10-11: $49,520.


LSSU 2010-11 road schedule / costs
Superior Cup - Thursday through Sunday. 900 miles. $3600 hotel, $2400 meals, $3600 fuel = $9600
Kalamazoo - Thursday through Saturday. 700 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $2800 fuel = $7000
Omaha - Wednesday through Saturday. 1700 miles. $3600 hotel, $2400 meals, $6800 fuel = $12800
RPI Tourney - I'm coping out again and saying that the RPI tourney is a wash financially. = $0
Bowling Green - Thurs through Saturday. 800 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $3200 fuel = $7400
Pittsburgh - Friday through Sunday. 1240 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $4960 fuel = $9160
East Lansing - Thursday through Saturday. 600 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $2400 fuel = $6600
Oxford - Thursday through Saturday. 1100 miles. $2400 hotel, $1800 meals, $4400 fuel = $8600
Fairbanks - UAf pays for the flight. I believe the hotel is still up to the teams. But for arguments sake... = $0
Marquette - Friday and Saturday. 340 miles. $1200 hotel, $1200 meals, $1360 fuel = $3760

Rough guestimate MINIMUM travel budget for the 09-10: $64,920.



And that's hoping that you can get a block of rooms for $80 a night everywhere. And that fuel remained at $4.00.

 

[aparch]

Re: Save Uah Hockey!

...So they saved $6,000, right? Big whoop.

In an era of State budget cutbacks, any fiscal responsibility needs to take place to show that care is being taken in watching the budget. If the hockey team is willing to pi** away only six grand, what are the REST of the departments throwing away financially?

And I also don't buy the, "the CCHA knew that Penn State would be starting varsity hockey, so they waited," argument. You know why? Follow the timeline:

At this point, I feel resentment towards Anastos.

And as a personal note aparch - isn't it time to "let it go" in regard to your "keep it at 11" signature? It might have been funny 2 summers ago, but at this point, UAH is in serious peril, as is the CCHA.

Probably. But updating the sig is one of my lesser concerns.