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The end of leagues as we know?

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Re: The end of leagues as we know?

dggoddard said:
The Miami / North Dakota rivalry will be huge from the get-go. Two programs that are regular Final Four contenders. I'd expect those games to have massive Pairwise ramifications every time they meet.

Miami's student section is second to none. They line up hours before the game and fill at least 25% of their arena.

North Dakota fans that make that road trip are going to love Oxford.
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Second to none? You must've been or have a student at Miami. They have one song that they all get up for and do something cool but that's about it. I was there for a series against SCSU two years ago to start the season when I believe Miami was ranked #1 in the nation and St. Cloud was in the top 10 and the arena was 3/4 full. You think it's going to be different when CC, UNO, or UMD come to town? Don't me wrong, Miami has built a very strong program and have recently had a lot of success. Let's not get carried away with the "regular" contenders though. Oxford does have a nice college atmosphere and the campus is impressive but I'm not sure how many UND fans live around there or will be willing to fly or drive there on a regular basis.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

motox said:
Second to none? You must've been or have a student at Miami. They have one song that they all get up for and do something cool but that's about it. I was there for a series against SCSU two years ago to start the season when I believe Miami was ranked #1 in the nation and St. Cloud was in the top 10 and the arena was 3/4 full. You think it's going to be different when CC, UNO, or UMD come to town? Don't me wrong, Miami has built a very strong program and have recently had a lot of success. Let's not get carried away with the "regular" contenders though. Oxford does have a nice college atmosphere and the campus is impressive but I'm not sure how many UND fans live around there or will be willing to fly or drive there on a regular basis.
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Remember, every crowd looks like the Oakland Raider's Black Hole compared to Magness.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

motox said:
Second to none? You must've been or have a student at Miami. They have one song that they all get up for and do something cool but that's about it. I was there for a series against SCSU two years ago to start the season when I believe Miami was ranked #1 in the nation and St. Cloud was in the top 10 and the arena was 3/4 full. You think it's going to be different when CC, UNO, or UMD come to town? Don't me wrong, Miami has built a very strong program and have recently had a lot of success. Let's not get carried away with the "regular" contenders though. Oxford does have a nice college atmosphere and the campus is impressive but I'm not sure how many UND fans live around there or will be willing to fly or drive there on a regular basis.
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Recent success? Miami doesn't have the tradition the other schools have in this new league. Makes me wonder if leaving the CCHA for the BHHC would be a good fit.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

BC/HE said:
Maybe Notre Dame would like to join a Catholic Division of Hockey East with BC, PC, Merrimack and add Holy Cross as the 12th team.
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Highly unlikely, given the importance the nonrevenue sports carry within the ND athletic department. If there's some kind of split in the Big East, I expect that ND would push pretty hard to land on the football side.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

SJHovey said:
I think I can state with pretty good certainty most North Dakota fans don't even know that Miami of Ohio is in Oxford.

This whole thing is just a very, very bad idea and it makes me unhappy to think about it.

Also, I don't get your zeal for this proposal. All we ever hear from you and PS is about the glory days of DU hockey in the 60's, a decade by the way in which Wisconsin wasn't in the conference and Minnesota refused to play you. Isn't this a chance for DU to return to those days?

I have been watching college hockey a long time. I can categorically state that the game of college hockey as a whole is substantially better since programs like DU, UND and the Big 10 schools actually helped programs like SCSU, Mankato, BSU, UAA, etc..., get developed, move from Independents into stable leagues, or move up from DII or DIII. How throwing those programs under the bus helps college hockey, including our own two programs, completely escapes me.
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I am glad to see there is a fan of one of these schools who gets it. The idea that the "We Want to be the Big Ten" conference is going to be a net gain in any way and is good for the schools involved just boggles my mind.

When the Big Ten was announced DU fans went ballistic saying "without those games we will go broke". dg basically made it sound like by the end of the first season of the new alignment the 12 Denver fans that show up at Magness will give up and go home. (he was saying what MavsFan is saying now, only Mankato /= Denver) Now he is running around trumpeting a conference that has the same issue (if Denver fans were not going to care about UND and UMD games before they wont now! Not to mention most casual fans have no idea who Miami is and we all know Denver fans are the height of casual) and loses the one great thing they still had going for them...THE WCHA ITSELF! They lose any shot they had at keeping a Big Time tourny at the X meaning campus sites most likely, they lose the McNaughton and they gain next to nothing.

The status quo for the WCHA is better than this.

As for this idea that a tourny at the Ralph could sell tickets for bucketloads of cash...yeah only if the league is ok with UND fans buying them all. Denver fans and CC fans arent filling up that arena and I highly doubt UNO, Western and Miami will be either. So now UND gets the ultimate advantage, tourny on their home ice with all of their fans. That is twice as unfair as it was having the Final Five in St. Paul because the X is not the Gophers home ice. (it isnt even the right size let alone city) Yeah that sounds like a good deal.

And I see games on tv being an issue rather quickly. The WCHA can find a way to get on tv in the Minneapolis area if they have the right guy work the deal. (45 showed MSUM and SCSU games a couple years ago...a deal can be made) This new league will have no clout and very little exposure in a sport that already is regionalized and niche. I can already see the Fox regional networks changing up the deals.

I repeat, this is a bad idea the WCHA should stay put. Hell they would be better of merging and going to two divisions than doing this.
 
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Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Handyman said:
I am glad to see there is a fan of one of these schools who gets it. The idea that the "We Want to be the Big Ten" conference is going to be a net gain in any way and is good for the schools involved just boggles my mind.

When the Big Ten was announced DU fans went ballistic saying "without those games we will go broke". dg basically made it sound like by the end of the first season of the new alignment the 12 Denver fans that show up at Magness will give up and go home. (he was saying what MavsFan is saying now, only Mankato /= Denver) Now he is running around trumpeting a conference that has the same issue (if Denver fans were not going to care about UND and UMD games before they wont now! Not to mention most casual fans have no idea who Miami is and we all know Denver fans are the height of casual) and loses the one great thing they still had going for them...THE WCHA ITSELF! They lose any shot they had at keeping a Big Time tourny at the X meaning campus sites most likely, they lose the McNaughton and they gain next to nothing.

The status quo for the WCHA is better than this.

As for this idea that a tourny at the Ralph could sell tickets for bucketloads of cash...yeah only if the league is ok with UND fans buying them all. Denver fans and CC fans arent filling up that arena and I highly doubt UNO, Western and Miami will be either. So now UND gets the ultimate advantage, tourny on their home ice with all of their fans. That is twice as unfair as it was having the Final Five in St. Paul because the X is not the Gophers home ice. (it isnt even the right size let alone city) Yeah that sounds like a good deal.

And I see games on tv being an issue rather quickly. The WCHA can find a way to get on tv in the Minneapolis area if they have the right guy work the deal. (45 showed MSUM and SCSU games a couple years ago...a deal can be made) This new league will have no clout and very little exposure in a sport that already is regionalized and niche. I can already see the Fox regional networks changing up the deals.

I repeat, this is a bad idea the WCHA should stay put. Hell they would be better of merging and going to two divisions than doing this.
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Luckily there appears to be at least eight Athletic Directors who don't agree with your colorful, if misguided, assessment of the situation.

Carry on. :)
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Handyman said:
There will be more people on the ice than there will be in the stands...and that is if you include the concessions people.
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But that isn't fair, they're all skiing in the MOUNTAINS!!11! OMG!!! and are way to busy to watch their favorite hockey team. :rolleyes:
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Here is another thing that bothers me about this. I think part of what may be driving this, from UND's perspective, goes back to the old North Central Conference. Ten years ago, or so, UND's biggest rival, NDSU, started talking about a move to Division I. UND top brass, and most fans, pooh poohed the idea, told them they were crazy, that it would result in the end of any relevance for their athletic programs, blah, blah, blah. No way was UND going to make that mistake.

Fast forward five years. NDSU makes the jump and UND sticks with their former conference mates. NDSU has modest success, the athletic programs expand, and of course the ultimate nirvana for a small school in the middle of nowhere, their basketball team makes the NCAAs. Now everyone associated with UND thinks we made this huge mistake in not making the move immediately, so we have to do a "me too." That causes others within the conference to follow suit, conference implodes, story over.

Is UND better off for making the move? Hard to make that case at this point. Would they have been better off moving when NDSU did? I don't really see how. At the end of the day I don't really see NDSU or UND being much of a player on the Division I sports stage (outside of hockey) other than the "once in a lifetime" March Madness appearances.

I'm not in Grand Forks anymore, so I don't really get any of the inside gossip. But I have more than a sneaking suspicion that part of this apparent urgency coming out of the athletic department is designed to avoid a repeat of the second guessing that occurred a few years ago surrounding the move, or failure to move, to D-I.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Why hasn't Puck Swami chimed in on all this? He was the first one to say his program was going to be a mid major with the BTC . he msut be jumping with joy over all this and just happy as hell his team will be fine and all the little guys are going to slowly die....
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

scsutommyboy said:
Why hasn't Puck Swami chimed in on all this? He was the first one to say his program was going to be a mid major with the BTC . he msut be jumping with joy over all this and just happy as hell his team will be fine and all the little guys are going to slowly die....
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Which is why we need Colorado and CSU to start teams. I would be very happy to see Denver turned into a mid-major.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

scsutommyboy said:
Well if the rumor that this is all about getting Bruce mcLeod kicked out is true, then UND/DU is using those facts to get what they want. Of course that is if the rumor is true......
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Getting rid of Bruce McLeod would be a positive thing.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

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Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Goon said:
Getting rid of Bruce McLeod would be a positive thing.
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If UND/DU wants him gone then tell the other schools he is gone or we are gone. It's really not going to be hard to get the other schools to agree...
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

scsutommyboy said:
If UND/DU wants him gone then tell the other schools he is gone or we are gone. It's really not going to be hard to get the other schools to agree...
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That is not the Sioux way. They are sneaky with their guerilla warfare tactics.
 
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