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The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

aparch said:
I apologize. I looked up the Wildcats when it was the Sun Devils that I should have searched for. :o

But, the midpoint is still the same.
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No problem! It was just a reflex reaction on my part. Imagine your first thought if someone called you a Laker!

I must admit, I am excited at the thought of the Sun Devils joining the WCHA, but I just don't see it happening. I understand why they'd want to, especially given the feeling that "We've conquered club hockey! Bring on the big boys!" but without a Pac 12 partner joining them, the logistics are pretty strong against it happening.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

Those are some nicely thought out and put together items that do make sense for the current alignment. But it's very likely that another shift is coming within a couple of years. It likely won't be as seismic as the last batch and will likely be one that makes a bit more sense geographically. Schools like Western and Miami had to learn from experience that flying to Denver and CC and lengthy trips to Duluth & St. Cloud didn't but any more butts in their home rink's seats than quick trips to Ferris or Bowling Green did.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

I don't get why people think Grand Rapids' location was the problem for attendance. They drew a (reported) 3968 for their championship game, the week after their four playoff series drew a combined 7000--and only 5000 in the contiguous US. As far as ratios go, that's about as good as you're going to get for percentage of fanbase traveling to a conference tournament, no matter where you put it. You can't put together a full Thanksgiving dinner if you all have to work with is a wing and a thigh.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

MaizeRage said:
I don't get why people think Grand Rapids' location was the problem for attendance. They drew a (reported) 3968 for their championship game, the week after their four playoff series drew a combined 7000--and only 5000 in the contiguous US. As far as ratios go, that's about as good as you're going to get for percentage of fanbase traveling to a conference tournament, no matter where you put it. You can't put together a full Thanksgiving dinner if you all have to work with is a wing and a thigh.
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i don't think Grand Rapids is the problem, I do think rotating will hurt though. What reason do you or I have to go to Grand Rapids when we can go to St. Paul next year?
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

More things in the Twin Cities as opposed to GR, but again costs...Wonder what it costs to rent the 20,000 or seat barn vs the 10,000 one for two days???
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

Shirtless Guy said:
i don't think Grand Rapids is the problem, I do think rotating will hurt though. What reason do you or I have to go to Grand Rapids when we can go to St. Paul next year?
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Even if that is the case, the attendance numbers at anybody's home rink suggest that isn't an issue for a significant number of people.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

Squarebanks said:
This is very true. I've always thought the nWCHA F5 should be in MSP or Chicago for that reason.
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For being a huge hockey hotbed, the MSP is desperately lacking a 6000-8000 seat arena (at least that I can think of). That would be a perfect size for the WCHA tournament, and there is a gap in high school hockey sectional locations now that the Hippodrome is officially shutdown for hockey. I believe that all of the high school rinks are too small, and Mariucci and the Xcel are too big.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

bigblue_dl said:
For being a huge hockey hotbed, the MSP is desperately lacking a 6000-8000 seat arena (at least that I can think of). That would be a perfect size for the WCHA tournament, and there is a gap in high school hockey sectional locations now that the Hippodrome is officially shutdown for hockey. I believe that all of the high school rinks are too small, and Mariucci and the Xcel are too big.
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If only Ridder were a little bigger. The location, quality of the facility, and atmosphere are great. You could go WCHA men's and women's in the same weekend.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

My favorite for the tourney was the Resch Center in Green Bay. It's the right sized arena, and has a central location, plenty of hotels, restaurants, bars and shopping nearby. But the arena has extended their contract to host the WIAA Girls Basketball Tourney the same weekend through 2020, so that's no longer an option.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

davyd83 said:
My favorite for the tourney was the Resch Center in Green Bay. It's the right sized arena, and has a central location, plenty of hotels, restaurants, bars and shopping nearby. But the arena has extended their contract to host the WIAA Girls Basketball Tourney the same weekend through 2020, so that's no longer an option.
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I think many would agree that the Resch Center would be about as good as the WCHA could do. Its unfortunate that basketball exists.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

I was about to say no way the nWCHA would hold its tourney on a Bi6 campus, but I totally neglected to consider the women's aspect of the WCHA and their connections as well. IMO, Ritter is waaay too small at only 3400 seats. If you're going to put it on their campus then you might as well use Mariucci (10,000). That's about the smallest "big rink" you're going to find in the MSP area.

It won't be possible to host the men's and women's tourney the same weekend because the women's season wraps two weeks earlier than the men. (The women's Frozen Four is the same weekend as the WCHA men's tourney.)

Maybe we could invite the Gophers men's team to play an "across the ice" 3v3 exhibition game between periods of the championship game to help boost ticket sales?

Ryan J
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

Do we really think that we need 8,000 seats? Last year's tournament attendance: MSU-BGSU 2,700; FSU-UAA 4,494; FSU-MSU 3,968. It really helped that the closest school to the venue played twice, but we're not going to get that every year, not with the UP schools and the UA schools being 60% of the conference and not within an easy car ride of the venue. Don't get me wrong, needing the Mariucci every year for the tournament would be a great thing, but for those us of from farther-away places, we're not very likely to go just because our team got there. (I mean, I would, but I'm crazy.)

GFM
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

There were more people in the big ten tailgate parking lot watching that game than there were in the arena.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

gfmorris said:
Do we really think that we need 8,000 seats? Last year's tournament attendance: MSU-BGSU 2,700; FSU-UAA 4,494; FSU-MSU 3,968. It really helped that the closest school to the venue played twice, but we're not going to get that every year, not with the UP schools and the UA schools being 60% of the conference and not within an easy car ride of the venue. Don't get me wrong, needing the Mariucci every year for the tournament would be a great thing, but for those us of from farther-away places, we're not very likely to go just because our team got there. (I mean, I would, but I'm crazy.)

GFM
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Agreed!
6,000 seats would appear to be ample.
 
Re: The New WCHA, 2014 Offseason: See-ya, Bruce

So the solution is to get Duluth back into the WCHA, trade BG for them and then hold the tournament there.
 
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