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Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

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Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

WiscDC said:
And if you think that's a bunch of crap, then cheer loudly and often anyway, because it's more fun. :)
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Well, I will be there tomorrow night with my daughters for our first game at the KC in nearly 5 years. Can't wait to be back there again.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

Timothy A said:
Besides going to the games, what other action might a person take?
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That was directed mostly towards the "UW should do this, how can they be so stupid as to not do this?!?" crowd.

Be it bringing back the Blue Line Club, or serving alcohol at games, or allowing signs in the crowd, or providing lower cost tickets, or providing lower cost concessions, or providing lower cost parking, or getting more games on TV, or getting more high end recruits, or getting more solid 4-year recruits, or having the band play more, or having the mighty mites play more, or having the big flag over the student section more, or having someone sign the national anthem more, or having more alum come back for ceremonial puck drops, or having the PA guy announce what is being reviewed, or offering better multi-game ticket packages, or collecting fewer fees when purchasing tickets online, or taking down the conference/tournament/ff banners, or getting rid of the programs, or not having the stars on the backs of the jerseys anymore...people on this board like to complain.

How many of those people have taken the time to thoughtfully and constructively reach out to someone at UW to address a situation? I've seen some people share the exchanges that they have had with Jason King. They send a grumpy ranting e-mail, and he replies as nicely as he can. If you take the time to be constructive and explain your stance and offer possible solutions, those conversations play out much differently.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

KaMiGo said:
That was directed mostly towards the "UW should do this, how can they be so stupid as to not do this?!?" crowd.

Be it bringing back the Blue Line Club, or serving alcohol at games, or allowing signs in the crowd, or providing lower cost tickets, or providing lower cost concessions, or providing lower cost parking, or getting more games on TV, or getting more high end recruits, or getting more solid 4-year recruits, or having the band play more, or having the mighty mites play more, or having the big flag over the student section more, or having someone sign the national anthem more, or having more alum come back for ceremonial puck drops, or having the PA guy announce what is being reviewed, or offering better multi-game ticket packages, or collecting fewer fees when purchasing tickets online, or taking down the conference/tournament/ff banners, or getting rid of the programs, or not having the stars on the backs of the jerseys anymore...people on this board like to complain.

How many of those people have taken the time to thoughtfully and constructively reach out to someone at UW to address a situation? I've seen some people share the exchanges that they have had with Jason King. They send a grumpy ranting e-mail, and he replies as nicely as he can. If you take the time to be constructive and explain your stance and offer possible solutions, those conversations play out much differently.
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You forgot to specifically mention the fact that a pretzel and cheese costs $7... $7! (That's quite literally the only Badger Hockey complaint I have that I cannot get past, nor get my head around... I just had to have a kid who loves a pretzel and cheese at a hockey game...) ;)
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

KaMiGo said:
I'll start up a post that I'll try to update weekly to keep track of important stats

Record: 1-1-0
USCHO Poll: 17
USA Today Poll: RV (18)
PWR: 18
RPI: 18
KRACH: not available
Scoring: 7.00 GPG; 1st
Defense: 5.00 GAPG; 47th
Power Play Goals: 5; 2nd
Power Play Rate: 50%; 1st
Penalty Kill Goals: 0; 1st
Penalty Kill Rate: 100%, 1st
Penalty Min per Game: 16.5; 5th (1st is worst)
Shorthanded Goals Scored; 2; 1st
Shorthanded Goals Allowed: 0, 1st
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taking over for me. That's excellent.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

KaMiGo said:
How many of those people have taken the time to thoughtfully and constructively reach out to someone at UW to address a situation? I've seen some people share the exchanges that they have had with Jason King. They send a grumpy ranting e-mail, and he replies as nicely as he can. If you take the time to be constructive and explain your stance and offer possible solutions, those conversations play out much differently.
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I am one of those that has reached out and Jason has been very decent to deal with. But it took years for anything to happen positive that I mentioned and the two biggest in lowering concession prices / offering deals and lower cost tickets just seems to be off their radar. So I just buy a ridiculously priced soda or water and refill in the bubbler.
 
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Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

KaMiGo said:
I get it, I just tire of the "it isn't what is used to be" crowd on this board that just moans and complains without taking any action.

Hey look everyone! We are going to have the largest home opener attendance in 5 years! :)
So? It won't be a sellout like it was that one time 13 years ago...when we had signs and banners and noise makers and... :(
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I think that is fair, but it is also fair that some of us got / are sick of the constant optimism all the time. Especially during the puppies crapping on the carpet days.....
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

KaMiGo said:
Not good?

Did you read the article?

This will be the largest home opener crowds in at least 5 years...

From the article:
Over the last four seasons, the first game in the Face-Off package (the first game of a series) averaged an announced attendance of 7,441, with a 9,012 average for the initial game in the Slap-Shot package (the second game).

In 2014, the Badgers drew announced crowds of 10,605 and 13,621 for the home-opening series against another former Western Collegiate Hockey Association rival, North Dakota.
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8700 right now for Friday is good? What the ****? If that's OK with you, it speaks volumes.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

ExileOnDaytonStreet said:
To be fair: it’s better than less than 8000, which has been the norm.
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I'm pretty sure I'll mentally categorize Friday's crowd as "kinda fine...not terrible considering recent history," which was a common category last year.

Looks like they're pushing a ton of tickets into the hands of students, so I know I'll probably be a) happy with the numbers and b) wishing that it didn't get stretched so thin (so about a quarter of the crowd would be surrounded by a well-seasoned, boisterous crowd each year) during the lean years. Hopefully the returning fans (and the band) keep the magic going and don't feel afraid to show some Badgers hockey level energy!

I'm pretty psyched. I'm always pretty psyched for the home games to get going, and this should be a pretty big test for the Badgers. Now if I can just get a hold of one of those t-shirts they're giving the students......
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

WiscDC said:
They've been in desperate need of more hype for a long, long time. Remember when they set record low attendances when they had the best team since 2009-10? They need to do this (at a minimum) in order to keep the program from turning into one where its ceiling is below the old baseline, and the new baseline is a fan base about a third of its old size.

The problem is that their play CAN'T do hyping itself. That's just not the nature of college hockey in this country, certainly outside of places like Duluth, St Cloud, Potsdam/Canton, Grand Forks, etc.

To reference 2013-14 again, the Badgers absolutely stormed into the national tournament as one of the top teams in the country. Unless thousands of people somehow knew they'd get upset by UND and decided not to care because of their visions, very, very few people cared. Even when there were some big crowds down the stretch of that season, attention was contained within a pretty well-defined bubble. Outside of people actively seeking it out - and their friends they talked to (or talked at) about Badgers hockey, it didn't register at all. Year after year, new classes of students would come in and not give hockey a shot, and not because they looked at the team and thought about their chances based on what they read on CHN or USCHO. It just didn't register in the first place, because there was zero exposure beyond the people who went way out of their way to seek it out.

If they want to build a fan base, they need people to engage with Badgers hockey. It used to be so hard to find any content at all, and I'm saying that as someone who will go out of my way for it.

Football and basketball can let their play do the hyping. Pick your favorite sports media outlet in this country, and they've got it covered. Reminders that it's fun to be a fan and worthwhile to follow the team aren't as necessary there. They are in hockey. After all, if a team is good, that only builds hype if people actually care about how good the team is. If they don't care, then however much they win or lose doesn't change that, because they won't notice anyway.

They have to make the program noticeable. Without plenty of exposure (and reminders that hockey season does indeed start before January), the only way to get those people outside the bubble to notice (beyond very small numbers) would be a Frozen Four run.

If you ask me, we could use more UW hockey content out there. Sometimes it feels like they're trying to keep this program a secret. It also helps to strengthen the sense that the program actually matters, which I see as a good thing. The football team does just fine with insane overexposure, and I'd argue that the little bit of promotion we're seeing for the home schedule starting is more in the "less underexposure and a little closer to baseline for what we all want UW Hockey to be," rather than anything resembling excessive hype.

Positioning UW Hockey as a worthwhile and notable "thing" (rather than a cutesy fringe "olympic sport") for sports fans is especially important for students and other new general Badgers fans

If it ever gets to "major distraction" levels, then mission accomplished. That would mean the fan base grew by a very large factor for that to be possible. But that would involve a lot of media attention, local radio hits, and a ton of stuff beyond a couple of videos and a few blurbs on some niche sports sites.
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VERY TRUE agree in every way. They do take a back seat with the fans
Just go to any Friday night game the past 5 years.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

WiscTJK said:
https://www.collegehockeynews.com/stats/ click on faceoff %

Nothing on individual faceoff % there or on the UW Badgers website..... https://uwbadgers.com/cumestats.aspx?path=mhockey&year=2019&
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Don't ask why I decided to take this on tonight... but here you go.

UW Hockey - Team and Individual Faceoff percentages

I went through the game-by-game stats for the Badgers and pulled those numbers to create this spreadsheet which calculates the player and team faceoff percentages.

Also, the UW (and CHN) stats are off by one on each game. I have no idea why they are, but if you add up the faceoffs they're off by 1 for the number won and lost. I went over my sheet over and over to see if I was getting the numbers right, but their math is wrong (which is great when you're a university....)
 
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Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

WiscTJK said:
I am one of those that has reached out and Jason has been very decent to deal with. But it took years for anything to happen positive that I mentioned and the two biggest in lowering concession prices / offering deals and lower cost tickets just seems to be off their radar. So I just buy a ridiculously priced soda or water and refill in the bubbler.
Click to expand...

Jason has been great to deal with. The UW ticket office and the UW band/music department have not been good to deal with.

I am totally on board with the concession costs. They seem to be offering more ticket/food voucher deals, which is nice. But yeah, how about a bottle of plain h2o for 2 bucks?

We are camping this weekend and have no cable. :(. We'll try and figure out how to get the games onto a laptop, but I am also dvr'ing them and I do enjoy the using the old radio to listen.

I just hope for everyone's sanity this weekend the play hard, play SMART sound positional hockey and let the chips fall where they may after that.
 
Re: Wisconsin Hockey 2019-2020: Time to Get Offensive

gwhinwi said:
Don't ask why I decided to take this on tonight... but here you go.

UW Hockey - Team and Individual Faceoff percentages

I went through the game-by-game stats for the Badgers and pulled those numbers to create this spreadsheet which calculates the player and team faceoff percentages.

Also, the UW (and CHN) stats are off by one on each game. I have no idea why they are, but if you add up the faceoffs they're off by 1 for the number won and lost. I went over my sheet over and over to see if I was getting the numbers right, but their math is wrong (which is great when you're a university....)
Click to expand...

I requested access to the file. Thanks for doing it gwhinwi!
 
Timothy A said:
All the hype in the world will never fill the Cole Center. Hockey's golden age in Madison is over. We must accept our fate.
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The team just has to win and the Kohl will be pretty full. The team has been overall crap for the last 5 years. Getting over 10,000-11,000 for a college hockey game, for a team that has been very disappointing for the past five years... is pretty good. If they can consistently win after this, then more fans will come.

This whole thing about the fans being gone forever and they're never coming back will be proved wrong if the badgers win. Fans just don't want to park and pay to watch a crappy team. If the Badgers win the fans will come.
 
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gwhinwi said:
Don't ask why I decided to take this on tonight... but here you go.

UW Hockey - Team and Individual Faceoff percentages

I went through the game-by-game stats for the Badgers and pulled those numbers to create this spreadsheet which calculates the player and team faceoff percentages.

Also, the UW (and CHN) stats are off by one on each game. I have no idea why they are, but if you add up the faceoffs they're off by 1 for the number won and lost. I went over my sheet over and over to see if I was getting the numbers right, but their math is wrong (which is great when you're a university....)
Click to expand...

Wow, awesome! I also requested access. My real name may not be DPlaya....
 
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