Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Was chatting with an old college friend, and we are starting to get pretty excited for next year. One topic that came up: does Jefferson Dahl have it in him to have a Tom-Gorowsky-as-a-senior-esque kind of season? That, and perhaps establishing a Grotting-Dolan-Mitchell/Bendickson or Licari-Brandt-Degenhardt sort of checking line are going to be the kinds of details we need to see falling through to know if next year really can be something special.

 

[DoorCtyBadgers]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

I don't. That being said, I think that they would prefer to have their product do well. They're not going to pull a bunch of stuff just to make people mad

I don't think that at all. I'm not blinded by what I would prefer in an ideal world. I follow UW's basketball team. I'm trying to think of a time in the past 2 years that they've had a regular season game, whether home or away, on a Friday or Saturday nigh. I can't think of one. Basketball TV scheduling, for Big Ten teams anyway, is based around a national schedule. 2 hour blocks so you have games starting at 7 PM ET on weekdays, and starting at noon on weekends. All our weekend games are in the day. Otherwise, they're night games in the middle of the week. I'm not saying the Big Ten will treat hockey like it does basketball, but I see no reason why they won't try and make hockey work in addition to basketball. What I was saying wasn't about priorities, it was about them prefering everything to work, instead of just one thing.

you see it isn't about uw basketball is about bt basketball network...if the bt basketball network schedule has what they precieve to be a big game, then the b6 hocky game gets pushed upback or moved to a different day.B6 hockey programs have to leave thurs-mon nites open so the big ten basktball network can kick them around anytime anyplace they want to.....but season 2 appears most b6 games will be moved to sun-mon to acomodate the b10 basketball networks schedule coming.....and it is coming real fast...with this type of control by the big ten basketball network the goal would be to broadcast as few hockey games as possible. only broadcasting 40 so far for next season is a start on how to bury a sport.

 

[WiscDC]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

you see it isn't about uw basketball is about bt basketball network...if the bt basketball network schedule has what they precieve to be a big game, then the b6 hocky game gets pushed upback or moved to a different day.B6 hockey programs have to leave thurs-mon nites open so the big ten basktball network can kick them around anytime anyplace they want to.....but season 2 appears most b6 games will be moved to sun-mon to acomodate the b10 basketball networks schedule coming.....and it is coming real fast...with this type of control by the big ten basketball network the goal would be to broadcast as few hockey games as possible. only broadcasting 40 so far for next season is a start on how to bury a sport.

So will they show less hockey than they already do?

 

[badger79]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Honestly I don't think it's a big deal to move games around for TV purposes. So BTN will move some games to Saturday afternoons or Sundays -- so what. Every single sport bends itself to the will of TV. Just look at basketball -- how often does the UW team play Wednesday-Saturday games anymore? Not that often, because of television. It doesn't have to be hockey vs. basketball. It will be, how can we televise as many live hockey AND basketball games as possible?

ESPN has events like Big Monday for college hoops, Sunday Night Baseball, Thursday night college football. The NFL Network features Thursday night football. This is a changing sports landscape, we gotta keep up with the times.

 

[DoorCtyBadgers]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

So will they show less hockey than they already do?

next year they have scheduled 40 B6 hockey games to be televised....that is 40 total.....and those games could be pushed back because of basketball....Baggott had an article in the madison papers on this subject in fact it was posted on this blog somewhere...all B6 hockey schools must keep Thurs-Mon nites open for hockey....The B6 hockey league willm eventually being playing a majority of its games on Sun and Mon....then in turn you are gauranteed crowds of 6thousand ppl....the B6 hockey league will be controlled by the big ten basketball network....and big ten basketball trumps anuthing else going on.....just wait til your in the middle of a B6 hockey game then some big ten assistant basketball coach decides to resign......your game will be interupted to bring you that uninspiring news conference

some ppl have yet to accept the reality of what is about to happen...but it is only a few months away before reality kicks in

 

[solovsfett]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

next year they have scheduled 40 B6 hockey games to be televised....that is 40 total.....and those games could be pushed back because of basketball....Baggott had an article in the madison papers on this subject in fact it was posted on this blog somewhere...all B6 hockey schools must keep Thurs-Mon nites open for hockey....The B6 hockey league willm eventually being playing a majority of its games on Sun and Mon....then in turn you are gauranteed crowds of 6thousand ppl....the B6 hockey league will be controlled by the big ten basketball network....and big ten basketball trumps anuthing else going on.....just wait til your in the middle of a B6 hockey game then some big ten assistant basketball coach decides to resign......your game will be interupted to bring you that uninspiring news conference

some ppl have yet to accept the reality of what is about to happen...but it is only a few months away before reality kicks in

no idea if this is true or not but here's the question then if the above is true

is it good exposure to show games on tv with 1/2 full (at best) arena's on a sunday, monday or thursday evening, or...is it better to show less games, keep the schedules to friday/saturday and then when the games are actually shown the arena's are full

I wouldn't mind sunday games if they were to start say at 3pm

 

[Timothy A]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

By any measure attendance and fan enthusiasm for Badger hockey are at a low point and the truth of the matter is that isn't going to change simply because the team has made the NCAA tournament two years in a row. That level of success may stem the tide but it is going to take at least 3 or 4 years of steady success to build the positive momentum and get disenchanted fans back.

I don't think the majority of the disenchanted would come back. Once thier time and money starts going to other places towards things they really enjoy (equal to or more than hockey), they will be unlikely to drop what they switched to and go back to hockey (I've seen this in other sports). I think the norm will be 8-9000 for non-marque and 11+ for marque matchups, provided the games are Fri-Sat. games.

I like the concept of the B6 hockey league, the wcha got way too watered down at the end, which may have hurt attendance. The b6 may give a slight bump in attedance for more recognizable foes. My big concern is that less UW hockey games will be on tv.

 

[Lalu38]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Honestly I don't think it's a big deal to move games around for TV purposes. So BTN will move some games to Saturday afternoons or Sundays -- so what.

The "so-what" for this Saturday night season ticket holder from Neenah is not attending games on weekdays and the hockey program losing another season ticket holder. Four hours driving on a weeknight is out of the question.

 

[oldtyme25]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

"The WCHA got way too watered down"??

So what does that say about your Non-Conference schedule?

Northern Michigan
Alabama-Huntsville
Penn State

And they only went 3-3 against these teams!

Their non-conference schedule looked like a Barry Alverez non-conference football schedule!

 

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

"The WCHA got way too watered down"??

So what does that say about your Non-Conference schedule?

Northern Michigan
Alabama-Huntsville
Penn State

And they only went 3-3 against these teams!

Their non-conference schedule looked like a Barry Alverez non-conference football schedule!

You conveniently left Miami out of that equation, who we split against.

I almost added that you left out Bemidji State, becasue I still forget that they're in the WCHA.

 

[Timothy A]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

"The WCHA got way too watered down"??

So what does that say about your Non-Conference schedule?

Northern Michigan
Alabama-Huntsville
Penn State

And they only went 3-3 against these teams!

Their non-conference schedule looked like a Barry Alverez non-conference football schedule!

Their record against those teams is immaterial. NM is an old WCHA foe, I have no problem with UW playing them (plus it was played in GB, a plus), PSU is a B6 team and UW was helping out a floundering UAH team. I think the n/c schedule should be a mix of tough and easy foes. The B6 will allow UW to schedule more n/c games

The wcha was watered down. SCSU, Kato, BSU, UNO brought no juice to the table and they were forced to play them. At least now UW has all name brand conference opponents and they can pick and choose who they want to play n/c-wise and not have SCSU, Kato, BSU and UNO forced on them. I'd be fine with UW never playing SCSU, Kato, BSU and UNO again. I'd like to see UW play the old traditional wcha foes once every 3-4 years for old tyme's sake.

 

[badger79]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

no idea if this is true or not but here's the question then if the above is true

is it good exposure to show games on tv with 1/2 full (at best) arena's on a sunday, monday or thursday evening, or...is it better to show less games, keep the schedules to friday/saturday and then when the games are actually shown the arena's are full

The Kohl Center isn't exactly full now on Fridays/Saturdays. Now, I will grant that that has a lot to do with the team's performance. But I think the opponents also have something to do with it. A lot of fans don't really care about playing SCSU or Bemidji or UNO. The WCHA used to be special, now it's kind of meh.

The basketball team plays on plenty of weeknights, sometimes to a bunch of empty seats, sometimes to a full and pumped-up Kohl. There will always be the diehards who are there for every game, but then there are the casual fans. The opponent and the scope of the game play a larger role in the crowd than the night they play. Ranked teams and rivals = more fans in the crowd. I don't see hockey being much different.

I do think hockey fans will have to go through a bit of a culture shock because of schedule changes. That's something that will ease over time.

 

[IndianaBadger1995]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Their record against those teams is immaterial. NM is an old WCHA foe, I have no problem with UW playing them (plus it was played in GB, a plus), PSU is a B6 team and UW was helping out a floundering UAH team. I think the n/c schedule should be a mix of tough and easy foes. The B6 will allow UW to schedule more n/c games

The wcha was watered down. SCSU, Kato, BSU, UNO brought no juice to the table and they were forced to play them. At least now UW has all name brand conference opponents and they can pick and choose who they want to play n/c-wise and not have SCSU, Kato, BSU and UNO forced on them. I'd be fine with UW never playing SCSU, Kato, BSU and UNO again. I'd like to see UW play the old traditional wcha foes once every 3-4 years for old tyme's sake.

SCSU brought no juice to the table? They went to the Frozen Four this year. They have been decent

 

[icebadger]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

SCSU brought no juice to the table? They went to the Frozen Four this year. They have been decent

I think he meant in terms of energy/atmosphere at the game due to the opponent.

 

[bucky15]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Brian Elliott hasn’t allowed a goal in 189:29.

 

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Brian Elliott hasn’t allowed a goal in 189:29.

He can call more moose in that timeframe.

 

[WiscDC]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

The Kohl Center isn't exactly full now on Fridays/Saturdays. Now, I will grant that that has a lot to do with the team's performance. But I think the opponents also have something to do with it. A lot of fans don't really care about playing SCSU or Bemidji or UNO. The WCHA used to be special, now it's kind of meh.

That's definitely true. I wish it wasn't so, especially for league games. I know I'm far from being a typical casual fan, but I've never understood people's obsession with the opponent. I get excited to go to games against Alaska-Anchorage, partly for the geographic chants and partly because they're a league opponent. I get it when it's, for example, Wisconsin vs South Dakota in football. But otherwise, I get perplexed, even with the understanding that not everyone is a diehard like most of us on this board. Even from a standpoint of considering the opponent, I liked when we played UNO.

 

[GB Puck Fan]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Sunday home games during packers season? I know madison isn't Green Bay but good luck with that

 

[WiscDC]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Sunday home games during packers season? I know madison isn't Green Bay but good luck with that

I'm not a Packers fan, but even if I were, I would much rather go to the hockey game than watch the football on TV. But other people go to just one game per weekend, and they'll choose the one not on Sunday. And I was at the basketball game against Nebraska last year with plenty of empty seats during the Packers playoff game. I hadn't thought of that angle, but it would definitely be something to avoid. Yikes.

 

[badger79]

Re: Wisconsin Hockey Vol XXV: There's Hope! Or whatever...

Sometimes there's weird scheduling occurrences that just unfortunately happen. Like when the football team was in the B1G championship game...on the same day that the basketball team played Marquette. There went basketball attendance. And this year -- the Windy City Classic was on the same day that the hoops team played Ohio State. My guess is that a lot more fans would have made the trip to Soldier Field had the basketball team not had a home game.

I do agree that Sundays during the Packer game is probably something to avoid; if they're scheduling Sunday, shoot for a 4 p.m. start if the Packers are playing at noon. Or a noon game if the Packers are playing in the late afternoon. But yeah -- you can't really plan ahead for things like the NFL playoffs, and you'll never avoid ALL conflicts. It's just not possible.