Thanks for the interesting and thoughtful responses.  I was starting to
speculate on some of those lines, but I was getting wordy and running out of
time on my lunch hour.
 
John Edwards wrote:
 
>>What the distances tell us is that if you are an eastern fan, the
Regionals are almost certainly going to be closer to you than if you are a
western fan. This makes it more likely that you will go, regardless of the
teams involved. This also means that, even though Boston was not represented
in the first day of the East Regionals,  that there were probably many
Bostonians who had bought tickets, in anticipation of seeing a Boston
team.<<
 
Also, it was fairly clear early on that UNH would be in Worcester.
Worcester's about two hours from UNH, so it's effectively local, especially
for the rabid UNH following.
 
Of course this can cause a secondary effect.  A lot of people might have
assumed that a lot of Boston area and UNH folks would buy tickets and
therefore the tickets would be sold out; so they bought tickets ahead of
time to protect against that contingency.  Also, in the more compact east,
it's probably easier to get rid of  your ticket if you choose not to go.
 
>>Aside from what I mentioned, I think the fact that you had two Big 1(1)0
schools there helped. Large schools have large numbers of alumni, helping
the East fill up whatever unsold seats there were.<<
 
Probably also helpful that one was Michigan specifically.  Michigan has a
great hockey history, it seems to have a loyal following, and even seems to
have a Boston presence.  Anecdotally, my son has two friends whose fathers
have UM/Harvard Law pedigrees and are Michigan hockey fans.
 
>>Mark Lagasse wrote:
 
I know there are hockey fans everywhere, but I would guess that there is a
much higher concentration of "college" hockey fans in this area.
 
Kirk Eisenbeis wrote:
 
Some have touched on the fact that there are more hockey fans in the
Northeast (threeish conferences in a concentrated area).
 
Robert Foulis wrote:
 
I'd also say that a lot of the schools in the Boston area have created fans
of the sport itself unlike the lack of schools around Madison.<<
 
Interesting point.  I can't speak for the west, and can't even generalize
about the east, but I know of at least one -- me -- follower of college
hockey generally rather than fan of one team specifically.  One factor that
affects this is that high school hockey is big and concentrated, and many of
the players (e.g. Bellefeuille, Mottau, Corrazini, Jim Fahey, Brian Collins,
Kevin Truelson, Mike Ryan, etc.) had achieved local notoriety BEFORE they
went to college.  Fans who come to college hockey from the high school
direction are likely to have shifting attachments to college teams.
 
Clay
 
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