NCAA HOCKEY NOTEBOOK

BU harbors bitter memories, but for Brown it was great



By Joe Concannon

Globe Staff



The 29th NCAA hockey championship is history, yet it is a tournament that will not easily be forgotten. Tarnished by a brawl involving eventual champion Minnesota and ECAC champion Boston University, it was an indictment of the win-at-any-cost philosophy.



At Minnesota, where a Bill Musselman once presided over basketball, and in the Big Ten, a conference that has also given us a Woody Hayes and a Bobby Knight, the road to a national championship was traveled two ways. The first, intimidation. The second, a fierce nationalism.



            In order to gain the upper hand against BU in the Friday semifinal, Minnesota used the tactics of intimidation. Then, by heaping verbal abuse upon BU co-captain Terry Meagher in the prelude to the brawl, a violent anti-Canadian sentiment surfaced. It was echoed by the Minnesota band on Saturday, blasting out "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" prior to the game against Michigan Tech.



            "To counter tactics like they used," said BU coach Jack Parker, "you do three things. No. 1, you beat them. No. 2, you get a couple of officials who keep throwing them off the ice to the point they get so many goals scored against them they stay out of the penalty box.



            "The third way is to go out and get a couple of goons yourself and go run at them. But you play 30 games and tell your kids not to retaliate. You say, 'Maybe I should have had them running at people all year preparing for that crap.' But I don't agree with that approach.



            "The other thing (nationalism) is an emotional pitch he (Minnesota coach Herb Brooks) uses. It's Minnesota against the Canadians and the rest of the world. He obviously has no control whatsoever over players. But, he won. If we had won, I wonder what he'd have said."



            After the brawl, Meagher said Brooks, "had my head, yelling, 'I'm going to kill you. I'm going to kill you.' This big guy had my arms." Trapped in the penalty box between the Minnesota team and a player serving a penalty, he was an easy setup. "I didn't see how it started," said Brooks.



            On Saturday, though, Minnesota played a physical game, yes, but was in control of itself to the point where it knew it could win only if it exercised some sanity. And, officials Bill Riley, the coach at the University of Lowell, and Medo Martinello of the West, were the perfect pair to keep order on the ice.



            If the experience was a bitter one for BU, it was a positive one for Brown, a team that lost, 7-6, in double overtime to Michigan Tech on Thursday, after leading 6-4, with 4:10 to go. After that, Brown edged BU, 8-7, in the consolation game Saturday afternoon.



            "For us," said Brown coach Dick Toomey, "it has a genuine positive effect. Just the experience, knowing they can play with the best. Not only that, they know this is something special. It has to keep them hungry for next year. Now, there's pressure on us. It's tough to get up top. It's tougher to stay there."



________



            Choicest items on the rumor list have Parker, 31, and Toomey, 29, being eyed for two coaching vacancies in the Ivy League. Parker has been contacted by Yale, where Paul Lufkin was fired. "No comment," said Parker. Penn athletic director Andy Geiger, who hired Toomey when he was AD at Brown, reportedly would like to talk to him about replacing Bob Crocker there. "Right now," said Toomey, "all I can say is I'm happy at Brown."