Looking at the rink sizes for the WCHA (thanks Doug), it appears that we are
actully only talking about three schools that are big enough to host a
regional (UMTC, UW and UND) so the rest of the WCHA teams could not get a home game
either.  Add to that the CCHA rinks of OSU and UM, and WMU and there are really
very few on campus sites that could host games out west.  The problem is most
of them are the home rink of perenial NCAA teams, leading to this same
problem every year.  In the east, there are plenty of neutral sites near enough to
have a local host, but not a home ice advantage.  Circular problem, unlikely to
change until regionals sell out reguardless of participants.

On the idea that the western teams could win in Lynah, they might, but I
would not bet on it.  Cornell's teams during Mike's tenure have been big, physical
teams well suited for playing on the NHL or smaller rink sizes of the ECAC
and the older HE rinks.  This has proven very sucessful in the league.  At
Lynah, speed teams can easily be bottled up by the smothering defense and narrow
ice surface (not to metion 3100 Faithful screaming for 60 minutes).

Conversely, most WCHA rinks are the bigger ice, which favors more of a speed
game.  In the NCAA, most of the sites are the larger ice surfaces ergo
advantage speed team. The ECAC and HE teams are forced to adapt their game, sometimes
not sucessfully.

Of course, since none of the WCHA teams would dare venture into Lynah (not
that I blame them, it is certainly better for your record to host Yale or
Princeton over Christmas than to risk a trip to Central New York), we probably will
never know how they would adapt.


William Sangrey
Cornell '87&'94
Let's Go RED!!!