Another jewel from Steve Crowe's college hockey article
in today's DETROIT FREE PRESS:
 
(begin quoted material)
WCHA: Michigan Tech coach Bob Mancini feels his team
deserves one of the 12 berths in the NCAA tournament
despite an 18-18-6 record and a 7-2 loss to Minnesota in
the WCHA final Saturday night.  Northern Michigan coach
and athletic director Rick Comley, also chairman of the NCAA
hockey committee, has said that Tech's mediocre record
disqualifies it from consideration.  "That's what they tell us,"
Mancini said, "but I can't see that anywhere in the tournament
selection rules.  We're 1-2-1 against Colorado College, 1-2
against Minnesota, 2-1-1 against Wisconsin -- and we have
a winning record against everybody else.  And without a
doubt, we're the hottest team in the WCHA right now."
(end quoted material)
 
Yeah, right.  Tell me, do you spell Bob with one "o" or two? :-)
It appears that Mancini could learn a lot by being on Hockey-L
and/or Info-Hockey-L.  Take away Tech's win over Laurentian
and you have an NCAA record of 17-18-6, not enough to be a
team under consideration.  I'm sure the .500 or better isn't written
down in black and white, but we've been hearing about it all
season.  If you and I know the NCAA selection criteria, you
would think that Mancini would.  And, if MTU is only one game
below .500 versus CC, Minn and Wisc, it makes them .500
against everyone else...hardly "a winning record against
everbody else."  As for hottest team in the WCHA...WHO
CARES?!  What, Mancini wants to replace a .500 record with
"hottest team" as a criterion?  MTU is 6-3-1 over 10 and 10-7-3
in their last 20.  Of course, they are the last team to beat CC.
If we follow that logic, shouldn't we let Merrimack in first?  The
Warriors are the last team to beat BU and they finished 2-1-0
in their last 3!  Four of their final five losses were by one goal
to quality opponents.  C'mon, NCAA, get 'em in there!  Let's not
stop there.  Michigan State gets in for being the last team to
beat Lake Superior, who gets in for being the last team to beat
Michigan.  Or, maybe we should let Team Canada in, who beat
LSSU and MSU.  Hey, Team Canada is 2-0-0 versus the CCHA...
Michigan Tech is 0-3-0!
 
And, please don't forget Air Force.  They haven't lost a game
since February 17th.
 
Also in Steve Crowe's column was an interesting quote from
Ron Mason following Sunday night's game: "We're so beat
up right now that, as crazy as this may sound, I said to my
staff, 'If I knew we were going to get into the NCAAs, I wouldn't
care if we lost tonight,' because our guys need some time to
heal and regroup."
 
 
John H ([log in to unmask])
 
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