Hello out in Hockey-L land,
 
It has been a while since I have posted anything, but while looking over
the Vote for Hobey page at USCHO I noticed something odd. Try to follow
along.
 
There are three semifinalists from each of these three schools:
 
North Dakota
        (Jason Blake, Jay Panzer and Jeff Panzer)
Michigan State
        (Mike York, Bryan Adams and Joe Blackburn)
New Hampshire
        (Jason Krog, Darren Haydar and Ty Conklin)
 
If you assume that the lowest vote getter from each school was the third
pick on a straight school ballotwhat happens if you take those votes
away from the top vote getters from that school? (This is only applying
to those voters claiming to be from that schools region, assuming that
those people are alums or students and voting for their school
regardless of merit (this may not always be true, but assume along with
me))
 
Ty Conklin (UNH) gets 1150 Eastern Votes.  Multiplied by 5 (the number
of points given for a first place vote) gives 5750 points.  If you
subtract this number from Jason Krog's point total (East and West) of
8879, you get 3129 points.
 
Joe Blackburn (MSU) gets 528 Western Votes.  Multiplied by 5 = 2640
points.  Mike York Total (4403) - 2640= 1763 Total
 
Jeff Panzer (UNoDak) gets 1293 Western votes. Multiplied by 5 = 6465
points.  Jason Blake's Total (6921) - 6465 = 456 Total
 
Obviously, there is no way that any of these assumptions are true.
(Jason Blake has more Eastern Points (1339) than would be true if the
above were taken into consideration) But if you look at the votes, you
see that the three UNH players have gotten more votes than any other
player from the East among eastern voters and the same is true for MSU
and UND among Western voters.  As it stands now, Each of these schools
will have two players among the final ten on USCHO.  Altough this has no
bearing on the actual finalists picked, it is unfair to the other
competitors.  Boston College also will have two among the final ten.
This might be because they don't have a solid third best player.  ;-)
 
A side note, maybe North Dakota would have a better showing if all of
their fans could decide on their best player. (Or could decide which
Panzer to place 3rd)
 
Just some thoughts
 
Remember, this poll has as much to do with real life as the USCHO Top
Ten poll, nothing.
 
Scott Spooner
 
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