In response to my speculation:
 
>>matchups, and to keep teams with big draws in their own region.  So I
>>could see Clarkson being sent out West instead of Cornell.  If that
>>happened (in addition to an outcry from Clarkson supporters) we'd
 
Dan Olsen cried out:
 
>Why would you speculate sending Clarkson out west for less injury to the crowd
>draw.  Discounting the ECAC playoffs, because they're in Clarkson's back yard,
>let's look at fan support at the regionals.  If we take a look at last year's
>east regional at the Knickerbocker Arena in Albany, I believe you'll see that
>Clarkson did in fact have a huge draw (not quite the size of Vermont, but I
>think Potsdam's residents went to Vermont to milk the Vermonters' cows while
>they were away).
 
>Past history also shows a huge draw from Clarkson.  If you look at the crowds
>in Worcester in both 1993 and 1995, you would see that only the host HEA
>schools had larger crowds than Clarkson.  I'm not sure whether Cornell can
>actually be perceived as a better draw than Clarkson, as Clarkson alumni have
>nothing other to cheer for and usually show up in force.
 
        Let me first say that I think that seeding teams in the NC$$
tournament based on attendence potential is an unfair thing to do, and
I wish the selection committee would stick to impartial measures of
the teams' accomplishments.  I can see the logic behind letting the
host team stay in their own region (at least they don't get an
automatic berth like in hype-ball), but even that is unfair to schools
not located near cities with large venues.  What are the odds the East
regional will ever be hosted by Clarkson?  Or Cornell, for that
matter, unless they hold it in Syracuse.
 
        What made me speculate that the NC$$ would favor Cornell,
attendence-wise, over Clarkson, was that that seemed to be their
perception last year.  To quote some hearsay via Mike Machnik last
March:
 
>Rick Comley said that one of Clarkson, Lowell, or Cornell should go West
>(along with PC).  He said that it was decided to keep Cornell East because
>of their fan base.  So the decision came down to Lowell or Clarkson.  Rick
>said that fan base was determined to be even.
 
        So the NC$$ at least does not recognize Clarkson as a big
draw.  I can't speak for Albany last year (I'd be interested to hear
who had more fans Friday night), since I wasn't there, but at Lake
Placid, Vermont clearly had the numbers.  I thought Cornell, and also
Clarkson, had a higher quality of fan support (especially considering
how little the Golden Knights supporters had to cheer about that
weekend), but noisy, creative fans don't generate any more revenue for
the regionals.  Anyway, I'm sure the NC$$ would choose Vermont
hands-down in an attendence contest.  Based on what I saw in Lake
Placid, Cornell did seem to have a bigger fan base than Clarkson, but
I'm not exactly qualified to be impartial on the matter. ;-) And I'd
hardly be one to slight Knights supporters, after what I saw in
Potsdam last month. :-/
                                        John Whelan, Cornell '91
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        <http://www.cc.utah.edu/~jtw16960/jshock.html>
 
Cornell Men's Ice Hockey: 1996-7 Ivy League Champions
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