Mike Machnik writes about the Ice Breaker tournament:
 
>After the tourney, USCHO contacted the NCAA and was told that the games
>would not count in NCAA selection or in the NCAA's overall stats.
 
        This comes as a surprise, since the last word from the NCAA
that appeared on the list was the following, right after the
tournament.  I think this was a second- or third-hand account, by way
of the Milwaukee Journal.
 
" Prior to Friday's games Parker said that the four coaches (Parker, Sauer,
" Mason and Morris) met and agreed to recommend that the games be treated as
" exhibition games. The issue is going before the championships committee of
" the NCAA for a ruling. The ruling is not expected for a couple of months.
 
So does this mean
        1) The championships committee actually ruled back in October
        2) The issue was settled without ever making it to committee
or      3) The committee still hasn't ruled officially, but the powers
that be know how they will rule.  (Sorry, I didn't mean to make that
sound like a conspiracy theory.) ?
        I haven't seen any official announcement on the resolution of
this, either on INFO-HOCKEY-L or the press releases on USCHO.
 
> It has been suggested that it was "known" that they
>would count back when the tourney was announced, but having been present
>for the tourney announcement and the statements by the coaches, I can
>recall nothing that was ever said that pointed to the games counting or not
>counting.  Again, I think that various people assumed certain things and
>proceeded on those assumptions.
 
        I could swear I heard back in April that they were supposed to
count (ordinarily it wouldn't be mentioned, if not for the exemption),
but of course I didn't save any messages from back then that addressed
the issue, so perhaps I'm misremembering.  In October, though, Jim
Love said
 
"  The press
" kit outlining the background/status of the IceBreaker Tournament (that I
" picked up in Milwaukee last April) in its original Chicago location
" clearly states that these were to count as regular-season contests, and
" were NOT exhibitions.
 
Now, I don't have that press kit myself, so I can't verify that one
way or the other.
 
        Ultimately, it doesn't matter what was announced back in March
or April (except that I don't like loose ends).  The important
question is what the NCAA says now, and it sounds like USCHO has
definitive, if not official, word that they won't count.  (Too bad for
Mankato State; back before they lost tonight and dropped below .500,
they actually won the pairwise comparison with Clarkson if the Ice
Breaker games were counted.)
                                        John Whelan, Cornell '91
                                        <[log in to unmask]>
                <http://www.cc.utah.edu/~jtw16960/joe.html>
 
Cornell Men's Ice Hockey: Back-to-back ECAC and Ivy League Champions
 
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