Here are a few notes concerning the Wisconsin Badgers that the list may be
interested in. I guess history is all I can contribute, as I haven't actually
"seen" a Div I hockey game a couple of years.
 
  If Wisconsin wins the title, it will not be the first time they have done
  so as an at large team (1981) or after not winning the WCHA regular season
  title (1981, 1983). In 1981 as in 1992, Minnesota was the dominant team all
  year before coughing it up in March, as they have every year since Herb
  Brooks left.  In 1983, Wisconsin got the snot pounded out of them by North
  Dakota, going 0-7 before they solved the Sioux in the WCHA playoffs.
 
  Wisconsin goes as far in March (April) as their goalie takes them. The list
  of Badger goalies to go on to professional careers == the list of Badger
  goalies to win NC$$ titles. I don't go far enough back to know who was
  between the pipes in 1973, but Julian Baretta (77), Marc Behrend, Terry
  Kleisinger (81, 83), and Curtis Joseph (90) all continued playing hockey
  after their college eligibility expired. Starting goalies in non-title
  years didn't.
 
  Finishing stronger than they start is a trademark of Wisconsin teams, of both
  Jeff Sauer, and The Badger before him. This is not to say they field great
  tournament teams every year, because some years they're just not that good.
  But beating Wisconsin is harder to do in February and March than in November
  in most years. Poor starts are one of the reasons regular season titles
  are as scarce in Madison as they are, given the number of NC$$ titles.
 
This weekend is a landmark of sorts for me since I plan on watching the game
on TV, which I'll have to go somewhere else to do because mine exploded in
October. It'll be the first Div I hockey I'll have witnessed since the 2-weeks-
late title game in 1990 on ESPN. It was in a sports bar in Atlanta (hockey
center of the universe), 1 guy perched in front of one TV showing hockey
amid 500 TVs tuned to golf. I exaggerate only slightly.
 
Bob Schwartz
[log in to unmask]
 
UW '84, '89  After which my mom said "Jeez, what took you so long?"