There has been much talk about whether or not the ECAC should move their
phinal phour to the Knick. The only two arguments against it seem to be:
tradition and not wanting to widen the decreasing rift with Hockey East.
 
a) As Mike mentioned, the Garden won't be around much longer. The new one
   is SUPPOSED to be around sometime soon (so they say). So when the new
   Garden comes, it certainly won't have that same aura.
 
b) ECAC must do what's best for itself not caddy to HE. If moving the ECAC
   tourn. to ALbany would be better for the league and its member schools
   (pocketbooks), it must do so. I personally would like to see it move to
   the more central location of Albany. It certainly does play second-fiddle
   to the Hockey East tournament in Boston. Let's face it, Boston is about an
   hour away from almost all the Hockey East schools. Only Harvard and Brown
   are that close in the ECAC. In fact, Clarkson and SLU (and Cornell?) are
   7-8 hours away. That's a prohibitive distance for a tournament. Albany
   would be about 4 hours from the most distant location (Brown, Clarkson
   SLU, Yale and Princeton). Much more reasonable.
 
I vote for Albany because its a more central location and, as Ross said,
it would be better for the students (call me a bleeding heart).
I believe you would see notably higher attendances.
 
Also, I would vote for a return to campuses for the NC$$ regionals.
A game in Detroit with 5,000 people (in a 19,000 seat arena) is not quite
the same as a similarly sized crowd in a smaller campus arena. I can see
using the Joe for a MSU-Michigan regional but I think attendances would
be higher on campuses (and I doubt many would disagree). The atmosphere that
many say is lacking at a neutral site would certainly be present on campus.
Anyways, if a team works 37 games or whatever to earn a #1 or #2 ranking
in the nation, it has earned home ice advantage. I also favor a return to the
best of 3 format.
 
In other news, I was fortunate to meet hockey-L'ers Carol, Rich Vehlow and
the Sweeneys at RPI. I also "met" Scott Preadmore that night at a minor
league game but didn't realize it until yesterday, almost 10 days later.
Quite a small world.
 
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BRI FARENELL	CLARKSON '95	[log in to unmask]
 
"It's a great day for hockey."	---Bob Johnson 1931-1991
 
GO ADIRONDACK RED WINGS! 	CALDER CUP CHAMPS: 1981 1986
 
PROUD TO BE A FAN OF USA HOCKEY AND US COLLEGE HOCKEY.