Sean Pickett writes:
>In Hockey east I think Dick Umile both deserves the award, and will win it.
 
I think Umile deserves the award and could win it, but I think Walsh
deserves it more.
 
Both are deserving coaches, and I would name Umile a close runner-up.
But I believe politics may result in Umile winning the award over
Walsh.  I believe some people's dislike of Walsh may lead them to
choose Umile.
 
>Shawn Walsh did a great job with Maine, but I think New Hmapshire's top 5
>national ranking and excellent record, done without a home arena, surpasses
>what Shawn Walsh has done with Maine this year.
 
I STRONGLY disagree.  I am impressed by the job Umile has done, but I
feel it in no way surpasses what Walsh has done at Maine.  I felt UNH
would finish third in the league before the season began, and they
did.  But I thought Maine would finish 4th, and they finished first.
In the HE preview I wrote before the season, I said that Maine was
"rebuilding", and you will find that word applied to Maine in many
other previews written about that time.
 
For a "rebuilding" team to go 15-3-6 in the league, 28-4-6 overall,
and unbeaten (2-0-2) in four games against the preseason #1 is nothing
short of amazing.
 
UNH finished 14-6-4 in HE, 22-8-4 overall.  I would challenge anyone
who selects Umile over Walsh to tell me in what way they felt UNH
exceeded expectations more than Maine did - as a start.
 
As well, the HE coaches picked UNH 2nd and Maine 4th.
 
In general, I believe people expected UNH to do about this well, even
knowing ahead of time that they had no home rink in Durham.  The
preseason polls bear this out.  So, I don't think the simple fact that
they played away from Durham is enough in Umile's favor for me to lean
towards him over Walsh.
 
This has clearly been the finest season-long coaching job of Walsh's
career.  I have been quite impressed with the way he has gotten his
team to continually pay attention to defense and take advantage of
their strengths to remain consistent all year long.  It is a team that
I feel is less talented overall than Umile's UNH club.  And that is
another reason to select Walsh: he did more than Umile did with less.
 
As an example, check the top 15 league scorers in the HE stats I
posted last night.  UNH has 4 players in the top 15, all forwards, and
Eric Boguniecki is just outside the top 15.  Maine has 1...defenseman
Jeff Tory.  Maine's highest scoring forwards in HE games are Brad Purdie
and Dan Shermerhorn, and they are tied for 20th.  Only UMA and Merrimack
have to go further down the list to find their highest scoring forwards.
 
Yet, Maine posted the highest power play percentage of any team in HE.
 
>As for BU coaches, I can not think of any other head coaches , but BU also
>has assistant coaches in the college ranks, including Bob Deraney at UMass
>Amherst and David Quinn and Jim Craig at NU.
 
Arthur Berman mentioned Ron Anderson at Merrimack, who was also a member
of the last team to win back to back NC$$ titles (BU 71, 72) and is the
all-time winningest coach at Merrimack.  And, there is Steve Stirling,
a teammate of Anderson's, who coached Providence a little over a
decade ago and took them to the championship game in 1985 before
losing to RPI (actually, many would say an eight-armed goalie took
them there :-)).  Stirling left PC soon afterwards for Babson, and I
believe he is still there.
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                                            [log in to unmask]
Cabletron Systems, Inc.                                    *HMM* 11/13/93