A few notes on the Maine/UNH games:  Line of the night to Larry Mahoney
who said on the radio that HE should just rent apartments for Refs. Fowkes
and McBride up in Orono.  They have now done, if memory serves, at least
6 of Maine's last 10 games (I don't recall the refs of the UML series).
Larry pointed out a few weeks ago that they were seeing too much of Maine,
and that ref-ing so many games "breeds familiarity" which in turn can
cause problems between the players/coaches and refs.  We saw that in
the Northeastern series (at that point, it was their fourth game in five)
when McBride called a misconduct
 
penalty when a Maine player (Lovell?) approached McBride to argue a call,
fell over a downed player and landed on McBride.  Judging by Joe Carr's
blow-by-blow account of Shawn Walsh's arguements with McBride and Fowkes
this weekend, I'd say its time for HE to assign a different crew to work
Maine's playoff games.  Which also leads to another point Larry brought
up a few weeks ago, HE needs to hire a few more refs.  Larry and others
have said that HE hopes to expand from 5 to 7 crews for the 95-96 season.
 
What are the odds that the top 3 seeds in the NC$$ East Regional are
all from HE?  UM, BU and UNH all make strong cases.
 
I have commented in the past about ESPN's coverage (or lack thereof)
and have been told repeatedly that ESPN will not profit by airing
college hockey, but will profit by airing shows such as billiards,
croquet and lumberjack-ing (add that one to Webster's :-> )
Unfortunately, college hockey suffers from the same affliction which
hinders, and ultimately forces the demise of, some network/cable
programming: It has a rabid and growing base of fans, but it is still
too small to offer commercial success.  Which is why critically acclaimed
shows like "I'll Fly Away" end up on PBS.  Hmmm  The PBS/College Hockey
Game of the Week...yeah...play-by-play done by Fred Rogers, and color
commentary by Barney.  I'm sure that would be a major success  :->
 
If the tournament schedule is the same as in the past, it is doubtful
that ESPN would give up Thursday night Prime Time for college hockey,
even if it is the Phinal Phour.  More than likely, it'll end up on
ESPN2, which is pretty much a step down in coverage, since they'll
probably black it out and/or not allow other stations to carry it live.
And no one gets ESPN2 anyway... :(
 
One other hockey-related note: The Maine High School playoffs conclude
tonight.  Apologies to Barry Clukey and Jeff Libby, but once again NYA
knocked Waterville from the playoffs  :->   Tonight, Cony High of
Augusta will attempt to become the second answer to a trivia question:
Since the inception of hockey in 1916, four teams have dominated the
sport: St. Dom's, Lewiston High, Waterville High and NYA.  Only tiny
Dixfield has managed to win a Class A championship away from the Big 4.
Cony will try for history tonight when they play Lewiston.
 
John Forsyth
"The Fabulous Sports Babe hopes she did not cause any confusion by
parking her White Ford Bronco in front of OJ's house last June"
- promo for "The Fabulous Sports Babe"  March 3, 1995.