Does anyone else find it odd that the Hockey East commissioner is floating
the idea of giving the #1 seed a bye into the semifinal round of the HE
tournament... after a season in which the top two teams in Hockey East were
tied in the standings and were declared "co-champions"?  If the league is
not willing to use the tiebreakers to declare one of those two the sole
regular-season champ (I know, there were probably other factors at work
here), I'd have a hard time seeing them use the tiebreakers to determine
which team gets a week off in the playoff round.  Granted, this is the first
time in Hockey East history that there has been a tie for first -- a quick
glance at previous years' standings shows that the HE regular-season champ
usually has a margin of something like 8-10 points.  (though there were some
close races between BC and Maine in '89 [BC by two], '90 [BC by one], and
'91 [BC by one])
 
When the bye was part of the Hockey East playoffs, the two-week break seems
to have been largely beneficial.  Of the eight teams (#1 seed in '85 and
'86, #1 and #2 seeds in '87 through '89) that had byes, only one lost its
semifinal game -- Lowell in 1987.  If the top team in the league has thor-
oughly dominated everybody else, then perhaps a bye is in order.  But if
there's only a slight margin between #1 and #2 (or, in the case of Maine and
BU this year, no margin at all), then the argument for a bye becomes a lot
more difficult to make, IMHO.
 
Besides, a bye would mean that the fans of the top team would not be able to
see their guys at home in the postseason -- the fans would have to travel to
the semis to see their team play.  Because of the proximity of most of the
Hockey East schools, that's probably not as much of an issue as it would be
for teams in other leagues (unless you're making the trek down from Orono),
but still, I think the fans would relish the chance to see their team play a
home quarterfinal series.
 
I don't know how many tickets each school participating in the Hockey East
semifinals gets, but the number may very well be fewer than the number of
tickets available for a particular school's home games... meaning that some
fans of the top school might not even be able to get in to see their team
play in the semis.  So while it's apparently a benefit to the team to get
the extra week off, it may wind up cheating the fans.
 
With apologies to UMass (or Mass Amherst), I think it might not be a bad
idea for Hockey East to leave the ninth-place team (and tenth-place team, if
they get one) out of the playoffs.  Yes, the Minutemen proved they belonged
in the playoffs when they knocked off Boston College, but still, a 3-21
record (30 points behind 8-14-2 BC, which in the 2-1-0 point system would
convert to a margin of 12 points) is not exactly the stuff playoff-bound
teams are usually made of.  Personally, I would prefer at least SOME com-
petition for playoff spots, and there really isn't any if the playoffs are
thrown open to everybody, which is the case in three of the four leagues
right now.
 
Once upon a time, before the split, the ECAC had 17 teams in it, with only
the top eight making the playoffs... which all but guaranteed that a team
had to have a 0.500 record to even *think* about the post-season.  If the
ECAC were still that large, I shudder to think about what the playoff format
would look like.  Maybe the top 16 would go, and there would be eight pre-
liminary-round games in the middle of the first week, and the surviving
teams would go on to the quarterfinals... ugh.
--
Disclaimer -- Unless otherwise noted, all opinions expressed above are
              strictly those of:
 
Bill Fenwick
Cornell '86 and '95
LET'S GO RED!!                                                  DJF  5/27/94
"I still remember sitting in a darkened theater with my arm around 17-year-
 old Mary Jo Rasmussen, trying to get to first base.  I can even remember
 the name of the film:  'The Lion King'."
-- Steve Martin, presenting an award at the Oscars