Brian Morris writes:
>IMHO, the ECAC IS weaker this year. The overall quality of the ECAC has been in
>a downward spiral since the strong Harvard teams of the late 80's.  My guess
>regarding the cause is 1)Better competition from Hockey East for the ECAC's
>traditional Canadian connections.  Hockey East initially went after the
>Massachusetts hotbed.  Having secured the home turf they set their sights
>Northward.  Hard to believe that BC sports an Canadian netminder!
 
However, the rest of BC's team is still American.  Looking at the HE
rosters over the years, I really don't see much of a change from Mass
players to Canadians.  Perhaps Northeastern is the only school that
has more American/Mass players now than several years ago, because of
Ben Smith and his local connections.
 
It could be argued that the two expansion additions to HE, Merrimack
and Mass Amherst, have increased the competition for players -
including Canadians - and that this makes fewer players of the same
quality available to other teams, such as the ECAC.  Both MC and UMA
have a significant number of Canadians.  But MC also recruited heavily
from Canada back in the late 80s, too.  And in the ECAC, you do have
Union competing for better players now as well.
 
If anything, schools like Maine and BU seem to have bulked up even
more on Mass players now as opposed to the 80s.
 
At any rate, I find it interesting that ECAC followers would consider
the league to be weaker this year.  Many of us who follow Hockey East
think that this is a weak season for that league, too.  I tend to
think it is indicative of an overall decline in DivI hockey over the
last ten years.  More teams are competing for players, so you have
more competitive teams but fewer outstanding teams.
 
>RPI Inconsistency
 
I mentioned this to several people via email, but perhaps it is worth
tossing out here.  Back over Christmas, I was discussing RPI with
Engineer asst coach Steve Duncan.  In regard to RPI's 9-1 loss to
Princeton, Steve said, "Mac, the wheels just came off."  But in regard
to RPI itself, he offered the following: "We're just an average team
with average players."  An average team will win some you don't expect
them to win, and lose some you don't expect them to lose.  That seems
to me to be the best analysis of this year's RPI team.
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                                            [log in to unmask]
Cabletron Systems, Inc.                                    *HMM* 11/13/93