Some opinions on the tourney selection committee:
 
1. The committee selecting and seeding tournament teams should not include
   representatives from teams under consideration.
 
Although the individuals involved might be totally honorable, to participate
in the process when your team is being considered is clearly a conflict of
interest.  I know there's the "leave the room" rule, but an individual either
loses his voice when discussing other teams or is forced to argue for or
against a team competing with his own. (No offense intended by the use of
masculine pronouns - has there ever been a woman on the selection committee?)
 
2. But aren't the selection criteria pretty cut and dried - anyone should be
   able to apply them?
 
"Answer" A: If so, why do we need a high-powered committee?
 
"Answer" B: Who decides the criteria in the first place and how they should be
            weighted?
 
Oh - we'll let the committee do that.
     Example: League tournament games are no more important than regular
              season games.  Is this a universal truth?
 
The first public discussion that I recall from the committee on criteria
during the discussed 90-91 season was at about this point in the season when
some aspects (like out of league record) were already pretty well set.
 
3.  If there were clear well-defined criteria, does the committee need to
    be set for the entire season?
 
Clearly, if a condition for committee membership was "no chance my team
will be under consideration" - it might be difficult to recruit members
at the start of the season.  Shawn Walsh would probably never be able to
serve (:>).  However, would it be unreasonable for say Jack Parker (BU
coach and committee member)  to resign from the committee now in favor
of some other Hockey East representative.  Sure - the new guy's team might
sneak into the tourney  by winning the league tourney, but then somebody
else could take his spot.  Note that this requires those agreed upon
general criteria specified in advance so that someody could join the
committee and get up to speed easily.
 
4. On Cornell vs. SLU in 1991:
 
A rational case could be made for either team (or even both) being included
in the tourney that year - I recall lots of discussion and good arguments
on precisely that topic on hockey-l at the time.  The relevant point regarding
the selection committee was that both committee members from the East
(Cornell's Kennedy and BU's Parker) had teams which got attractive draws
- Cornell making the field over SLU and BU getting a 2nd (or 3rd?) seed as one
of four HE teams selected while ECAC regular season AND tourney champ
(Clarkson) was seeded 4th in the East.  That gave Clarkson a path through
No. 1 ranked Lake Superior - which they survived only to lose (to BU?) in
the semis.  Maybe the seedings were done correctly/ maybe not - remember the
committee makes the rules as well as interprets them.  Whatever the case,
the "controversy" was magnified by the conflict of interest.
 
5. What about Joe Marsh?
 
He's a good guy and should do a fine job on the committee.  I only hope
that he gets a chance to emulate Jerry York and resign because his team is
always in contention!  Or maybe this is a bad omen for the 1993-94 year?
It looks like the this year's Saints might be headed for another year like
90-91 "on the bubble", although maybe their 5-2-1 out-of league record (all
against HE 4-1-1 and CCHA 1-1-0) will help more this time - unless the
committee "adjusts" its criteria...
 
Robin Lock
[log in to unmask]