I just returned from Providence and the shocker that you all know about by
now, MSU over Maine 3-2.  Wisconsin beat SLU 5-2 in the first.  Official
boxes will come in a day or so.
 
MSU will play Minn/LSSU Thursday in Albany at 2:05.  Wisconsin will play
NMU/Mich Thursday at 7:35.
 
First, I think everyone who attended the games in Providence or somehow heard
details of the games owes a hearty congratulations to Providence College for
the way it pulled off the East Regional.
 
I was honored to have been asked by Providence SID Tim Connor, one of the
nicest guys in college hockey, to help him out in Providence and so I
volunteered my time to join his staff this weekend.  For the record, my job
consisted mainly of calling the official scoring for goals and assists in
all four games.  Take my word that the staff worked extremely hard this weekend
to produce all of the information that you saw in my earlier postings of
Thursday's game summaries and notes.  They deserve a round of applause, most
being Providence students, so I'll mention them by name: Kevin (a little bit
of everything), Heather (game summary), Andy (period by period shot charts),
Dave (ran copies of every penalty and goal to all radio stations, usually
before they were announced over the PA), and Erica and Barbara (goal by goal
descriptions/players on ice), and there are others whose names I don't know.
It was a lot of fun and everybody did their part to make everything go
smoothly, and most of it was volunteer work.  Providence has some good people
and I was happy to have been the only non-PC person to be helping out.  BTW
some of the PC women were players for the Lady Friar team that just won the
unofficial women's national championship and finished the season 22-2-1.  I
am looking forward to Merrimack's matchups with PC next year although I'll
be on the other side then.
 
Tim Connor, in particular, was responsible for handling ALL of the press
related matters like passes, seating in the mammoth temporary press box, etc.
and he worked many hours to make sure everything went smoothly, and he
deserves mucho congratulations (and got mine).  I got home late because the
staff held an impromptu post-regional celebration that was well-deserved.
I don't know where the regionals will be held in the future, but the 1995
Final Four will be back in Providence and I am confident you can expect the
same level of dedicated support.  Needless to say, after many nearly sleepless
nights over the past few days, Tim said he was looking forward to spending
all of Sunday in bed.  :-)  Tim, you deserve it.
 
During the Maine game, Barbara, who I mentioned before and is from Maine, was
quietly chanting "M-A-I-N-E GO BLUE" every time it came forth from the massive
Maine contingent and she even had her own "Let's Go Maine" sign. :-)  We also
ripped up little pieces of paper and wrote the letters on them, and held up
"M", "A", etc. for her during the chant. :-)
 
I also manned the phones during the games and there were probably more calls
from all around the country during Maine-MSU than during the previous three
combined.  The phones were ringing off the hook.  It seemed that everyone who
called and got the final score had one response: "Wow!"
 
[I thought it was pretty funny that one of the stations that was calling from
Madison had the call letters WKOW - Cow!]
 
Things may change, but I get the impression that the current format may be
continued for at least one more year to see how it goes.  If so, I hope the
problems with tv coverage will be resolved for next year.  Early candidates
for the 1993 East Regional will likely be Albany and Providence, but again,
no decision has yet been made.
 
Anyway, I know there's no way you can all know the level of hard work that
was required to go into pulling off the biggest national playoffs at one site
ever, but I hope you got a bit of an idea.  I am sure the situation was the
same at Detroit.  It sure isn't easy coordinating six teams and everything
that goes into it, but it went well.
 
GAME THOUGHTS (clearly not complete)
Attendance was 8,521 (capacity 12,000) and it seemed that 7,000 were from
Maine.  Shawn Walsh tried his best to turn the Civic Center into Alfond South
as he went around to the dorms, fraternities and sororities to urge Maine
people to come down, and as was mentioned, somewhere around 15 busloads of
people made the trip and were quite enthusiastic.  During the first game,
the Maine team was seated behind one of the nets watching the action, and
when they got up to head for the locker room near the end of Wis-SLU, the
Maine people rose and gave them a thunderous ovation.  Then, when the
scoreboard was lowered between games and the "St Lawrence" was removed to
reveal "Maine" underneath, the crowd exploded into a roar.  Likewise, between
games, the board ran a listing of teams competing in the regional one at a
time, and every time "Maine Black Bears" was flashed up, the fans roared.  It
was a lot of fun to watch and listen.
 
Roy got his misconduct after Jim Montgomery was robbed by Gilmore on a mind-
bending glove save.  Roy went by the goal judge and pounded on the glass and
was hit with 10 at 13:11 of the second with the score 3-1.  After the game,
Roy was asked about it, and he said that he said something in French to the
judge but that apparently the judge spoke French too. :-)  This got a laugh
out of the interview room although Roy wasn't in much of a mood to be jovial.
 
The game was evenly played throughout the first two periods, but Maine threw
everything and the kitchen sink at Gilmore in the third, down 3-2, and he
was immense.  Maine fired 20 shots on Gilmore in the third which is amazing
for an NC$$ quarterfinal game.  Ten of those came in the first five minutes.
But as Gilmore continued to make save after save, I could get the feeling
that this was not to be Maine's night.
 
MSU's first line of Suk-White-Norris had an incredible game at both ends of
the ice.  Norris's two goals and an assist give him 43-39--82 on the year.
I too would like to know how he cannot be a Hobey candidate.  He is as good
of a two-way player as I have ever seen.
 
Ron Mason said after the game that he still considers Maine to be the best
team in the country, and he may be right.  But MSU was better tonight.  Back
in January, Shawn told us on the air that he thought the single game format
worked against a team that was likely to be favored like his, especially
when that team receives a bye.  I do think that is true.  Both SLU and Maine
had to go up against teams that had played a full game just two days earlier.
It's not an excuse, but it is no longer a benefit to receive a bye and I
wonder if it could lead to teams trying to not get byes.  It will be
interesting to see what happens with Minnesota and Michigan Sunday.  However,
it is likely that the two-week layoff hurt more than just receiving the bye,
and I will be surprised if Hockeyfest is not moved back to cut down on this
disadvantage for the top Eastern teams.
 
I think the assessment made earlier that Maine played into MSU's hands by
matching the physical play and taking dumb penalties is completely accurate.
MSU had six PP's by the midway point of the game.
 
It wasn't actually that much of a surprise that the East had as much of a
rough time this year as it did.  The East was considered to be Maine and
everybody else this year, while the six West seeds were ranked highly all
year long.  I don't consider it an upset that Wisconsin became the first
sixth seed to ever advance to the FFour, they are a FFour caliber team.
 
However, afterwards one of the Western press folks said something to the
effect that "this proves that the West is best and the East is least."
Apparently he forgot the makeup of the last two FFours.  I don't look at it
as a West-East thing, but I have no problem with the fact that this year,
the West was stronger than the East.  Several perennially solid Eastern teams
were in a rebuilding mode.  The question of "which is best" has a different
answer from year to year, and that's the best way to look at it.
 
I can't add much to what has been said about Wis-SLU, Wisconsin played a
strong physical and skating game and took advantage of their opportunities,
although they also blew several open nets that could have made the score very
lopsided.  They could be a sleeper if Derksen continues to be hot.  All four
lines are playing very well.
 
For SLU, Dan LaPerriere was probably the overall star of the game despite his
team losing.  He was breaking up all sorts of plays in his own end and has
the ability to create the quick turnaround when he breaks up a play and sends
it up ice to a teammate for a sudden return rush.  I regret that I didn't get
to see him more than a few times in his career.
 
As I said, boxes and maybe more things to come in coming days if I think of
them, it's very late.  Congratulations to Wisconsin and MSU and good luck
in Albany!  And congratulations to the people of Providence College.
---
Mike Machnik    [log in to unmask]   mikem@{beanpot,bubba}.ma30.bull.com
(Any opinions expressed above are strictly those of the poster.)