Just a few questions and comments on the situation up in dear ol' Maine: 1) What's going on in terms of the other athletic teams at Orono whose students have been declared ineligible? Has the indoor track team forfeited all its meets? Have their athletes been banned from regionals or nationals? Have any of the other teams been treated in the same fashion as the hockey team, or are only Division I champion teams subject to being banned from post-season action by their league? 2) Maine doesn't belong in the NCAA tournament. Yup, die-hard supporter that I am, I just can't accept that the Black Bears have played well enough this season to merit a place in the tourney. This has nothing to do with eligibility; IMO, at-large bids depend mostly upon games just previous to selection. Those who say that the selectors look at the whole season may be right, but they also look at how well a particular team is doing just prior to the tournament. Team X may be second in the toughest league around (insert your favorite league here), but if they've been losing to the weaker Ivies and the military academies of late, no ones going to give them a spot unless they get an automatic bid by winning the league tournament. Let's face it, Maine just hasn't been playing to their potential of late. Sure, they showed what they could do with that 0-0 game against BU, but they also lost to UNH this past weekend (a team that has been up and down all season) and had a difficult time pulling out a win against hapless BC. Even with the Ferraros back and Tardif eligible again, Maine simply isn't playing well enough at present. 3) Why the hell did the Ferraros play this past weekend's two games? Why did they give up a whole year of eligibility (there's that word again!) just to play two games? Kariya did the smart thing by waiting to see what Maine's future would be; if they do get a bid (yeah, right!) then he could still come back, but if they don't he's still go that extra year to fall back on. (Not that any of those three will necessarily use all four years of eligibility, of course.) 4) My advice to HE: reverse your decision and let Maine play in the tournament. Sanctions against clubs have been levied in the past and has it stopped the same thing from occurring again? Certainly not. One need only look at Mike Machnik's examples of posting of precedents to see that violations have happened in the past and to figure out that they'll happen in the future. All the current situation does is piss of a lot of Maine fans to no real end. They're not going to win the HE tourney anyway -- :'( -- so why not avoid a lawsuit that just might cost you oodles of money? If they do end up defending their HE tourney title, well, let the NCAA deal with them; if they decide not to recognize your champions' right to a spot in the national tournament, then YOU can file the lawsuit. (God, it's almost comic!) As former league assistant commissioner Nonni Daly said, "You've go 30 kids who... were penalized heavily for something they didn't do." Give the Maine team a break; all it can do is help. ___ ___ | \ / | | \ / | Jason A. Pierce Black Bear Fan in Exile |M A I N E| University of Maine, '93 |B L A C K| University of St Andrews, '94 [log in to unmask] |B E A R S| (hopefully!) | \ / | | |\ /| | M - A - I - N - E Go... BLUE!!! | | v | | |___| |___|