I'm certain the other 40 or so hockey-l people there will echo those sentiments. My plane arrived Wednesday evening, and Pam was gracious enough to meet me at the airport. She took me to Stub and Herb's for a dinner where we were joined by Erik and Paula Biever. Then she delivered me to the Motel. Thursday were the semi-finals. There were 30 or so hockey-l people gathering between periods, but the best part of it was the bloc of seats Carol had arranged for us. Mike Machnik was next to me on one side, todd antonson (?) was on the other side. Glen Keeney was in front, david parter was next to gele, and it was neat watching the games with fellow hockey-l ers. There were 50 of us at the luncheon, and a great time was had by all (as far as i know) After the 2nd game, our gopher hosts invited us back to their hotel room, and we visited and discussed the games and solved the problems of the world. Friday, we got a tour of Mariucci arena, including locker rooms, weight rooms, and vip seating. It is a beautiful facility. About two dozen of us put on the blades and went skating after that. We adjourned to Stub and Herb's for a late lunch and then went back to St. Paul for the Hobey Baker Award. There were media people, coaches, athletics staff, and the contingent from hockey-l, all bedecked in our hockey-l shirts. Then we all got back in the various cars and headed back to Mariucci to watch the Des Moines Bucaneers play the St. Paul Vulcans in a Junior A playoff game. We sieved the empty net when Des Moines scored their third goal. Then again to stub & herb for some after game festivities. Apparently the fun went on for quite some time, but I crashed before the next round of partying. Saturday, Bob G took a contingent to the twins game. i spent the day doing job-like work (bummer) and then we met for the championship game. Adam, Tony, and tony's dad from BU were in the BU section, but their presence was well noted. in what I thought was a great touch of class, those three remained in the BU section through the entire awards ceremony after the game. Then today it was the plane ride home, and the wading through 200 messages. I'll post hocky game mpressions separately. charlie shub [log in to unmask] -or- cdash@colospgs (BITNET) (719) 593 3492 (fax) 593-3369