From the College Hockey Showcase... The Michigan/Minnesota game brought back bad memories of my trip to Milwaukee a few years ago. The Michigan/Maine semifinal, in my opinion, was a very similar game. Michigan seemed to play hard and (sometimes) dominate the first two periods. In both the Maine and Minnesota games, the Wolverines went into the second intermission with a two goal lead. But the third period's were a much different tale. In both games Micigan seemed to come out and skate the third period with a "let's just play defense and hope they don't score" attitude rather than with a "let's score another goal" attitude. Against teams with as much fire power as Minnesota and that Maine team have/had, you can't play hockey this way. If you give them that many chances, they _will_ score. Some other thoughts while watching the game on TV: 1. The "disputed" Michigan second period goal. Someone commented that the ref made the call from the blue line. This is not true as the WCHA still uses two ref's and Director-of-Referee's Shephard was directly on the goal line and made the call from within feet of the net. IMHO, it was a good call. Watching the replays, the shot hit Callinan in the chest and fell to the ice in front of him. Before Callinan could have the chance to even think about getting his glove down to cover it, he & the puck were knocked into the net by a defenseman. The puck was never covered and this appears to be why Shephard made the call he did. Shephard signalled a goal from the start and there was no hesitation on his part. 2. I liked Ron Mason's comments in his second intermission interview during Saturday's MSU/Wisconsin game: he commented that once the four year contract with this Showcase was over (next year in Milwaukee, the fourth year at the Joe Louis Arena), they should continue in a "neutral" site (what better than to have four popular schools and four good hockey teams advertise College Hockey in other areas, said Ron). What was funny about it, is all of Ron's suggestions for places were in the nice warm south ... ie Atlanta, Florida, etc... You know, this really seems like a good idea! Roger Spurgeon U Mich '94 (But still a student at heart...) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ____ ____ |_ \ / _| Roger L. Spurgeon <[log in to unmask]> | \ \ / / | MarkeTech Systems | |\ \/ /| | _| | \ / | |_ MICHIGAN HOCKEY - 9-4 !! |__| \/ |__| SPLITS @ COLLEGE HOCKEY SHOWCASE -- WOLVERINES BEAT Go Blue! BADGERS 7-2, RUN OUT OF TOWN BY GOPHERS 3-4 ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- "We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best that we can hope to find in our travels is an honest friend."