As today is the eve before the appearance of America's favorite rodent, and my pre-assigned date for the third update, we proudly present the final update (before the end of the season and the crowning of our Demigod of Prognostica- tion [Regular Season Version]) for the Hockey-L Regular Season Prediciton Contest! (You'll have to pardon me, the spellchecker in my brain is on vacation this week.) As is our wont, the current standings (and the tiebreaker procedures used): HE ECAC CCHA WCHA 1. Maine Clarkson Michigan Colorado College 2. Boston Univ. Brown Bowling Green Wisconsin 3. New Hampshire Harvard Michigan St. Denver 4. Northeastern RPI Miami Minnesota 5. Mass Lowell Colgate Lake Superior Michigan Tech 6. Boston Coll. Yale Ferris St. North Dakota 7. Merrimack Vermont Illinois-Chicago N. Michigan 8. Providence Princeton W. Michigan Minnesota-Duluth 9. Mass Amherst Cornell Notre Dame St. Cloud St. 10. Union Ohio St. Alaska-Anchorage 11. St. Lawrence 12. Dartmouth First off, I'd like to thank fellow Spartan Glen Keeney for his "h2h score list" which made my job infinitely easier. There were no ties in the HE standings and both ties in the CCHA (Michigan and BG for first and Lake Superior and FSU for fifth) were broken based on head- to-head play. The three ties in the ECAC (Clarkson/Brown for first, Vermont/ Princeton for seventh, and Cornell/Union for ninth) were also broken on head- to-head play. There were three ties in the WCHA which were a bit more challenging. Wisconsin gets the nod over Denver for second based on head-to- head play. North Dakota edges out Northern Michigan for sixth based on more conference wins (the second WCHA tiebreaker). And St. Cloud escapes the cellar by winning the third tiebreaker with UAA, better goal differential. With the third update, we have our third new leader. The man who's been lurking near the top for a while finally takes the lead. We welcome to the front of the pack STEVE KAPETANAKIS who also wins the longest name contest. Steve (like many others) dropped his total score from 90 to 62 during the month of January to take the lead. Our leader at Christmas, Lance Harry, has fallen to second, despite shaving 12 points off his total. The leader at Thanksgiving, Bob Constantine, still languishes in fifth. Our big mover of the month was Robin Lock, who jumped from 48th to 14th. (Yours truly still lingers in a tie for 8th.) With the totals I have also included the number of teams correctly placed (to sort the tied participants out). Note this does not replace the existing tiebreaker. The person with the "most correct" entry is Eric Robinson, who has 16 of the 41 teams correctly positioned. The complete list: Current Last Number Last Rank Rank Correct HE ECAC CCHA WCHA Total Total _______________________________________________________________________________ 1 6 Steve Kapetanakis 13 6 22 8 26 62 90 2 1 Lance Harry 7 10 16 14 24 64 78 3 6 Eric Robinson 16 2 26 14 26 68 90 4 3 Tony Buffa 9 8 30 10 26 74 82 5 2 Tim Newman 7 8 24 16 28 76 80 5 5 Bob Constatine 6 8 30 12 26 76 88 7 14 Brian Morris 9 10 30 14 24 78 96 8 29 David Wang 10 10 22 18 30 80 102 8 8 G. M. Finniss 8 8 30 16 26 80 92 8 14 Russell Jaslow 8 8 30 14 28 80 96 8 20 Jeff Bowen 5 10 24 18 28 80 98 12 20 Steve Weisfeldt 7 12 26 16 28 82 98 12 8 Bruce Spencer 4 10 32 18 22 82 92 14 35 J. Jodzis 8 12 24 16 32 84 104 14 29 Andrew Frisch 7 8 26 22 28 84 102 14 35 Brian Gentry 7 10 24 22 28 84 104 14 48 Robin Lock 7 10 32 16 26 84 110 14 20 Brian Roberts 6 8 30 20 26 84 98 14 14 Kristen Robinson 5 24 32 14 14 84 96 20 35 Dave Hendrickson 13 6 34 16 30 86 104 20 29 Rich Boehme 6 8 28 14 36 86 102 20 35 Mike Sheehan 5 12 24 16 34 86 104 20 43 Tark McMains 4 14 36 12 26 86 106 24 10 Eric Maiwald 11 12 30 14 32 88 94 24 10 Glenn Gale 8 8 34 14 32 88 94 24 46 Mark Johnson 5 10 30 22 26 88 108 24 35 Andrew Peed 5 14 24 20 30 88 104 24 14 Dave Kaufman 4 10 26 20 32 88 96 29 35 John Forsyth 11 8 28 24 30 90 104 29 29 Steve Phillips 10 6 38 18 28 90 102 29 25 I. R. Rutks 9 6 32 24 28 90 100 29 25 Mike Machnik 8 12 32 16 30 90 100 29 20 Ross Bracco 6 16 32 16 26 90 98 29 14 Ron Fraser 6 10 34 18 28 90 96 29 29 Dave Nicolai 6 12 28 20 30 90 102 29 48 Andrew Weise 4 12 38 22 18 90 110 37 51 Chris Paine 8 12 24 18 38 92 112 37 10 Sean Pickett 6 14 32 16 30 92 94 37 14 Nate Webster 3 8 32 16 36 92 96 40 35 Lloyd Hsu 8 14 32 18 30 94 104 40 51 Peter Knapp 8 14 26 24 30 94 112 40 4 Joe Brownson 7 18 36 14 26 94 86 40 25 William Krebs 5 18 28 22 26 94 100 44 43 Robb Dunn 8 10 40 18 28 96 106 44 43 Andrew Samwick 5 8 36 18 34 96 106 46 20 Troy Thiele 7 6 40 18 34 98 98 46 35 Roger Feeley 4 14 36 26 22 98 104 46 25 Eric Hoffman 2 14 30 18 36 98 100 49 29 Bill Fenwick 4 12 36 20 32 100 102 49 10 Beth Darrah 3 10 40 16 34 100 94 51 58 Jayson Moy 8 10 36 20 36 102 120 51 56 Don Demick 4 22 34 18 28 102 114 51 51 Steve Moerland 3 14 28 22 38 102 112 54 57 Willis Lam 6 18 30 22 34 104 116 54 51 Curt Nelson 6 8 40 22 34 104 112 54 51 Jeff Kelly 4 14 40 18 32 104 112 57 48 Scott Biggar 6 14 40 22 32 108 110 58 46 Anthony Frolik 7 30 34 14 32 110 108 59 60 Greg Williams 3 16 40 20 36 112 132 60 58 John McCumiskey 5 12 40 30 42 124 120 61 61 Jeffrey Anbinder 1 22 42 40 36 140 152 _______________________________________________________________________________ The final standings will be posted sometime around March 10 (give or take a few days). More details on the Conference Tournament contest should come out about February 20, with the deadline for that contest being March 7 (hopefully, the conference standings will be pretty well set the week before that, since the end of the season and the start of the playoffs are only 2 days apart). G. M. Finniss Michigan State University 12-3-2, 17-6-2 Contest Central WVU '87, UTenn '92, MSU who the hell knows when?