Saw a few references to this on the list. It just goes to show how un-noticed NC$$ Hockey can be. Begin quoted text U-M's undercover champions: Hockey players like their secret-agent status By John U. Bacon / The Detroit News ANN ARBOR -- Like two dozen other Michigan electrical engineering students, Mark Sakala woke at 6 o'clock Monday morning, went to North Campus and took an engineering dynamics test. But as the professor passed out the exam, he stopped at Sakala's seat, said "Congratulations," and handed him the test. Afterward, Sakala said he could have done better if he'd studied more. The problem was, Sakala and his teammates had been busy two days earlier defeating Colorado College 3-2 in overtime to win the NCAA hockey title. Darn the luck, anyhow. A week after claiming Michigan's first NCAA hockey crown since 1964, the players find themselves in an odd situation: As a team, they've become the famous National Champions, but individually they're still the same bunch of nameless faces, caught somewhere between big-time celebrity and small-sport anonymity. So be it. While college basketball and football players seem to live in a world separate from their classmates, the Michigan hockey team is a refreshing throwback to an era when championships were won by the guys next door. What game? In the middle of the playoffs, forward John Madden's English teacher saw his letter jacket, and asked him if he played a sport. Captain Steve Halko's Euclidean geometry professor didn't get that far. When Halko handed him a travel slip for an away game, the professor looked up, surprised. "They still have a hockey team?" he asked. Things didn't change much after Michigan won it all. On Monday morning, Halko showed up at 8:30 for his macro-economics exam. Beyond a few whispered "Congratulations," the weekend's big event went unnoticed. "It was business as usual," Halko said. "And that was fine with me." Because the hockey players don't weigh 300 pounds or stand 6-foot-10, they easily mix in with their classmates around campus. Since they wear masks on the ice, they're rarely recognized off of it. Said assistant coach Billy Powers: "The kids waiting outside the locker room don't know who signed their programs until after they signed it. They don't say, 'There's Brendan Morrison,' they read the autograph and say, 'That was Brendan Morrison.'" Their personalities draw no more attention than their looks. That might be because half these guys are Canadians, who are not known for their hubris. It's just as well, since college hockey does not provide many chances for self promotion. Michigan football generates almost $15 million a year and basketball about $5 million. Hockey brings in $720,000, with no national television contract. The attention Mike Legg got for his goal against Minnesota (where he put the puck on his blade and threw it in the net lacrosse-style) took the team by surprise. "That's all brand new to us," Powers said. "Our kids still think it's fun, because we don't go through this everyday." After Sakala's name was mentioned a dozen times on ESPN's broadcast of last Saturday's title game, one of his father's co-workers at Chrysler asked if he'd heard of this college player on television with the same last name. Yes, Vladimir Sakala replied, he'd heard of him. Horror show If people around the state do not know who Mark Sakala is, it's a cinch that the 7,000 fans who pack Yost Ice Arena do. "We've got sort of a niche," Powers said. "The hockey fans are hockey fans, period. It's a tight, tight group." So tight, they've developed a dozen inside jokes they share at every game. Games at Yost feature all the ritualistic camp of The Rocky Horror Hockey Show. When the clock strikes 1:10, the crowd always asks, "How much time is left?" "There is one minute remaining in the game," the announcer says on cue. "Thaaaaaank you," the crowd replies. The announcer sometimes plays along and says, "You're welcome." The fans aren't as kind to opposing goalies. After a Michigan goal, the fans point at the netminder and chant, "It's all your fault!" When a phone rings in the scorer's booth or the press box, they yell, "Hey, goalie! It's your mother! She just called to say, 'You suck!'" Small wonder opposing goalies were pulled in nine of 17 games at Yost. It may be less glamorous than the football or basketball games, but U-M hockey fans think they have a lot more fun. And players in all three sports will tell you they're the loudest, too. The team, the team They'll be even louder next year, when Michigan defends its title. Ironically, it might have been the players' anonymity that helped them finish the job this year. Coach Red Berenson concedes that this was not his most talented team. Of the eight seniors from 1993, for example, five played in the NHL the next season and a sixth played on the U.S. Olympic team before joining them. But this team had two things more talented teams didn't: A disregard for any title short of the NCAA crown, and an apparent indifference to individual acclaim. In the NCAA semifinals, Michigan faced defending champion Boston University -- and dominated them in a 4-0 victory. "B.U. was a team of big names, but that's not what makes a championship team," senior defenseman John Arnold said. Of the 23 players on the Michigan roster, nine arrived as walk-ons. In other words, almost half the team wanted to be at Michigan more than Michigan wanted them -- which speaks volumes about devotion. Take Arnold. Several colleges expressed a strong interest in the Toronto native, until he tore up his right elbow. He was ready to go to a Division III school when his father told him, "You're better than that." Arnold started calling college coaches but got nowhere until he tried Michigan, who had recruited Arnold's teammate, Steve Halko. "They asked me my SAT's and grade-point-average, they called admissions and said, 'Welcome to the University of Michigan.'" Arnold advanced from a walk-on to a full scholarship in his final year. Such trials have made the players unusually close. "This team was more selfless than past teams," Berenson said. Even recent hockey alumni agree that their teams were not as unified as this one, often citing Red Wings minor-leaguer Aaron Ward as an obstacle to team unity. "No one's ever left out on this team," Arnold said. "If someone says, 'Can I come along?' the answer's always yes." Perhaps because they were all in it together, they weren't as tense in the finals as previous teams. Sakala recalled that when Michigan made it to the final four in 1992, "Everyone had the death grip on their sticks. "This time we were dancing in the locker room before the game." Relief, not rapture You'd think they'd be dancing afterwords, too. "Red always says, Never get too high or too low," Mark Sakala said. "But after this game, Red said, 'You can get as excited as you want.'" Despite Berenson's go ahead, the predominant emotion was not rapture but relief. On the bus ride home from Cincinnati, everyone was too exhausted for revelry. "People just wanted to be by themselves to think about it," Halko said. Arnold and Sakala sat in the back of the bus with their new trophy between them. "We were just looking out the window at a beautiful sunset," Arnold said. "Then the stars came out. We thought, Geez, how much nicer does it get?" Later that night, back in Ann Arbor, some of the players made the obligatory stop at Rick's, a popular college hang-out. Aside from a few pats on the back and a round of drinks from a Rick's owner who fancies himself a hockey player, you'd have no idea the small group in the corner had done something special. You wouldn't even think to ask. The quiet scene was a stark contrast to the mayhem which followed the basketball team's Final Four appearances. The guys next door The sense of Eerie Normality increased when the subdued celebration retired to the campus home of seniors Sakala, Halko, Arnold and Kevin Hilton -- two blue-chip recruits and two walk-ons who've become close friends. If the NCAA decides to sniff around the U-M hockey program for illegal pay-outs, the coaches should take them a block from the rink to the seniors' house. Rest assured, not a dime has funneled toward decent furniture, maid-service or commercial rug shampooers. Their only extravagance is a softball-sized African Ridgeback frog that eats live mice. They got it from -- surprise! -- some fraternity members. "There are a lot of memories in this old house," Arnold said, and one suspects some of those crusty memories are still around, growing mold. Forget eating off the floor; you'd be advised not to eat off their plates. One bedroom is so heaped with clothes, books, papers and other debris that it could serve as an archeological dig. Their home is, in short, just like every other college house. Only the broken sticks in the front lawn tip it off as a hockey haven. Perhaps nothing demonstrates how non-big time this team is than their fifth roommate. Instead of picking some jock-wannabe who'd worship the varsity athletes, they invited Tom Bersano, an Italian student whom Sakala met in an engineering class. Bersano is as friendly and unassuming as he is eccentric. When Sakala introduced Bersano to his housemates last year, Bersano promptly did a headstand in front of the TV. "The idea is," one housemate said, "blood rushes to his head without him having to take a nap, which helps him concentrate." Concentration is crucial when you only sleep 10 hours a week, as Bersano does, in 15-minute intervals every four hours. The only notes he's taken in four years of engineering are contained in his well-worn 30-page, pocket-sized notebook, in hand-writing so small it could be used for microfilm. Bersano knows as much about hockey as his housemates do about his home town in Italy. He attended his first and only hockey game in January (in shorts and a T-shirt, to strengthen his body against colds) but missed the title game while studying in the library. When Halko came home after winning the championship, he found Bersano at the top of the stairs. When he told him they'd won, Bersano said, "This was big game?" Yes, Tom, this was Big Game, even if it was won by small names. "These guys are real people," Berenson said. "That's what I like best about this team. These are the kids down the street who'll wash their dad's car, go out and play top-notch hockey, then come home and take out the trash -- and not think anything of it." What now? Although you probably wouldn't invite the Michigan hockey players for tea with the Queen -- unless Her Majesty provided razors and spittoons at the door -- their work ethic and agreeable personalities would encourage you to hire them. Since 90 percent of the hockey players get their degrees, one of Berenson's few concerns for his players is that they don't spoil the joy of this accomplishment by embarking on a disillusioning minor-league stint. "Sakala's one of those kids I hope never plays again," Berenson said of his senior defensemen, a walk-on who became one of the team's top five defensemen. "Why go through all the disappointment kids feel playing minors? He has nothing more to prove. You can't buy what we had here." Unlike college basketball or football, winning the college hockey title does not bring wealth or fame. When you point this out to Mark Sakala, he just shrugs and says, "We really wanted to win it just to win it." Years ago, Sakala's father, a Czech immigrant, asked only that his son "do something with hockey." Sakala may not have become an NHL prospect or a big name on campus, but he did do something with it: he became an NCAA champion. Even without a pro contract or endorsement deal, that's still worth something. Copyright 1996, The Detroit News end quoted text HOCKEY-L is for discussion of college ice hockey; send information to [log in to unmask], The College Hockey Information List.