Posts Tagged ‘Hockey East’

After a 4-point weekend in Burlington, the Huskies rescued themselves from elimination in the playoff race. Helping them along the way were highly beneficial results elsewhere in Hockey East – UMass and UNH were both swept, while Providence lost its lone game. Separation has really started to take shape in Hockey East, with the top five pulling away from the rest of the pack. That leaves sixth through ninth place up for grabs. Northeastern now sits tied for seventh with UMass, and the ability to control its own destiny as far as sixth place.

Here’s where we stand after the weekend: Read more…

Alex Faust Hockey Hockey East

We’re entering the home stretch of the Hockey East season, and things do not look good for the Northeastern Huskies. The team currently sits 9th in the standings, 3 points behind 8th-place New Hampshire (who also owns a game in hand over the Huskies) and 4 points behind 7th-place UMass (who owns two games in hand). While making the Hockey East playoffs looks like a bleak possibility at the moment (due to the run of play), Northeastern is far from mathematically out of contention.

Here’s where we stand after the weekend’s games: Read more…

Alex Faust Hockey Hockey East

Originally reported over the summer by College Hockey News, NBC Sports Group has decided to begin televising college hockey games from four leagues: Hockey East, ECAC, CCHA, and WCHA. Northeastern is not involved in any of the games (in fact, only Boston University, Boston College, and Vermont are involved in NBC Sports Net games). However, the package does include a major plus for Hockey East fans – the Hockey East tournament (one quarterfinal game, the semifinals, and championship game) will be televised nationally on NBC Sports Network. [Schenectady Gazette]

ECAC insider (and all-around great college hockey journalist) Ken Schott has the details:

The NBC Sports Group announced a 16-game college hockey broadcast schedule, with the games being featured on Versus/NBC Sports Network. Eleven of the games will be part of a Friday-night package.

Speculation about college hockey games being carried by Versus/NBC Sports Network began shortly after the announcement of the National College Hockey Conference that will begin play in 2013-14.

From a Hockey East release:

“The landscape in college hockey is about to go through a significant change. Television will become even more important to all programs with national aspirations and national television will become a key to future success,” said Hockey East commissioner Joe Bertagna. “This agreement will play a major role in our ability to stay in a leadership position in our sport.”

The only downside? After the Hockey East tournament is nationally televised on NBC Sports Network, college hockey runs into a buzzkill with the NCAA tournament on syndicated local TV or ESPNU. Womp womp.

WRBB Sports Hockey Hockey East, TV

On Hockey East This Week, we had a chance to speak with conference commissioner Joe Bertagna about realignment, Notre Dame and the league’s competitive structure, future conference expansion, and the league’s ongoing negotiations with television partners for this season and 2013-beyond.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

WRBB Sports Audio, Press Pass Hockey East, Hockey East This Week, Interview Season

This Thursday and Friday, Interview Season continues on WRBB as we air segments on both Hockey East This Week (Thursday, 9:00pm) and the Dog Pound Sports Sound (Friday, 3:00pm)…

October 13 – Joe Bertagna [Radio Exclusive]: Hockey East was already the top college hockey conference in the nation, but throw in the addition of Notre Dame, as was announced last Wednesday, and it takes the league’s aspirations to new heights. We’ll talk to Joe about adding Notre Dame, the future of the conference (and conference realignment) as well as the impact on television. Thursday during Hockey East This Week (9:00pm)

October 14 – Cheryl Murtagh [Exclusive]: One of the hottest field hockey programs in the country happens to be right on Huntington Avenue, with the Huskies in and out of the top 20 ranks all season. We’ll talk to Cheryl Murtagh about her work keeping field hockey, historically one of Northeastern’s most competitive teams, towards the top, as well as the competition faced every day in the CAA. Friday during the Dog Pound Sports Sound (3:00pm)

WRBB Sports The Dog Pound Field Hockey, Hockey East, Interview Season

With the new season starting tomorrow night, we wrap up our preview series with our final team, the Northeastern Huskies.

Last year: 14-16-8 (10-10-7 HEA), finished 6th in the Hockey East regular season standings, lost to Boston College in Hockey East tournament semifinals.

What happened: The Huskies got off to an ugly start, both in and out of conference. Home losses to Holy Cross, Bentley, and Niagara made for a forgettable first few months at Matthews Arena. Northeastern got going after the winter break and made their push, with the common team goal of “trying to get back to .500″. After another Beanpot final turned heartbreak, NU found themselves in the thick of the playoff race when their head coach Greg Cronin was suspended for the final six regular season games. Despite the adversity, the team went 2-2-2 against the top three teams in the conference to end the season. With Cronin back for the playoffs, the Huskies came into Agganis Arena and pulled off the upset, knocking off BU in three games to move on to the semifinals where they had yet again another heartbreaking loss to BC, ending their season.

Key losses:

• Wade MacLeod/Tyler McNeely/Steve Silva (1st Line): These three players accounted for 46 goals last season. They were the heart and soul of the team, and carried everyone offensively. All three were expected losses to graduation, but their talent and chemistry came through all season. It will be tough for the Huskies to replace all that offense.
• Brodie Reid (F): Reid got going in the second half last year and provided a much needed spark to the Husky power play. He finished his freshman year with 11 goals and 17 assists while playing in 37 games. After just a single season on Huntington Ave., Reid signed a deal with the NHL’s San Jose Sharks.
• Jamie Oleksiak (D): After being drafted in the first round of the NHL draft by the Dallas Stars, Oleksiak decided to leave college in favor of the OHL. The defenseman gave NU size (6’7”) and physicality on the back end but Oleksiak was raw at times and it took him time to adjust to the college game. The reason this is a big loss is because he looked like he was getting there when the season ended and he would have been an asset this season.

Key returners:

• Anthony Bitteto (D): The Long Island native is a leader both on and off the ice. Never afraid to speak up, Bitteto has earned the role of assistant captain after piling up 20 points last season. Look for him to get a lot of ice-time on the back end with his partner, Luke Eiber.
• Steve Quailer (F): Quailer struggled to get his form back at the beginning of last season after recovering from his ACL injury. This year the Huskies are counting on him to help replace the scoring they’ve lost. He will be one of the biggest keys to whether NU can succeed.
• Chris Rawlings (G): One of the bright spots for NU this year is their goaltending situation. Rawlings is coming off a good season, (2.68 GAA, .920 SV%) but he is expected to split some time with sophomore Clay Witt, who showed promise at the end of last saeason. The best case scenario is that Rawlings ups his game to another level and never lets Witt off the bench. If that happens, the Huskies will be in good shape defensively.
• Braden Pimm (F): Coming into his sophomore season, Pimm will see more minutes and get more chances to contribute. Just like with Quailer, he is going to be counted on for offense and he did enough last season to show he is ready to step his play up a notch.

2011-2012 Outlook: It’s always takes a bit of time to adjust to a new coach. Jim Madigan and his new staff are hoping that adjustment doesn’t take too long because every game matters in Hockey East starting with Friday’s season opener. That said, Northeastern isn’t as deep as they have been over the last few years and it could be their biggest problem. Just one or two injuries and there could be a lot of inexperienced players on the ice. This team has some experience, like Quailer, captain Mike McLaughlin, and Alex Tuckerman, who made the NCAA tournament in 2009. But they also have a lot of guys who are stepping in to new roles. Predictions for this team have ranged from as high as 5th, to 8th where they were slotted in the coaches’ poll, and even as low as 10th. This team has enough talent to be in the middle of the pack in their conference, but if they have early season struggles like they have over the past two years, they might finish a little lower down in the standings.

–Jared Shafran

Jared Shafran Hockey Fall Preview, Hockey East

On a landmark day in the history of the Hockey East Association, the league announced its expansion to include an 11th team, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Wednesday’s announcement came as college hockey realignment entered its final phase, with the final moves being made in anticipation of the 2013-2014 season.

Here’s our media roundup:

John Connolly of the Boston Herald reports that discussions were taking place as early as March.

Mike Lynch, Boston University assistant vice president and director of athletics, played an integral role in the decision-making process. “I had the distinct pleasure to chair a special group who has been looking into the possibilities of expanding the Hockey East Association for some time with the right partner and we believe firmly that we’ve found that partner,’’ said Lynch. “Over the last few months, we’ve entered into some really substantive discussions about the future of our league and the future of college hockey.”

The Associated Press says that the plan for a national TV deal is for NBC Sports to televise Notre Dame games, and then maybe a couple of Hockey East games along the way.

“The University of Notre Dame’s hockey team will have a more robust national television platform than any hockey program in the country,” athletic director Jack Swarbrick said at a news conference held Wednesday on the ice rink of the school’s new $50 million Compton Family Ice Arena.

Jon Miller, president for programming for NBC and Versus, said the plan is to do a big schedule of Notre Dame games and include Hockey East teams in the telecasts when the opportunity is there.

Details of the TV deal have not been completed.

Dick Baker of the Springfield Republican writes that the challenge of an expanded non-conference schedule is for the smaller teams to get home games.

But there is one obstacle at least some Hockey East teams face, and that’s filling the non-conference slate with games that are affordable, and don’t reduce the RPI ranking. Notre Dame talked about having more home games than road, and it will be easy for them to attract high-ranking opponents. The problem for teams like UMass will be trying to get Western teams like Minnesota to come here. They’re okay with you going there, but don’t feel the need to fly East when they can stop at places like Notre Dame along the way.

Adam Wodon of College Hockey News writes that the leverage was always in Norte Dame’s hands, bringing a national Irish-oriented TV deal to the table, something the NCHC didn’t want.

As Notre Dame continued to mull invitations from the NCHC and Hockey East, it was negotiating its own television deal, which it could then bring to the respective leagues to see which would be OK with it.

That deal leverages a longstanding partnership between Notre Dame and NBC, which has exclusively televised the school’s football games for years. NBC Sports Network president John Miller chimed into the news conference via telephone.

Notre Dame had a preference for the NCHC because of its Western footprint, but the NCHC ultimately decided it didn’t want to accept Notre Dame with its TV deal in tow.

Jim Meenan of the South Bend Tribune reports that the TV deal means that ALL Notre Dame home games will be on national television, and that a conference-wide package would be a secondary concern.

Notre Dame will not only get more opportunities to play in front of alumni out East, but also gains what athletic director Jack Swarbrick called “an unprecedented level of national exposure through our expanded partnership with the NBC Sports Group.”

More details will be forthcoming, but one high-ranking school official said that all of Notre Dame’s home hockey games will be on national television starting in 2013-14.

Jon Miller, president for programming, NBC Sports and VERSUS, believes the combination of Notre Dame and Hockey East hockey will help in its branding of the NBC Sports Network.

“Our hope is to get a very robust schedule on our air of both Notre Dame games, and honestly when the opportunity arises, Hockey East games,” he said.

USCHO’s Matt Mackinder writes that no additional plans are in the works currently for a 12th team to join the league:

WRBB Sports Hockey Hockey East, Notre Dame, Off the wires

We’re on the cusp of a new hockey season, but before we begin, we have two season previews remaining: today, we look at last year’s regular season and Hockey East tournament champions – the Boston College Eagles.

Last year: 30-8-1 (20-6-1 HEA), finished 1st in regular season standings, won Hockey East championship, lost to Colorado College in NCAA tournament first round.

What happened: Boston College started the season (once again) as the team to beat last year. The team sat in first place in the national rankings for most of the season and looked destined for another national championship – in our WRBB bracket pool, BC was heavily favored to win it all. Yet despite an 8-game winning streak leading into the NCAA tournament, they were stunned by Colorado College in a largely empty Scottrade Center in St. Louis. Were they too complacent? Untested when their backs were against the wall? Perhaps. But sometimes the NCAA tournament is full of crazy upsets, and for the way BC played throughout the season, they likely deserved better – stellar offense helped carry them through the year, despite a defense that was at times inconsistent (it allowed 4+ goals on 10 occasions).

Key losses:

• John Muse (G): A two-time national champion, and one of the best goalies we’ve seen in the NCAA tournament (a record of 8-1). Despite not being the most skilled goalie, he stepped up when it mattered and deserves a hefty share of the credit in BC’s two national title runs in the last four years. In addition to the national championships, he backstopped the Eagles to three Hockey East championships, three Beanpot championships, and two first-place regular season finishes. That’s quite a glittering resume.
• Brian Gibbons (F): One of the most consistent forwards in the league, Gibbons departs BC with 164 career points, but more importantly, 108 career assists. He was crucial in setting up BC’s talented, athletic forwards and was tied for second in the nation in short-handed goals (4)
• Cam Atkinson, Jimmy Hayes (F): Both left to sign professional contracts over the off-season, and can you blame them? They had both achieved all there is to achieve at the college hockey level, and both were always threats to score on the ice, from any angle. Atkinson in particular will be tough to replace: 68 goals in three seasons, including a staggering 31 last season. Atkinson finished tied for 10th in the nation in points per game (1.33, with UNH’s Paul Thompson), second in the nation in goals scored (31). Hayes, meanwhile, had a nose for big games, scoring the Beanpot game winner over Northeastern, one of five game-winning goals on the year. Their departures mean that four of BC’s top 5 scorers from last season will have left.
• Philip Samuelsson (D): Perhaps one of the most criticized early departures of the off-season, Samuelsson leaves after a sophomore year in which he became a key part of BC’s defense, but many believe still could have spent another year in college hockey to develop.

Key returners:

• Brian Dumoulin (D): One of the best defenseman in all of Hockey East, he was named to the all-conference first team, and scored more points than any defenseman in the league last year. Dumoulin rejoins a BC defensive corps that is highly talented (with names like Tommy Cross, Patrick Wey, and Edwin Shea) and largely intact from last season. And in all of this, Brian is still only a junior. Look for him to again be one of the top-performing defenseman in the league, if not the country.
• Chris Kreider (F): The New York Rangers had at one point wanted Kreider to leave the team, but Kreider wanted to stay, and his decision may pay dividends – he’s one of the most exciting players to watch in the conference, and coming back for his junior season may be what Boston College needs after its offensive firepower was somewhat depleted during the offseason. After a terrifying injury late in the season last year, Kreider should be back to full health.
• Patrick Wey (D): With a new goaltender at Boston College, the defense will have to play tighter, and perhaps no BC defenseman will be more counted on to do the job than Wey. Wey wasn’t the type to join the fray on offense, but was as solid a defenseman as anyone in the league.

2011-2012 Outlook: Boston College lost a lot of offense to graduation and early departures, but as we often say, they don’t rebuild – they reload. Expect plenty of freshmen to get chances to contribute – Jerry York is confident in his recruits, and has no problem putting them into pressure situations. At the same time, the most important area of the team – goaltender – has quite a bit of uncertainty. Parker Milner saw very limited time the last two years, and Chris Venti has barely seen game time. The defense will become more of a focal point for BC, much as they will try to retain their reputation for a run-and-gun offense. There may be some surprise results in the first half of the year, but counting BC out of a home ice spot would be foolish. They’ll be contenders, just as ever.

–Alex Faust

WRBB Sports Fall Sports, Hockey BC, Fall Preview, Hockey East

Yesterday was the unoffficial kickoff to a new season of Northeastern hockey – Hockey East Media Day at the TD Garden. A chance for the media to mingle with coaches and league officials, and catch up with other college hockey media folks who have returned from the summer break.

Here’s a breakdown on the major league-wide happenings and talking points from the event:

No Notre Dame…yet: League commissioner Joe Bertagna made mention of expansion only in the sense that he hadn’t started work on a league schedule past March 2013. It was both because of the potential for Hockey East to expand (though no schools were mentioned), and as a result, he would be interested in shortening the league schedule from 27 games. Notre Dame is still reportedly on the fence, likely due to the fluid situation with conference realignment in the football/basketball world. The prevailing thought is that this story won’t go away until Notre Dame makes a final decision.

No TV schedule…yet: This was less about back-room dealings for conference expansion and more to do with finalizing details with league partners NESN and CBS Sports Network, as well as a potential national deal with another TV outlet (likely Versus/NBC Sports Network). It’s expected that the TV schedule will be finalized soon.

Rosters delayed: The league did not publish its media guide for the new season on Tuesday, not only because of the TV schedule, but because several teams have delayed releasing official rosters. Due to three new coaches in the league, several players opting to leave for professional deals during the off-season, and the lack of practice time available to coaches, several teams have not yet finalized their rosters. This is by far the latest we’ve ever seen rosters published. We’re less than 10 days away from the start of the season!

–

Now, onto the Northeastern side of things…

No longer robots: We had an interesting discussion with Steve Quailer about the changes to the coaching staff. The words he used – it’s like a “breath of fresh air,” and the players aren’t being forced to be “robots” anymore. Strong words about a change in coaching philosophy that you could see coming from the moment Jim Madigan was named head coach. Listen for more in the audio we’ll be posting later today.

Exhibition tension: Madigan said that he would dress his entire team in Sunday’s exhibition against St. Francis Xavier, and it would be a “dry run” not only for his team, but for the coaches as well. This is perhaps the most important exhibition game Northeastern has played in several years, as it gives the new coaching staff a first look at real game conditions.

No major change to the system: Jim Madigan, as we know, has been closely tied to the Northeastern hockey program for many years. He said on Tuesday that he’s largely taken the previous system (he didn’t say it outright, but we assume that this includes the cycle) but has let the offense open up a bit. Look for a continuation of the “identity” that Northeastern has developed of a physical defense, but perhaps with a more aggressive offensive look.

Flaman honored: Joe Bertagna let the cat out of the bag, so to speak, as he mentioned that Fernie Flaman would be inducted into the Massachusetts Hockey Hall of Fame this fall. Yet another honor for Northeastern’s best coach in program history.

–

Look for part 2 of our Media Day redux this evening as we post full interviews with coaches and players from Tuesday’s event.

Alex Faust Hockey Hockey East