Thank you, Notre Dame. Thank you, Miami. Thank you, Northern Michigan.
I know you three programs didn’t win this past weekend to make this girl reporter happy — Walt Kyle told me as much — but the sweeps of Colgate and Wisconsin along with the Icebreaker title helped to soften the blow of writing this first column of the season, what with the CCHA breaking up with me and all.
Wait — you don’t see it that way? Think I’m taking this too personally? You think I’m the only one who does?
“I’m disappointed the way the cards fell, and the way everyone left the league so quickly.” That’s what Michigan coach Red Berenson said just before the 2012-13 season began. He was referring to the way in which several CCHA teams felt the need to find homes in other leagues when news of the Big Ten was breaking.
Every time Berenson talks about it, it sounds personal. That’s because it is. In the press box in the newly renovated — and even more beautiful — Yost Arena last Thursday night, every reporter was keenly aware that he or she was covering a game at the beginning of an end. The feeling is unavoidable, no matter how we choose to dress up this final season for cameras and press releases.
I’m just glad the league begins 2012-13 with a title. I am hoping it ends that way, too.
Speaking of the end of the world …
How about that Thursday night game in Yost Arena?
The Wolverines had two, two-goal leads in their 5-4 overtime loss to Rochester Institute of Technology. The Tigers scored two unanswered goals in the third period to tie it up and won on Adam Hartley’s goal 14 seconds into OT.
In his postgame news conference, Berenson said that the goals that freshman Jared Rutledge allowed looked “soft.” Rutledge — who it should be noted has had recent eye surgery — allowed five goals on 26 shots. Also, the Wolverines looked lost without junior defenseman Jon Merrill, whom Michigan lost the week before to fractured vertebrae. Berenson said that losing Merrill was no excuse for the Wolverines’ mediocre outing.
“It was a tough night to be a goalie in our end and we have to be better than that,” Berenson said. “Our D have to play better and our forwards have to play better, too.”
Afterward, there was a different perspective from people familiar with the RIT program. It was as though the Tigers had brought a slingshot to Ann Arbor and slain a giant.
I found this surprising — perhaps because I didn’t find it surprising that a good RIT team could come to Ann Arbor and beat Michigan. I knew that Michigan’s goaltending would be untested. I knew that the team would be adjusting to the unexpected loss of Merrill. I had already suspected that the entire Michigan squad would need a few weeks to look ready — just as I believe that by February, Berenson & Co. will have worked their magic and the Wolverines will be contending for a league title, no matter where they are in the standings at the end of December.
It also never occurred to me that a good Atlantic Hockey team like RIT, a program that has made a Frozen Four appearance in recent memory, wouldn’t have a chance against a top CCHA team — not because the CCHA is weak (as you know I don’t believe that) but because I see the AHA as competitive.
I walked away from the night happy for RIT and Tigers coach Wayne Wilson, a really good guy with deep CCHA ties, because the win seemed to mean more to that program than the loss did to Michigan. I also walked away from the night having had early season suspicions confirmed about the Wolverines.
That the Wolverines scored four unanswered goals within a seven-minute span in the third period the following night to beat the Tigers 7-2 — and that 21-year-old freshman Steve Racine earned his first win in the process — didn’t surprise me one bit, either.
This college hockey landscape is changing in more ways than one.
A happy surprise
I’ll be honest here: I was surprised that Northern Michigan swept Wisconsin. You can add “delighted” to that, too.
“We were happy with it,” said Kyle, NMU’s coach. “I thought it was a typical opening weekend.”
Typical? Going to Green Bay, Wis., as the “home” team and sweeping a team that was ranked the week before, a WCHA team that was ranked the week before?
Kyle clarified. “There were moments when we were good; there were moments when we were sloppy,” he said. “I’d say the same thing for Wisconsin. Both nights, we came out in the second and third and we were much better than we were in the first.”
With five different Wildcats players scoring, there were a number of familiar names on the tally sheet, but freshman Cohen Adair had two goals on the weekend, including Friday’s game winner.
The hero of the weekend, though, has to be junior goaltender Jared Coreau, who had 37 saves in the two wins and a .925 save percentage to begin the new season. Kyle said that Coreau emerged as the NMU starter in the second half of last season.
“There’s no doubt,” Kyle said. “We had Reid Ellingson here, and I kept coming back to splitting the two in net.”
Kyle said that Coreau struggled his freshman season with back-to-back nights and then had a tough weekend of consecutive nights early last season, so Kyle didn’t play Coreau as much as he now thinks he should have.
“The dumb coach that I am I said, ‘Let’s keep him back,'” Kyle said. “I was cautious with it and he only got a couple kicks at it.”
This season, Kyle said: “Jared’s really taken his training to another level. He trained all summer, watches what he eats, counts calories, all to an exceptional level. And he’s an exceptional kid off the ice, too.”
Although he sounds a little low-key about it, Kyle is optimistic about the Wildcats’ chances this year.
“I like our leadership,” he said. “We have a really good chemistry and a really good belief. I’m not just saying that because we won a couple. That leadership was really evident to me after the first period on Saturday. We were down 1-0 and we weren’t playing well. I didn’t have to say a word to those guys in the locker room. They did it all themselves.”
In recent years, NMU has had a knack for beginning the season with a challenging schedule. That doesn’t change this season. “We have to survive through a really — our schedule is moderately ridiculous,” Kyle said.
This weekend, it’s 16 hours on the bus each way out to Omaha, Neb., and back to play the Mavericks. The Wildcats follow that up with home series against Notre Dame and Michigan before traveling to Ohio for two consecutive weekends in November, first for a series against Miami before returning to play Ohio State.
“There’s wisdom there,” Kyle said.
The weekend for the CCHA? Meh …
The CCHA is .500 in nonconference play after the big opening weekend. Against which league did the CCHA fare poorest? Atlantic Hockey, against which the CCHA is 1-2-2 in the early going — although the conference is also underwater (3-4-1) against ECAC Hockey.
You know, we do have a lot to celebrate
Of course, we wouldn’t be celebrating if we weren’t staring at the league’s imminent demise.
That aside, the CCHA itself has launched a very cool search for former players who have won a league championship, and the conference is asking for your help to locate these guys. The league wants to catch up with as many of these players as possible, giving updated bios, photos and anything else that the players themselves will want to share.
Here’s the press release from before the season, explaining the initiative and telling you how you can help. This is worth a look and a little effort if you can help.
And this is how this works
You long-time readers don’t need a reminder, but if you’re new, you may not know that we conference writers talk about our leagues three times per week during the season. On Mondays, we blog about three things that struck us from the previous weekend. Columns are published midweek. On Fridays, each of us makes picks for the weekend — although I may do that early when there are Thursday games.
You can contact me via email (paula.weston@uscho.com), through Twitter (@paulacweston) or you may respond to what I publish in the forum below. I can’t check constantly, but I do check in for reader comments when I can and I will respond when I have the time.
I’m often found at Michigan State or Michigan home games — not because I favor those teams, but because Munn and Yost are the closest rinks to Flint, Mich., where I reside and where I teach at Mott Community College. Please say hello to me if you see me at a rink.
I am sure that I will sound flippant (and dramatically bitter) about the end of the CCHA this season, all in an effort to entertain, but make no mistake about it: I am sad. I don’t plan to dwell on this, but there’s no getting around the fact that I will miss this specific mix of teams and many, many of the people associated with them, from coaches to equipment managers to sports information directors to ushers to fans.
For 18 years, the CCHA has been an integral part of my life. Given the big geography of this league and how far removed it is from the concentration of college hockey out East, I have often felt like I’ve been covering college hockey in some Midwestern outpost, and because of that I have made a home in this CCHA landscape.
I’ll be thinking of my favorite CCHA memories this season and sharing them and my perspective in my columns. I would like to share yours, too. I can only do that, though, if you email me to tell me your stories and give me permission to use them.
While the league is wanting to remember all the guys who won a championship — and it’s a fitting way to celebrate the final year of the CCHA — I suggest that we share all of the stories that we have, big or small, that make up our CCHA memories.
Don’t be a stranger.
