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Spear and Magic Helmet

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Spear and Magic Helmet last won the day on March 15

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  1. Ha. Probably not. But she is doing a good job. Their content looks great.
  2. I think the more interesting story would be at Liberty University. They have plenty of Canadian players too.
  3. I absolutely do remember that. The school exists still and coincidentally, one of the better players on the River Monsters is a Canadian who went and played there. I also don't know if Life is still a powerhouse or if they even still have a team, but yeah in that era, they were always at Nationals in D2 and won a few times. I want to say that the ACHA might have made it harder for grad students to play. They definitely reduce the amount of eligibility. It was 12 semesters or 6 years back in that era (I forget which) and I know at one point it went down to 10 semesters or 5 years. https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/222041/kynan-tarnowski https://www.achahockey.org/mens-division-1-national-champions-2
  4. Hockey budget size is a much, much bigger factor than school size. They also have a rink on campus, which some NCAA schools don't have. Jeff Docking is a big hockey guy and gets their teams a lot of money. He sort of had a vision like that at W&J, but I don't think he had the support from the administration that he wanted. W&J was a very good ACHA D1 team when he was there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Docking
  5. Perkiomen Valley is a public school and about the same size as the AAA schools out here, but you are right that AAA is dominated by private schools. I don't know what the answer is, but I do think making them play the biggest classification is a good solution.
  6. Let's put it this way, if PIHL can do individual stats, so can PAHL. I'm sure the complaints are happening in PIHL. There is a policy you can put in, I'm sure. I actually thought the issue was a lack of volunteers to do the manual input of stats, but it's clear that is not the reason. Also, to your point about the NHL, I'm in a fantasy hockey league that counts hits as a stat. They have been correcting those totals for the last 3 weeks due to some review the NHL did of the hit stats. So even those guys don't get it "right". I say just publish what you have and figure out some way to deal with things being wrong. It seems nearly universal that people want to see the stats and they would much rather see stats that are 95% accurate than nothing at all. The comment about player names on jerseys, I guess I'm old. When I was more involved, most teams did not have player names on jerseys. I will say though that uniforms have become much more elaborate and nicer...and more expensive. The uniforms I'm thinking of without names on the were owned by the organizations and they were adequate, but not nice. Sounds like that's just the times changing, but I do also feel like the names on the backs of jerseys take away from the team concept.
  7. I agree with the points about Black Bear and AA hockey. I think it's just a matter of time before PAHL is B and their 6-8 levels of A (minor/major, white/gold/black, birthyear, whatever other way they want to divide it). I think the "independent" teams will probably migrate to the black bear leagues because they will let them play AA and there is already some travel built into the schedule, because driving farther means it's "better". In the end, a Pittsburgh division of AA teams is probably not a bad result, but the cost is certainly not going to go down.
  8. It's been years since I've been around ACHA hockey, but my experience matches yours. In the 90s, you were happy to get kids who at least played on a high school team. Believe it or not, playing high school hockey was a much lower bar than it is now. By the early 2010s, those same kids were getting cut. And around the same time (1990s), I do remember ECHL games were nothing but fights. Were they called the Wheeling Thunderbirds at first?? Now it's a legit AA option and even some of the single A leagues are sort of legit these days. I think it started when NHL teams needed a place to put their goalie prospects and it kind of ballooned from there. I'm not sure that the money is a whole lot better for the average ECHLer, but they do offer housing and some other amenities now.
  9. Not so sure that the local team is run any different from the other teams in the UHL. The bit about them going to Senior AAA status is a bit, uh, interesting. The fact that teams do way better at home than on the road is kind of telling. There are Senior leagues in the west, like the Black Diamond League, that would blow the doors off this league. I agree that the social media for the River Monsters is very good. Whoever is doing that should get a raise. https://www.eliteprospects.com/league/bdhl
  10. I agree with that. Plus it's not like the rink will come up in a month. It's a years-long plan to get the rink built.
  11. I agree. The comment about RMU losing to a D3 program doesn't have much weight. I don't see that happening. The D3 programs that were good enough to be D1 programs moved up to D1 a long time ago (St Cloud State, Mercyhurst, RIT, Bemiji State, etc.). The D3 programs left are barely better than ACHA D1 teams, and in fact in many case are not even that good. Yes, the big-time programs are going to dominate, but with only about 60 NCAA D1 programs any given year, there is just too much talent that RMU won't get some. Not granting the full 18 scholarships and smaller budgets will hurt, of course. The comment about the coaches not being the right staff to get them to a better spot, maybe that is true too. But despite the comments about there being too many Tier 1 programs around, there is still plenty of talent in the US, Canada, and Europe for RMU to fill its roster because of the scarcity of NCAA D1 options. I do think an on-campus rink and better facilities will help. It's not like basketball, where there are hundreds of programs & choices. If this option is a little better, their recruits will get better too. I am definitely not saying RMU is going to be a top choice for top 10 draft picks, but calling it a "last ditch" is not really true either. The alumni report certainly isn't as impressive as Michigan's or even UMass's, but it's not like there aren't some good players who went to RMU: https://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/alumni.php?tmi=7731
  12. I think you have the right as a coach to ask the question, but the referee doesn't have to respond. I have seen plenty of respectful and productive conversations result from a question, but I have seen plenty that are not. At the end of the day, blaming the calls or the officials is like blaming the YMCA rink for painting the goal lines too close to the end boards. I mean, yeah, it can affect the game, and the home team has a better idea of what will happen, but both teams are still playing by the same rules.
  13. Does a referee truly "owe" an explanation for a call? My gut says no. If you had to explain every single call, you would never finish a game. I feel like people who say that a call wasn't "explained" really just want to yell at the referee to either get the call overturned or intimidate the official into not making the next call. That's not to say that there aren't officials making terrible calls, but, let's be honest, there are plenty of players making terrible plays too and they don't have to hear about it from everyone else in the rink. I haven't looked at a rulebook in years, but when I did, I remember reading something along the lines of the referee only has to talk to the team captain who is marked with a "C" on the scoresheet. The official can talk to other people as courtesy, but the official only has to talk to the officially designated captain.
  14. Heard a rumor that there may have been a shakeup with the coaches too. Some disagreement between the owner and the coach. Anyone else hear anything?
  15. https://cdn1.sportngin.com/attachments/document/af77-3058963/What_is_Junior_Gold_Hockey.pdf https://cdn1.sportngin.com/attachments/document/0022/6821/JuniorGold_FAQ_2012-13.pdf It doesn't line up exactly that way, it's more of an alternative path. Technically, Jr Gold is 18U and 16U hockey. However, in MN, the emphasis is very much on high school hockey, so you only would play 18U/16U if you do not make a high school team. I am sure that there are exceptions to the rule. In general, JV is better than Jr Gold A and callups would be JV to Varsity like here. If you are cut from the JV team, you play Jr Gold if you want to play hockey still. Jr Gold A players do sometimes end up making varsity teams in later years. I am sure there are Jr Gold A teams that beat JV teams, depending on the high school. What is not clear to me is whether you have to be in the school district to play on the Jr Gold team. I think their school districts are much larger than here, so probably they do not have "co-op" Jr Gold teams. However, it doesn't seem like it is something that is against the rules. It also sounds like the JV & Varsity teams are funded by the school districts and Jr Gold teams are not.
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