The Terry Pegula Effect

[X. Benedict]

Is there a Terry Pegula Effect in College Hockey?:

 

http://www.stanleycupofchowder.com/2011/7/15/2276540/hockey-east-national-collegiate-hockey-conference-terry-pegula

 

If there is, not everyone is happy about it.

 

 

"The Terry Pegula effect extends beyond adding a couple million dollars to the Sabres bankroll. Before taking the helm up in Buffalo Mr. Pegula made his first splash in the hockey world by agreeing to fund Penn State's entry into Division I college hockey, and before they can even drop the puck in State College the world of NCAA hockey is beginning to shift dramatically.

 

With the news that Colorado College, Denver, Miami, Minnesota-Duluth, Nebraska-Omaha and North Dakota intends on forming a new conference in the wake of the creation of Big Ten Hockey. What's left is the dissolve of both the CCHA and WCHA and what could be a dangerous precedent from college hockey."

[LastPommerFan]

I don't see this as a danger for college hockey. I think it is exactly what is needed right now. The knock on NCAA hockey (although it is improving leaps and bounds) is that the competition level is just not good enough. If reallignment creates fewer programs with better talent, then that competition level will rise. There is still one real big fish left in the midwest (Notre Dame), but other than that, I see a split occurring where the talent will head toward the Big 10 and the Great Plains conferences out west and of course the goliaths in the east will still be great. As these teams start to concentrate the talent, there will be some tragic conciquences for the Ferris States and Michigan Tech's of the world, but the competition will get much much better.

 

Look at the College World Series. There really are only 4 competative conferences (ACC, SEC, Big1210, and Pac1012) in baseball, and the sport is great at the college level.

[shrader]

I can't agree with a single word of that, LPF. Take a look at the last few frozen fours. We've seen underdog teams like RIT, Vermont, and Bemidji State make it into the frozen fours, as well as overachieving teams on the rise like Miami and Notre Dame. There is quite a bit of balance in the college hockey world. A few of the power teams may run through the regular season, but they've been failing in the post season lately.

 

With these two re-alignments, 5-8 programs are staring death in the face. That would be horrible for american hockey. With less teams and less roster spots to fill, even more kids will reject hockey in favor of football/baseball/hockey. The NCAA needs to be expanding, not losing teams. That unfortunately will never happen when you have two superconferences who won't want to play the lower level programs.

 

College hockey is and will always be a niche sport. The last thing they need to do is to shut the door on the already tiny number of fans they have.

[X. Benedict]

I can't agree with a single word of that, LPF. Take a look at the last few frozen fours. We've seen underdog teams like RIT, Vermont, and Bemidji State make it into the frozen fours, as well as overachieving teams on the rise like Miami and Notre Dame. There is quite a bit of balance in the college hockey world. A few of the power teams may run through the regular season, but they've been failing in the post season lately.

 

great point.

 

With these two re-alignments, 5-8 programs are staring death in the face. That would be horrible for american hockey. With less teams and less roster spots to fill, even more kids will reject hockey in favor of football/baseball/hockey. The NCAA needs to be expanding, not losing teams. That unfortunately will never happen when you have two superconferences who won't want to play the lower level programs.

 

College hockey is and will always be a niche sport. The last thing they need to do is to shut the door on the already tiny number of fans they have.

 

If it means fewer D-1 programs...that is bad for US Hockey.

[korab rules]

I can't agree with a single word of that, LPF. Take a look at the last few frozen fours. We've seen underdog teams like RIT, Vermont, and Bemidji State make it into the frozen fours, as well as overachieving teams on the rise like Miami and Notre Dame. There is quite a bit of balance in the college hockey world. A few of the power teams may run through the regular season, but they've been failing in the post season lately.

 

With these two re-alignments, 5-8 programs are staring death in the face. That would be horrible for american hockey. With less teams and less roster spots to fill, even more kids will reject hockey in favor of football/baseball/hockey. The NCAA needs to be expanding, not losing teams. That unfortunately will never happen when you have two superconferences who won't want to play the lower level programs.

 

College hockey is and will always be a niche sport. The last thing they need to do is to shut the door on the already tiny number of fans they have.

 

Shrader - I agree with everything you said - college hockey needs to expand to increase its popularity at the youth level - the opportunities for kids to play in college are extremely limited at present. Take one school in my backyard - Elmira College, a very good Div. III program - well over half the roster are Canadian kids coming in as 21 year old freshen after exhausting their Junior eligibility. I can't swear to it, but am pretty sure all the kids they play against are in the same boat. Very few American kids are going to play junior until they are 21, losing 3 years of their life when they could already be in college, for the opportunity to MAYBE play college hockey. I know its not entirely the same at the Div. 1 level where the real top talent goes and plays at 18, but at the lower levels there is so much competition for so few spots that when kids hit high school and are looking to concentrate in a sport to maximize their chance at playing in college they are moving away from hockey because of the limited opportunities.

 

We are a country almost 10 times the size of Canada, but we can't beat them consistently because most of our best athletes never strap on a pair of skates. In Canada, the vast majority of their best athletes are playing hockey from the time they are 3 years old. We need to do everything we can at every level of hockey to increase the opportunities to play so that we can keep our hockey players playing hockey into the college ranks and not make them choose between sacrificing 3 years of their life or playing a different sport.

 

And to the person who gave shrader a thumbs down for a well thought out post without so much as stating why you disagree - :thumbdown:

[Weave]

And to the person who gave shrader a thumbs down for a well thought out post without so much as stating why you disagree - :thumbdown:

 

I spent one of my +1's to fix it. Too many well thought out posts getting neg'd without explanation.

[BetweenThePipes00]

I was not the one rating posts, but I am not buying the idea that a big school with resources, in a big conference with resources and a television network, adding hockey is going to be a BAD thing in the long run. We need more of this, not less. I am not saying there will not be growing pains, it might hurt some smaller programs in the short run ....

 

But kids growing up thinking they can play hockey for a school like Penn State is a good thing ... like it or not, Bemidji State is NOT a destination school for most kids. Penn State is ... Youth hockey is growing like crazy in Pennsylvania and Ohio .and a lot of other states on the edge of college hockey's reach. Give these kids a place to play at schools they grow up following and they are more likely to stick with the sport. Kids are 12 and 13 when they are deciding which sport to commit to ... how many 12 year olds have heard of Bemidji State? How many think "Hey yeah, I'll go to Alaska-Anchorage!" But you have a chance if they can go to a place like Penn State where they can major in anything and maybe they are not going there JUST to play hockey.

 

I admit I am not a hard-core college hockey guy ... so maybe I am out of my league in this discussion. But I think college hockey needs more of this, not less.

[LGR4GM]

I think non professional hockey needs to start acting like soccer. Everyone has a soccer team. High schools, middle schools, youth leagues, pretty much every college. Hockey needs to expand not shrink. The more colleges involved the more talented i think those programs will get because they would have to, to be competitive.

I bet there are lots of kids who could be pro players but because at the ripe old age of 18 they arent there yet skill wise or mentally they fall by the wayside. More college is hockey is a good thing for the sport in general. UB not having a hockey team has always baffled me but the fact a lot of places don't is sad. I dont want hockey to be like baseball has become where its contracting instead of expanding. More college hockey means more players are playing which means there is generally more talent in the mix to begin with. I hope that Hockey grows in colleges because it would be so much fun to watch... kinda like college football.

 

I spent one of my +1's to fix it. Too many well thought out posts getting neg'd without explanation.

9 out of 10 of mine are but its just a rating system, it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of life

[LastPommerFan]

I can't agree with a single word of that, LPF. Take a look at the last few frozen fours. We've seen underdog teams like RIT, Vermont, and Bemidji State make it into the frozen fours, as well as overachieving teams on the rise like Miami and Notre Dame. There is quite a bit of balance in the college hockey world. A few of the power teams may run through the regular season, but they've been failing in the post season lately.

 

With these two re-alignments, 5-8 programs are staring death in the face. That would be horrible for american hockey. With less teams and less roster spots to fill, even more kids will reject hockey in favor of football/baseball/hockey. The NCAA needs to be expanding, not losing teams. That unfortunately will never happen when you have two superconferences who won't want to play the lower level programs.

 

College hockey is and will always be a niche sport. The last thing they need to do is to shut the door on the already tiny number of fans they have.

 

I totally agree with the first bold. There is a ton of balance in college hockey. The problem is that balance is at a mediocre level. It is not a place to develop to the best of your abilities. There are 57 Major Junior hockey teams in Canada. There are 61 Division I Ice hockey programs in the united states. There is simply not enough talent right now looking to go the NCAA route to support a high level of hockey for that number of teams. Top players are not going to improve as much playing against bad teams half the season as they would playing in a smaller higher performing realm.

 

The other huge benefit of this change is that the Big10 has it's own TV network with significant household penetration. Starting in 2013 fans of these schools will be able to watch entire seasons rather than just the ccha/wcha tourney and the frozen four. This is what college hockey fans need. Not simply more of their sport, more access to their sport. Hockey needs to move beyond just looking at season tickets and gate reciepts to measure their fan base. Kids watch 95% of their sports on TV. College Hockey needs to be on TV.

 

PS- it is of note that I am an alum of the big midwest school that appears to be left out of the conference shuffle. And they just built a new arena too.

 

EDIT- Also, I did not neg rate any of the posts. They're good points, just missing a greater long term vision.

[Weave]

9 out of 10 of mine are but its just a rating system, it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of life

 

LOL and someone just neg'd you for it. :clapping:

[LGR4GM]

LOL and someone just neg'd you for it. :clapping:

lol, i have pretty much narrowed that down to 3-4 posters, honestly whatever :thumbsup:

[SabresFan526]

The investment Terry Pegula made in Penn State is very good for College Hockey. There needs to be more investment like that at other schools to get the game to pick up as a collegiate sport. It's a great sport and there need to be more teams competing in college hockey.

 

The Conference Realignment does not seem good. You want more colleges competing in hockey and creating super conferences creates the issue you get with the BCS. Only the BCS Conferences matter and that hurts the small schools. You want the small schools to compete and they have had some success in the Frozen Four, and you want to encourage that. The model should be like College Basketball where the small schools have a chance to compete and be successful in the Frozen Four. BCS Bad, College Basketball model is good. Investment in College Hockey is great.

[ROC Sabres]

I was not the one rating posts, but I am not buying the idea that a big school with resources, in a big conference with resources and a television network, adding hockey is going to be a BAD thing in the long run. We need more of this, not less. I am not saying there will not be growing pains, it might hurt some smaller programs in the short run ....

 

But kids growing up thinking they can play hockey for a school like Penn State is a good thing ... like it or not, Bemidji State is NOT a destination school for most kids. Penn State is ... Youth hockey is growing like crazy in Pennsylvania and Ohio .and a lot of other states on the edge of college hockey's reach. Give these kids a place to play at schools they grow up following and they are more likely to stick with the sport. Kids are 12 and 13 when they are deciding which sport to commit to ... how many 12 year olds have heard of Bemidji State? How many think "Hey yeah, I'll go to Alaska-Anchorage!" But you have a chance if they can go to a place like Penn State where they can major in anything and maybe they are not going there JUST to play hockey.

 

I admit I am not a hard-core college hockey guy ... so maybe I am out of my league in this discussion. But I think college hockey needs more of this, not less.

I'm in the same boat as you in not being in depth with college hockey knowledge but I agree with what you are saying. One of the biggest hurdles I think that really hurts smaller programs is scholarships. Colleges that move from D-3 to D-1 have that added advantage over schools in D-3 programs. Most students will play for Alaska-Anchorage with a full ride instead of playing for a local school that they have been accepted to.

 

And please clarify if I am wrong about the scholarships but I THOUGHT you could only get a full athletic scholarship to a DI program.

 

And here come the negs.

[LastPommerFan]

I'm in the same boat as you in not being in depth with college hockey knowledge but I agree with what you are saying. One of the biggest hurdles I think that really hurts smaller programs is scholarships. Colleges that move from D-3 to D-1 have that added advantage over schools in D-3 programs. Most students will play for Alaska-Anchorage with a full ride instead of playing for a local school that they have been accepted to.

 

And please clarify if I am wrong about the scholarships but I THOUGHT you could only get a full athletic scholarship to a DI program.

 

And here come the negs.

 

15 of the 20 current players on the AA roster are NOT from the US, only 2 players are from the continental US. Very few players are heading to play for the seawolves because they can't get a scholarship locally.

[BetweenThePipes00]

15 of the 20 current players on the AA roster are NOT from the US, only 2 players are from the continental US. Very few players are heading to play for the seawolves because they can't get a scholarship locally.

 

Bemidji State also has 15 non-U.S. born players. Lake Superior State has 17. Remind me again how these programs are helping to grow the game in the U.S.? They are mostly just giving out scholarships to Canadians. That's fine, I guess, I am sure Penn State will have some too ... although Michigan has only 5 and Notre Dame has only 4.

 

Any chance that might be because American kids are drawn to the big schools? And so adding more big schools like Penn State might be good for the game in this country, even if it comes at the expense of a school that is just giving most of its scholarships to Canadians anyway?

[shrader]

The investment Terry Pegula made in Penn State is very good for College Hockey. There needs to be more investment like that at other schools to get the game to pick up as a collegiate sport. It's a great sport and there need to be more teams competing in college hockey.

 

The Conference Realignment does not seem good. You want more colleges competing in hockey and creating super conferences creates the issue you get with the BCS. Only the BCS Conferences matter and that hurts the small schools. You want the small schools to compete and they have had some success in the Frozen Four, and you want to encourage that. The model should be like College Basketball where the small schools have a chance to compete and be successful in the Frozen Four. BCS Bad, College Basketball model is good. Investment in College Hockey is great.

 

Right. Penn State is good and the Big 10 itself wasn't really going to hurt much, but the second re-alignment is what really stings. What essentially happened is they took 2 good conferences, weeded out all the weaker teams and then threw them out to the side. So now we basically still have 4 big time conferences, but 6-8 times were cast aside. They either merge into another Atlantic Hockey type conference or they are left playing for nothing (need to have 6 teams in a conference to qualify for an auto-bid). My guess is that a few of them do get picked up and the rest drift around for a couple years.

 

BTP, you're right, many people don't dream of going to a school like Bemidji. What we need to remember though is that with so much of the college hockey talent coming from the Minnesota area, those kids have in fact heard of that school. They may not be a draw in the northeast, but they can definitely draw from other talent rich hockey markets. The same goes for schools like St. Cloud.

[LGR4GM]

Right. Penn State is good and the Big 10 itself wasn't really going to hurt much, but the second re-alignment is what really stings. What essentially happened is they took 2 good conferences, weeded out all the weaker teams and then threw them out to the side. So now we basically still have 4 big time conferences, but 6-8 times were cast aside. They either merge into another Atlantic Hockey type conference or they are left playing for nothing (need to have 6 teams in a conference to qualify for an auto-bid). My guess is that a few of them do get picked up and the rest drift around for a couple years.

 

BTP, you're right, many people don't dream of going to a school like Bemidji. What we need to remember though is that with so much of the college hockey talent coming from the Minnesota area, those kids have in fact heard of that school. They may not be a draw in the northeast, but they can definitely draw from other talent rich hockey markets. The same goes for schools like St. Cloud.

thank you! :thumbsup:

 

edit: thxs again shrader! :thumbsup:

[BetweenThePipes00]

Right. Penn State is good and the Big 10 itself wasn't really going to hurt much, but the second re-alignment is what really stings. What essentially happened is they took 2 good conferences, weeded out all the weaker teams and then threw them out to the side. So now we basically still have 4 big time conferences, but 6-8 times were cast aside. They either merge into another Atlantic Hockey type conference or they are left playing for nothing (need to have 6 teams in a conference to qualify for an auto-bid). My guess is that a few of them do get picked up and the rest drift around for a couple years.

 

BTP, you're right, many people don't dream of going to a school like Bemidji. What we need to remember though is that with so much of the college hockey talent coming from the Minnesota area, those kids have in fact heard of that school. They may not be a draw in the northeast, but they can definitely draw from other talent rich hockey markets. The same goes for schools like St. Cloud.

 

So why do they need 15 kids from Canada?

[Weave]

lol, i have pretty much narrowed that down to 3-4 posters, honestly whatever :thumbsup:

 

given your earlier admission that 9 out of 10 of them are from you, you probably are asking for them.

[shrader]

So why do they need 15 kids from Canada?

 

They're going to pull in the best talent they can get regardless of where they come from. That's not why it's bad for american hockey. It's bad because if these teams do go away, there will be less games for kids to watch. Kids don't want to play a sport because certain players are from the US. They want to play because they learn to love it by watching it. No one would ever wind up playing hockey if they only wanted to watch american players all day.

[biodork]

given your earlier admission that 9 out of 10 of them are from you, you probably are asking for them.

 

I think he meant that 9 out of 10 of his own posts were getting a negative rating. :unsure:

[Weave]

I think he meant that 9 out of 10 of his own posts were getting a negative rating. :unsure:

 

 

Oh. :blink:

 

Well that's different then. :blush:

[LGR4GM]

given your earlier admission that 9 out of 10 of them are from you, you probably are asking for them.

no 9 out of 10 of my posts get negated. I posted "I love Hockey" and got a -1 so the rating system to me is a joke! lol :thumbsup:

[MattPie]

No one would ever wind up playing hockey if they only wanted to watch american players all day.

 

I often wonder if baseball's fall from 'the national pastime' to football is related to there being more and more non-US players. Ditto for Indycar vs. NASCAR.

 

About hockey vs. soccer: the "problem" with hockey is money. If you want your kid to play soccer, you buy him or her some shoes, shin guards, socks, and a ball, and set them loose in the back yard or down at the local park. The same applies to basketball. Hockey requires a ton more equipment ($$) and somewhere to play, unless you're talking street hockey. I'm not sure how you fix that.

[LastPommerFan]

They're going to pull in the best talent they can get regardless of where they come from. That's not why it's bad for american hockey. It's bad because if these teams do go away, there will be less games for kids to watch. Kids don't want to play a sport because certain players are from the US. They want to play because they learn to love it by watching it. No one would ever wind up playing hockey if they only wanted to watch american players all day.

 

Right, and by definition right now, those kids are second rate, and it shows on the ice. Small schools with small alumni bases will never help hockey move forward. It's harsh, but I want huge Michigan-OSU hockey rivalries broadcast to every home from Traverse City to Cincinnati. I want to see loads of, "This guys was drafted by The Redwings", "That guy will be playing in the Rangers organization next year", etc. This is the stuff that will grow hockey. And having players leave the NCAA ranks to go play in the AHL because the talent and competition level are so much higher, is not going to grow the game. [que the impassioned speech music] I want top talent players on the ice at all times, and more importantly, glowing through the screen at my sons precious 3 year old eyes so he dreams of playing hockey for the Irish, or the Spartans, or the Eagles, or the Crimson. But he's easy, he'll be a hockey fan by blood, I want some kid in Denver watching the Denver-North Dakota games by himself because he learned about hockey in Phys Ed class in school and now he wants to see great teams playing each other. Hockey, good hockey, will win over any sports fan anywhere, it just needs to be high quality and more accessible.