Sunday, January 28, 2007

Get Back to Basics

A week from past Friday, RIT lost to UConn. They let a 3 goal lead after 1 slip away. Basically, they stopped playing good hockey and seemed to play like they had the game won. Well, UConn just outworked and outplayed RIT after that first period and won in OT.

RIT seemed to learn that you can't take it easy against anyone the following night. RIT won that game 4-2 and looked much better doing so.

Fast forward to this past weekend. RIT played AIC. The last time they met, RIT outscored them 16-3. The made them look terrible. You would think that RIT would have learned the lessons from Friday. I don't think any RIT fans gave them much of a shot.

Well, RIT decided to only play 2 periods over the weekend. Thanks to some great goaltending, that was enough. RIT trailed AIC 2-1 late in the second before RIT rattled off 5 straight goals to win 6-2. The Tigers did not play their kind of hockey. They played a more up and down game condusive to what AIC wanted to do. Only in the 3rd did RIT play it's normal game.

The Tigers seemed to learn their lessons when Saturday started. RIT scored the first 3 goals in the first period. But then several penalties in a row against RIT changed momentum and AIC started to get back into the game. Only some excellant goaltending by Menard allowed RIT to win.

This is a disturbing trend. RIT has only recently been put in the position where winning is expected again. Perhaps they have been checking all the college hockey sites and seeing all the press they have been getting. Everyone keeps writing about how good they are. Hopefilly, they don't think they can just win games by showing up. That certainly is not the case on this level.

I think this weekends games against Canisius are going to be telling. The Griffins are a phyisical team. RIT beat them in their first 2 matchups this year. They will work hard. The Tigers are going to have to outwork them to win. IF RIT can beat them the way they did last time, I think they will be ok. Otherwise, it could get tough holding on to the conference lead.

Thursday, January 11, 2007

RIT vrs. Syracuse? Don't best on it

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while. Sometimes, things like your job get in the way of doing some of the things you want to do.

The hot topic this week on the RIT thread seems to be that Syracuse is looking at going Division I in hockey. College Hockey News is reporting that the Orange is investigating how things work.

I'm not going to hold my breath here. Syracuse has a lot on it's plate already athletically. The football team is one of the worst in the Big East. The basketball team is playing pretty well at least, and will likely make the NCAA tournament again. And don't forget that Syracuse already has a great lacrosse program. So, hockey would already be behind in that respect.

We also know that while Syracuse fans are rabid, they won't show as much if the team does not win. Football attendance is going down while the team is losing. The hockey team would take a while to win - especially if they go into a "major" hockey conference. I don't see where Syracuse fans wanting to go to a small conference like Atlantic Hockey. Think they would turn out for an RIT-Syracuse game at SU? Not me. Maybe UConn.

Now if Syracuse can get other Big East members that have club teams to move up and create a Big East hockey conference with UConn, Providence, and Notre Dame - that could cause interesting reprecussions with 2 holes in major conferences. There would be some interesting conference realignment there. This could also get other major conferences to get their hockey teams under their banner (the "dreaded" Big Ten hockey conference. But I think that would be hard to to.

Let's not forget that Syracuse doesn't exactly have a long history of successful AHL teams. The have had several teams at the War Memorial. They also used to have a Syracuse Invitational Tournament (RIT has played there). That folded in part to lack of interest. I don't know if a new NCAA team would succeed where this failed.

In closing, I wouldn't hold my breath on Syracuse making the leap anytime soon.