Thank goodness it wasn't Danis; now I don't have to eviscerate anybody.
Bee(e)eej
Winner, Stupidest Nickname
2004 Facetimer Awards
Whew. Now we just need a couple of Pioneer goals tomorrow.
[Q]Thank goodness it wasn't Danis;[/Q]
Why? Is it a bad thing to show recruits that the ultimate national recognition can come to those who play in the ECAC?
Would it be a bad thing to show fans of the other conferences that the national media believes (rightly or wrongly) that the player with the best performance in a season played in the ECAC?
Give me a break.
[Q]CUlater 89 Wrote:
[Q2]Thank goodness it wasn't Danis;[/Q]
Why? Is it a bad thing to show recruits that the ultimate national recognition can come to those who play in the ECAC?
Would it be a bad thing to show fans of the other conferences that the national media believes (rightly or wrongly) that the player with the best performance in a season played in the ECAC?
Give me a break.[/q]
I think people would be all for an ECAC Hobey winner, but it was a general fairness issue since Leneveu didn't get the award last year and Danis was not on the same level as Lenny.
[Q]CUlater 89 Wrote:
[Q2]Thank goodness it wasn't Danis;[/Q]
Why? Is it a bad thing to show recruits that the ultimate national recognition can come to those who play in the ECAC?
Would it be a bad thing to show fans of the other conferences that the national media believes (rightly or wrongly) that the player with the best performance in a season played in the ECAC?
Give me a break.[/q]While all of those are legitimate reasons for wishing Danis would win the Hobey, I don't think you'll be shocked to find that not many people here find them convincing. I don't even think Danis was the best goalie this year; Howard has been stellar and his numbers were only depressed because his coach had a noble loyalty to a senior who had proven himself a worthy D-I goalie. (Sort of like Cornell '01-'02.)
Last year our[/i] goalie had a historic season, but had the (Hobey-related) misfortune to have it come so soon after Ryan Miller's equally spectacular season. He also had the misfortune to share the season with Peter Senja and a Ferris Stater that I no longer remember, both of whom had standout years.
It would be a bitter pill to swallow for me (and, I venture to guess, a lot of eLFers) if LeNeveu simply "loosened the jar" for Danis and Danis took home the hardware because of a weaker field and a gathering feeling that recognition for great years in net shouldn't be as rare as a Haley's comet sighting.
anyone agree that this years field was weaker than last year, at least in terms of stats? just seemed that way when i glanced at the stats for the players for this year.
[Q]ugarte Wrote:
[What apple said.]
[/q]
Very well-expressed. Agree 100%. ECAC or no, Danis simply was not deserving.
[Q]CUlater 89 Wrote:
[Q2]Thank goodness it wasn't Danis;[/Q]
Why? Is it a bad thing to show recruits that the ultimate national recognition can come to those who play in the ECAC?
Would it be a bad thing to show fans of the other conferences that the national media believes (rightly or wrongly) that the player with the best performance in a season played in the ECAC?
Give me a break.[/q]
Right on! I think if Cornell can't win it all -- NCAAs or Hobey -- you should root for, in order
Ivy (or as I said in previous post, barring that, Brown)
ECAC
Eastern hockey
Wouldn't it have been quite a coup if two Ivy goalies won the award back to back? And if Danis won this year but Leneveu didn't win last year, there'd be material to keep eLynah humming through late summer.
[Q]billhoward Wrote:
Right on! I think if Cornell can't win it all -- NCAAs or Hobey -- you should root for, in order
Ivy (or as I said in previous post, barring that, Brown)
ECAC
Eastern hockey
[/q]
Bill and I will just have to disagree on this one.
In terms of the NCAAs, I absolutely agree with Bill's rooting priorities. If Brown were playing Duluth tomorrow night, I'd be screaming for Brown. And, if Brown were to put more pucks into the net and win, even if outshot 50-6 by Lessard and Duluth, they'd have won it on the ice, and no one could take that away from them. That's why you play the games in the NCAAs, rather than take an end-of-season poll.
But the Hobey isn't played on the ice until one player is left standing, and the candidates have to be judged by voters on what they've done over the course of the season. I'm not convinced that Danis should even have been in the so-called "hat trick" based on his season-long performance. In my view, it's absolutely just that he didn't get the Hobey. And there is no way I could have rooted for him to get it, when I didn't think he deserved it.
The significant difference between this year's "hat trick" and last year's is that all three members of last year's "hat trick" would have made deserving winners.
[Q]Al DeFlorio Wrote:
... the Hobey isn't played on the ice until one player is left standing, and the candidates have to be judged by voters on what they've done over the course of the season. I'm not convinced that Danis should even have been in the so-called "hat trick" based on his season-long performance. In my view, it's absolutely just that he didn't get the Hobey. And there is no way I could have rooted for him to get it, when I didn't think he deserved it. The significant difference between this year's "hat trick" and last year's is that all three members of last year's "hat trick" would have made deserving winners.[/q]
Were the Hobey Baker Award awarded to the truly best player, rather than who the voters think is the best player, then you shouldn't just root for the player who's in your league. But it is partly beauty contest -- no voter has seen Junior Lessard play all his games and if they have, they haven't seen all the Brown and North Dakota games. It is partly beauty contest. There is no ultimate truth -- gad, I sound like my freshman philosophy class -- as to who's the best. I mean, does the best player in college football win the Heisman, or does one of the best players who has really good PR and who has his best game on national television tend to win?
A lot of the discussion here, it seems, is dumping on Yann Denis because he might have won it this year and our favorite from last year, Dave Leneveu, didn't, and we don't like that.
The discussion that says Denis wasn 't as good as the other two guys, that's reasonable.
... and maybe this should be a separate thread, but how often does the best team in college hockey win the NCAAs? No. 1 this year is almost certainly North Dakota, with BC a reasonable candidate also. Last year the top two were Colorado College and Cornell. Every round of the NCAAs should be best 2-of-3 to eliminate one-game miracles on college ice, as probably should be the NCAA basketball playoffs, but that just can't happen. And one of the magical things is that a decent team wins most every time -- UConn in hoops, Maine in hockey perhaps -- and when it doesn't happen, we love Cinderella stories. Plus we can go back to playing what-if. If Maine wins, we can reconcile ourselves to knowing we beat the team in the Everblades that beat Maine in the consolaton.
[Q]billhoward Wrote:
And if Danis won this year but Leneveu didn't win last year, there'd be material to keep eLynah humming through late summer.
[/q]
Or fuming... ;-)
[Q]how often does the best team in college hockey win the NCAAs? [/Q]The point of the tournament is not to determine the best team, it's to crown a national champion. There's a difference. If they wanted the best team then there wouldn't be 16 teams invited and we wouldn't have conference tournaments to decide conference auto-bids. I mean, a 28 game WCHA season clearly showed that Denver was not the best team in their conference (let alone the country) since they finished tied for 4th in the league. Not to take anything away from the Pioneers - they earned their trip to the national championship game. But if we were trying to identify the "best" team in the country then they wouldn't have gotten a bid.
[Q]KeithK Wrote:
The point of the tournament is not to determine the best team, it's to crown a national champion. There's a difference. If they wanted the best team then there wouldn't be 16 teams invited and we wouldn't have conference tournaments to decide conference auto-bids. I mean, a 28 game WCHA season clearly showed that Denver was not the best team in their conference (let alone the country) since they finished tied for 4th in the league. Not to take anything away from the Pioneers - they earned their trip to the national championship game. But if we were trying to identify the "best" team in the country then they wouldn't have gotten a bid.[/q]
Exactly right. Hence my comment about cheering for a hypothetical Brown victory over Duluth, even though they might be outshot 50-6 (meaning they were likely not the "best team") . Doesn't matter. What matters is who wins the game on that day. And I would always prefer the "winner-on-the-ice" to be ECAC.
But voting someone the "best player" when--in my view at least--that someone clearly was not, is something I just could not root for.
Was at the Town Hall Meeting and the ceremonies sitting between a Yale/BC fan (who quite fondly remembered Beeeej's correction of the Dryden/Cropper mixup in the video during last year's Town Hall Meeting) and Confederate calvalryman Jeb Stewart - see article and picture of the guy here:
http://www.uscho.com/news/2004/04/09_008455.php
I think I spotted Adam shooting a home movie in the back.
Anyway, there were a couple of Brown fans there, a couple of UND fans and then the majority of UMD fans plus the very classy move by Denver of showing up just after coming off the Fleet Center ice from practice.
I don't think anybody thought Danis was going to win but it is good exposure to have Ivy Leaguers as the Hat Trick Finalists even if they don't win, especially if they're going to continue with the practice. As I've said on another thread, you can't compare goaltenders and forwards and so maybe you need another award for best goaltender - you can argue, I suppose, that first-team all American is an honor so there you have Danis and Wisconsin's goalie.
Lessard is the story of near tragedy to triumph and his final chapter of signing a contract has yet to be written. Okay, I'll leave the poetic license to Adam.
While mingling with the Hobey sport jacket types at the Hobey party afterwards with a real nice older Colgate couple - yes, they do have nice fans, I overheard a member of the Humanitarian Committee say, they could have thrown a dart at any one of three finalists for that award. I hope that's not how the Hobey Committee works. Well basically the Hobey party was a chance for Hobey bigwigs to sell Hobey merchandise that I believe was all free last year - posters and the like. They also had a framed drawing of Lessard in various poses and a profile for advanced order for $100. I don't know when they drew that up or if they drew one up for each finalist but it was pretty detailed.
And I think Mazzoleni is following me (or maybe vice versa) since I ran into him noshing on some Mickey D's fries on my way into the Fleet Thursday morning, then again on my way into the Hobey yesterday (Taylor made a reference during the Town Hall to recruiting the same kids that Mazzoleni is going after) and then he wandered up to the bar next to me at the Hobey party. I'm not one to start trouble but how can you pass up a line like 'Four third period goals by Denver yesterday. Hmm....where else have I seen that recently.'
[Q]dss28 Wrote:
[Q2]billhoward Wrote:
And if Danis won this year but Leneveu didn't win last year, there'd be material to keep eLynah humming through late summer.
[/Q]
Or fuming... [/q]
Either way, we're spreading the faith. As is everyone who agrees or disagrees with the Hobey award, or thinks North Dakota really ought to be in the title game, or that Howard this year is/isn't better than LeNeveu last year.
Lessard signed with Dallas today: http://nhl.com/onthefly/news/2004/04/211178.html