ryan@fremen.DEC (03/04/85)
The ECAC and Hockey East regular seasons are now done (and the WCHA and CCHA have already played their quarter finals). In eastern action this weekend, St. Lawrence scared Harvard with an OT win on Friday, but the Crimson managed to take second place by clobbering Clarkson 6-1 Saturday while RPI came from behind to get their first win at Cornell in 21 years, 5-4. Scott Fusco set a Harvard record by scoring in his 25th consecutive game (he's approaching Adam Oates' ECAC record of 31, set last year). Meanwhile Oates got his 200th point in 3 years for RPI. Fusco beat out Oates for the ECAC scoring championship by one point. RPI also clobbered Colgate, 8-2, and now has a 25-game winning streak. The Ivy League title ended up as a three-way tie among Harvard, Cornell, and Yale. In Hockey East, Lowell upset UNH to take fifth place. They were better off losing - now they'll have to play UNH at UNH, much tougher than a game at Providence. BU and BC closed their seasons with a 2-2 tie. I haven't bothered mentioning it lately, but just about every weekend a different Hockey East coach has complained about the officiating (and not always the loser). I saw the game from early in the third period on last night, and saw the refs take "letting them play" to ridiculous extremes. The reason nobody scored while I was watching was simply because every scoring threat was met with an unpenalized trip or hold. There were no surprises in the CCHA or WCHA playoffs (although Minnesota came perilously close to losing to Northern Michigan). Skipping the ugly details (not all of which were in the paper, anyway), next week's CCHA semi-finals will pair Lake Superior against Bowling Green and Michigan State against Ohio State. In the WCHA, Minnesota-Duluth, North Dakota, Minnesota, and Wisconsin were the winners (I don't know how they'll be paired). Hockey East playoffs: Lowell (11-21-2) at New Hampshire (12-21-1) Northeastern (11-22-1) at Providence (15-15-5) Maine (8-26-0) at Boston University (19-11-4) Boston College gets a first-round bye ECAC playoffs: Princeton (7-12-2) at RPI (20-1-0) Colgate (9-12-0) at Harvard (15-5-1) St. Lawrence (12-9-0) at Clarkson (15-6-0) Yale (13-7-1) at Cornell (14-6-1) I don't expect any major surprises in the quarter-finals (although Maine may give BU a tougher time than expected - in the last week they had a win over BC and 2 over Providence). Also, Yale vs. Cornell ought to be a close match. If BC wins the playoffs, the second NCAA team is sure to be BU unless they blow it against Maine. If RPI wins the ECAC, the second choice will probably depend a lot on playoff performance (with Clarkson at a distinct disadvantage with two convincing losses to Harvard). Cornell, despite being in fourth place, may have the advantage because they were 1-0-1 against Harvard and played RPI tough. Any other teams wanting to go to the NCAA will have to win the playoffs. Mike Ryan