All I've got is a photograph

In a week of death, cancer and breakups there had to be a time to get away from things, and even in the middle of that I found a sense of sad finality.

We went to our first Ohio State Hockey game of the season last night. The Buckeyes were playing the #6 ranked team in the country, the Western Michigan Broncos. The first period was a back and forth match that had the visiting side up 2-1 at the end of the first period.

In the second the Broncos went up 3-2 but Ohio State fought back and went ahead with the final score being 6-3. I was very impressed with both sides and the play of senior OSU goaltender Brady Hjelle, who did some rather remarkable gymnastics making a few saves. He even picked up an assist.

The star of the game was Junior winger Alex Szczechura, who scored a hat trick. The third coming off a play that had some dandy passing. It was a game I enjoyed watching, and in between periods the band came out and did Script Ohio on the ice.



Toward the end of the game I realized this is most likely going to be the last CCHA game I ever see. The conference is being made redundant after this year since the Big Ten conference is being started up. I really enjoyed seeing the smaller schools, Western Michigan, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Alaska-Fairbanks, Bowling Green and others play the so called larger school and often play them well or even better the home side.



I've been following the league for about 15 seasons now and it's odd to know that it is all going away, all the history of the league will simply halt. The Big Ten will start with at least six teams, Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, Wisconsin, Minnesota and the newly started Penn State. It will be different and I'm sure we'll see a few of those familiar teams, such as Miami, come through town to fill out the schedule. The rivalries will be changed though.



Maybe The Buckeyes will have a home playoff game in March I can attend.

Never Drove the Zamboni

Around 1995 that a new sport came into our lives.



It was sometime in 1990 or 1991 that we took in our first Ohio State Hockey game. They were playing Michigan and neither team, especially the Buckeyes was very good. The old ice rink was sold out and we ended up in the standing room only area behind the north goal. Ohio State got beaten rather convincingly. For whatever reasons we never went back.

Fast forward a couple of years and my wife has a couple of the players in one of her classes, including the team captain. We end up going to another game, and the team has deteriorated. The coach's contract was not renewed and he resigned. The interim coach, John Markell, was trying to turn the team around and become the permanent coach.

Somehow my wife landed a position writing about the team for a Michigan hockey publication and leveraged her way into writing about the CCHA for a national college hockey website.

I started going to the games as my work schedule allowed and watched John Markell turn the team from a horribly coached team into something slightly short of mediocre to a league upstart in the matter of two seasons. The ice rink began filling up, the pep band played in their corner and the little rink rocked. It was a dump, but it was our dump. And the team was going to be moving out into the newly built Value City Arena in early 1999.

I think the best game at the ice rink was in 1998 when number one ranked Michigan State came to town. The building was rocking and Todd Compeau added to the atmosphere when he scored less than a minute into the game. He also added the game winner on a sweet feed from Dan Cousineau that I caught on a crappy camera.



This was the magical season the Buckeyes went to their first and so far only Frozen Four in Boston, only to lose to Boston College in the semi-finals. About all my wife and I had left was my crappy work situation and this hockey team. So when the season was over, there really was not much of anything left. The marriage officially ended in the autumn of 1998, but I still went to the games, including the last one in the ice rink against Notre Dame.



The team's first game at the Schott was in January of 1999. I was supposed to bring a date, but got stood up. It was for the best. I ended up taking this picture, had it blown up to poster size and signed by the team. They loved it and one of the player's parents asked for the negative. I gave it to Ryan Skaleski's parents and have not seen it since.



The old ice rink had some seating taken out to finally make the ice regulation size (it was fifteen feet short) and now houses the Women's Hockey Team.



Got to know a few of the players a little during this time. The first athletes I met who were not interested in throwing me into a locker or deliberately trying to break my glasses during dodge ball. Good kids. Fine, respectful young men. Their parents are devoted, they get that way through taking their kids to practice at 5AM. You get a few stage parents, but they're rare. One Dad would sit in the end where the opposing goalie was, to see his kid try and score goals. He'd switch ends between periods. Other parents would let the refs hear it, and not just when their son was hit. One hockey mom called the Athletic Director during a road game, demanding the coach be fired.

Like the fan dork I am I have a couple of old, game worn jerseys from this era. Because of this experience my respect for hockey players and what they do increased a hundred fold.

Hard to get to many games these days. I go when I can, the team has been through some changes. Markell was relieved of his duties, the new guy had an epic collapse in the second half of this season, but that's hockey.

At Least We Did Not Pay to See That

Full day as I went in for an eye exam in the early afternoon. My vision has been messed up and I have not adjusted well to progressive lenses. My peepers were poked, prodded and given a thorough once over for about two hours. Vision is worsening. I have to be wary of retinal tears and other disturbances.

Had a couple of new to me procedures done, a 3-D eye scan, which produced a cool picture that looked not unlike an ultra sound of the uterus. No baby in my eye, or nothing else really, a good thing.

Also had an ultrasound done on my optic nerve. A dab of goop was put on the end of a probe and placed on my eyelid. Very interesting look at the nerve too. Again, no problems were noted.

Ended up buying a set of reading glasses, which will be ready in three weeks.

Had to get home after the exam, which was a bit tricky walking around in the sunshine with dilated pupils. Put on the shades and walked a couple of blocks to pick up the #7 bus. No way I could drive in that condition.

Later, the eyes did improve and we headed to the Ohio State Hockey game.

When we got to the ticket office, we were approached by a kid of about 13-14, and he offered us free tickets. I'm a skeptic, so I tried dismissing him, but he was persistent. I looked at the tickets, which were legit, and thanked him profusely for them.

I was so gobsmacked I forgot to pick up our complimentary Thundersticks.

The team had been playing well, and I thought it would pick up attendance. I was mistaken, there were not many people - and they were fairly quiet, except for the student section. They had thundersticks and used them very appropriately

Sitting in front of us, in sparsely attended section, a Packer legend's jersey was at the game.



The student section and band support is growing. This is good to see.



Before the game, Michigan State Head Coach, Rick Comley, who is retiring at the end of the season, was given a plaque and a nice send off by OSU coach Osiecki. Class move by the team. Comley's one of the good guys of college hockey.

The game itself was rather close. Michigan State played well and their defense did not give OSU many chances to score. MSU picked up a goal right off a faceoff in the second period and the score stayed 1-0.

Late in the third, OSU thought they managed a goal, but it was waived off after the referee said the puck had been kicked in. I was on the other side of the rink and had no idea how the puck went it. There was no replay shown to the crowd but all reporters, bloggers and message board pundits think that was the right call. I was amused that after the red light went on and the team celebrated (prematurely) that two teddy bears were thrown onto the ice in anticipation of tonight's Teddy Bear Toss.

The Buckeyes have now lost four straight, and have only scored three goals in their last four games. The offense has to step up if they want any reasonable chance to move on in the playoffs or post season.

Snowpocolypse Now

Here on the west side, at least where I live, there was about six inches of snow. Other outlets are saying 9.5 inches.

The ex survived her surgery.

Blue Jackets coach Ken Hitchcock was fired on Wednesday. Claude Noel is the interim coach. We had planned on attending Thursday's game against Dallas. I was curious to see how the team and the crowd would act the first game of a new era. The team was pretty tentative, but not unconfident as they tried to impress the new dad.

The Dallas goaltender was Marty Turco.

I've seen a lot of hockey games and players over the years on a college and professional level. One of the few players I hate is Marty Turco.

Back when he played for Michigan, the team would always and I mean always kick Ohio State's ass. They owned them. Everyone knew it. What bugged me is that Michigan always took their dominance as a reason to be arrogant jerks. Like calling the old OSU ice rink a venue unfit for college hockey. At the Fairgrounds Coliseum, there was only one entrance to the rink and Michigan would go out of their way to enter the rink through a different door than Ohio State, as if the door had cooties. Fans who would approach the booth where the music was played during stops in the action, demanding that the Michigan fight song be played.

So many other reasons.

And Turco was in the middle was all this.

There was the end of Michigan dominance, when OSU finally beat them. When Turco left the net during the 1998 CCHA regionals and Todd Compeau fought him for the puck, took it from Turco and fired it into the Michigan net. A beautiful thing.

You have no friends Marty Turco.



So it was great to see Turco lose, this time to the Blue Jackets.



Steve Mason looked good in net. Poor guy has had a horrible sophomore season. Maybe this is the game that will put him back on the good path. But I've said that this year, too many times.

Blue Jackets play the Sabres tonight.

Getting My Rink On

This was the week we finally hit the hockey rinks this season. On Wednesday we went to see the Blue Jackets take on the Detroit Red Wings. I've seen my teams play many games live in my life. Wednesday night's game was the worst I had ever seen live. It was horrible, embarrassing to watch and I missed Smokey Oolong show up at Writer's Block to see a putrid spectacle. The Blue Jackets lost 9-1.

Here's part of a poem I wrote after wards.

We're left mopping up mud puddles after heavy loss
 Ones evaporating dreams, ambitions, abilities
-  our projections of what success should be
When we enter a sporting arena
Wondering why we observe well paid young men
To hit each other on a slippery surface,
with sticks
Tomorrow, what happens outside of the two hours spent
forgetting about the troubles of the day is always more important
Maybe it's the Zamboini we desire
With its quiet resurfacing of the ice,
readying it for a fresh start,
for every period, every game.
It's the calm grace of the swirling of the organ music
in the background we're seeking out - and
Waiting for a small version of the Zamboni
to drive around in our heads and lives
as we sleep

Last night we made the first trip to the Schott to see the Ohio State Hockey Team play Western Michigan. That the opposition did not score a minute into the game was an improvement over the game we saw two nights previous. I had known that OSU had problems winning on Friday nights this year and that they were down 1-0 going into the third period was not a good sign.

But our fears were eliminated after the Buckeyes tied it up, then went ahead and added another. They scored three goals in a raucous 49 seconds to put the game away.



We were sitting a couple of rows behind the OSU bench and were tickled to see the players fist bumping the kids who gathered before and after the game. Even the Broncos did something nice. A puck went into their bench during the game and one of the WMU assistants tossed it over the glass to a kid. Classy act Western Michigan!

The Speed of Things

It's over. 6-5 Detroit. An absolutely brutal too many men on the ice penalty led to a power play goal with 46 seconds left. Crappy way to lose a game. A loss for the home team means the season is over. I would have liked to see the Blue Jackets win one game at home, for themselves, the fans, the uniform. The Blue Jackets played hard, coming back to tie after being down 3-1, then 5-3. The crowd did not give up, it was the loudest it's ever been in Nationwide Arena, but the bounces and calls went the Red Wings way - and Osgood had been on fire in net. Tonight, though, they have found some chinks in his armor.

This was one heck of a hockey game. The Blue Jackets left it all out there. Even Russell and Modin had goals. Easily the most intense game the Blue Jackets have ever played. No shame in losing to an obviously better talented Red Wings team.

It's a fine learning tool for next season though.

Got to hand it to the crowd. They were loud and supportive all night long, even when they were down two goals.

A lot going on behind the screen here. Stuff to worry about. There's a lot of work to do. Got the lawn mowed after work. Going to be a glorious weekend and I do not want to do anything other than enjoy the weather, and start cleaning.

One of the weirdest things about this year so far is that the two best books I've read have been poetry. More on this as I form it.

Ohio State Hockey: A Post Mortem

The following numbers are sports scores that have a common result.

4-2
1-0
1-0
3-2
8-3

These scores mark the last five times the Ohio State Hockey team played in the NCAA tournament. They were on the losing end each time. The team has not seen victory in the tournament since their frozen four run, ten years ago.

I was surprised that they got into the tourney this year, they did beat three of the number one seeds during the season and got creamed yesterday by the only team they did not play - Boston University.

Next season is an important one for the OSU Hockey program. They're only losing three seniors. Only one of these seniors, Corey Elkins, was productive offensively. The other two, Zak Pellitier and Nick Biondo, provided veteran leadership and little else in their four years. They're really not losing much. It's also the final year of the head coach's contract.

A large number of underclassmen will be returning. Will Zac Dalpe, who is a high draft choice of the Hurricanes? Heck, will goaltender Dustin Carlson? Ok, he will be back.



In other words, there should be no excuses next season for the Buckeyes being a "young team."

Honestly, I heard that so many times this season I thought my head would fly off each time I read it.

Under John Markell, this program has always had excuses for consistent mediocrity, at best. The team was young, so and so got hurt, so and so (Hugo Boisvert) left the program early and my favorite - "the reason we've lost so many games is that we have played a lot of games."



One thing that has been consistent in the program's lack of consistency is John Markell. He came on and, admittedly, did bring the program into the eye of the athletic department and brought the program to its only NCAA frozen four appearance. However over his fourteen year tenure as coach it's been a couple of years of above average performance followed by a few more years of below average play, under achieving and excuses.

It's said that in in order to be considered a good college hockey team, winning twenty games in a season is a benchmark. In his time has coach, Markell's teams have won twenty or more games seven times. Half of his time here.

Ohio State, I suspect, wants to be considered one of the elite programs in the country for college hockey. After all, they invested millions of dollars into building the Schottenstein Center, untold sums of money in state of the art training facilities and the recruiting of top athletes to play for the Buckeyes. Here are the numbers for some of the elite college hockey programs.

Miami University's coach Enrico Blasi has won twenty games seven times in his decade as head of the Redhawks, the same as Markell.

Boston University's Jack Parker has hit the twenty win mark sixteen times in the last twenty years.

Jerry York has won twenty games 11 of his sixteen years as coach of Boston College.

The University of North Dakota has had three coaches in the last twenty years and has won twenty games fourteen of those years.

Now. Here's the staggering one.

Red Berenson's Michigan teams have won twenty or more games twenty two years in a row.

Markell has a long way to go to approach the elite status. I'm not sure he's the guy who is going to take your team to the next level. He's shown that his team can win, a little bit, during the regular season with an inability to win in the post season. One CCHA Championship in his time as coach is not enough. The University is not getting the proper return on its investment in the facilities and the program.

John Markell should not have his contract extended next season.

I like John Markell and want him to do well. I want the program to succeed and do well. In an ideal world Markell would be welcomed with open arms at Bowling Green, his alma mater, and return that program to its past successes.

Who comes here? Who knows? Rumors of former North Dakota coach Dean Blais have been around for a couple of seasons, but would Blais want to return to a city where he did not do well as a Blue Jackets assistant coach?

Attendance is horrible. An arena that seats 17,000 is barely a third full, at best for games. Part of this is the marketing of the program. Part of this is the coach providing a good hockey tradition. It's time for the Ohio State University Athletic Department to look at the talent that is coming into the hockey program, see how they are being coached and act appropriately.

Keep the Falcons

There is a lot of news and rumor going about that Bowling Green State University is about to dismantle its hockey program. This would be a detriment to the NCAA, college hockey, the CCHA and sports in general.

Sure, the main part of college should be academics, and sports just a diversion. In today's times, the college experience is more than classes. There is tradition of attending sporting events, along with theater, recreational events and so much more outside of the classroom. Plus, in today's hard times many universities have, are, and will be having major financial decisions to make.



To get rid of a institution that has a 40 year tradition, a national championship in 1984, and that has been a part of good rivalry with Ohio's other D-1 hockey teams and has been a clean program for its entire existence is a big mistake. Sure, the Falcons have seen better days and the arena it plays in is getting a bit long in the tooth, but positive change can happen.

I'm not saying to build a new arena, like Miami did - and during their lull in the late eighties there was talk of them shutting down their hockey program. But a change to the hockey culture, ie, a new coaching staff would be a good start. Surely some money for minor renovations can be raised by BGSU's hockey alumni that includes Rob Blake, Ken Morrow, Jerry York, Nelson Emerson, George McPhee and current Ohio State Hockey coach John Markell, among others.

Here's a list of trustees to contact and to let know that shutting down this program is not in the best interests of the university.


gachris@bgnet.bgsu.edu,AMayberry@co.wood.oh.us,paukenp@bgsu.edu,
jharbal@impact-products.com,stephanie.imhofff@longaberger.com,jacobyd@bgsu.edu,
antwanj@bgsu.edu,DavidLevey@forestcity.net,mikelaw@daycor.net,jemooremsp@aol.com,
Bill.Primrose@metalmarkermfg.com,ddryan@thepdrgroup.com,seboasst@yahoo.com,
voll@marion.net