In what very could go down as one of the most important weeks of the season for ECAC teams, league teams went 9-2-1 in non-conference play. Union and RPI had the most impressive wins of the week with victories over Boston University and Boston College, respectively. Those wins will be huge for the pairwise boost in the future, as both will probably be near the top come the end of the season. The league schedule will kick off in two weeks, as Harvard and Dartmouth will kickoff the slate with a pair on Halloween weekend. I wasn’t going to write this week, but there is a point I wanted to get across that is hardly league related but it is. Without much ado, here are my thoughts of the week.

North Country Good Times

I usually take little stock in games against Atlantic hockey schools, but in recent years those teams have put the country on notice as solid teams and have improved mightily. RIT was supposed to be a decent team this season. The Tigers were picked second in the league and we all know what they did last season, advancing to within a game of the Frozen Four. I felt if any AHA team had a chance to pick up a win last weekend it was them, heck I even picked them to win against Clarkson, which I shouldn’t have.

Over the weekend, the North Country teams had little trouble in dispatching the Tigers. RIT had a corsi for, of 39, which meant SLU and Clarkson had Corsi’s of 61% combined against them. Clarkson in particular had an impressive weekend, which actually doesn’t surprise me because they have been my picks to be the surprise Cinderella team in the ECAC this season, we always seem to have one.

St. Lawrence and Clarkson each scored ten goals in its two games. I look at the weekend as more important for Clarkson than SLU, because the Golden Knights needed the confidence that they can score. In just a pair of games, the Knights have already scored 12 percent of the goals that it did last season. I talked in my preview, just how important it was for them to raise its shooting percentage over the season and last weekend it went out and shot at a rate of 12 percent. It is a good start for them, but they will have better competition upcoming and whether it is sustainable is a question mark. There is no doubt, I feel more comfortable in saying I feel they are going to finish in the top half.

For St. Lawrence, the possession it had over the weekend was something that it built upon from last season. While I don’t exepct them to be at that top of the league in shots or even in corsi and all those advanced stats, I do think St. Lawrence will again have a high shooting percentage. This is much a product of the system that Greg Carvel has in place, that preaches quality over quantity. The weekend, was also a confidence booster for them if anything. This weekend the two North Country schools will travel to New Hampshire and Merrimack, which should be a bigger test for both teams. Just do not, discount how consistent AHA teams have been in recent years. SLU and Clarkson looked like good teams last weekend, and give them credit for it. I will see both these teams this weekend.

Jason Kasdorf Has a ton to Prove

Should it surprise us that Jason Kasdorf came back with a vengeance over the weekend with a fantastic performance against Boston College.? Probably not. I watched, like most college hockey fans on my timeline were, s Kasdorf sent shots after shot, confidently away. It was a different Kasdorf than we have seen in a couple of seasons, as he has struggled with injury.

It was almost three years to do the day that Kasdorf had a shoulder injury that sidelined him for the entirety of the season that year. Last year he was again plagued with injuries and again was in a tad in consistent. The orignial injury happened against Boston College, in a game that RPI ended up getting run out of BC’s Conte Forum. This time however, Kasdorf had vengeance and revenge on his mind.

Kasdorf put his Engineers on his back and led his team to victory against arguably the best team in the nation. The Eagles threw everything at him, but Kasdorf looked as cool and confident as ever. He of course has a ton to prove, like I mentioned in my preview last week, and it showed. The Jason Kasdorf I saw on video Sunday was the same one that led the Engineers to a lofty position in the standings three seasons ago as a freshman. 36 saves later and a win against a team like the quality of  BC has me on notice. He is good enough to lead RPI again to a lofty position in the ECAC standings…

Special to the ECAC blog: Maine Made a good Case if it wants to apply for a regional

I was going to write a separate blog on this earlier in the week, but my busy schedule of covering high school sports locally and college hockey for CHN kind of got in the way of it because while some teams had the weekend off I was covering four fantastic national games in Portland, Maine. This is hardly related to the ECAC but it is because regionals have all to do with the league in the future. It would have been better with an ECAC team, but hey I had a good time putting on the national hat so early in the year.

On Saturday evening, talk was abuzz in Portland about whether it had made a good enough case to possibly host a regional in the future. I will cut to the chase , it seems a foregone conclusion based on talking to Maine brass that I have gotten to know over the years, that Portland and the Cross Insurance Arena will submit a bid to host a regional in 2018, if there are regionals of course which there will be. Since the Icebreaker was awarded, it was always going to be a trial run for a possible bid In all honesty, Maine passed with flying colors over the weekend.

I have never attended such a well organized tournament, postseason or in season. It was actually quite the opposite of what I was expecting, because Maine’s sports information department is quite inexperienced and the Cross Insurance Arena has never hosted a truly national college hockey event, so to them Kudos and good work. The attendance was great. around 10,000 fans attended the two days in a 6800 seat arena, the atmosphere was great, the food was great, it had great beverages that I couldn’t partake in but I know because I live in the area, the facility has come a long way (recent renovations have made it much better) and in my estimation (this is coming from an alum of UNH mind you) Maine fans are the absolute best fans in the east (sorry to Cornell, Yale and all the other ECAC schools).

It all made for a special event for the four teams that were able to play in the event and for the folks that were able to cover it, I feel thankful because I have never been to an Icebreaker. It helped the four teams put on a show and were four of the most historic programs in the country. This was all the good, but there are cons as well.

I seriously believe that if Maine isn’t around there would be the usual attendance problems that plague regionals, but if UNH is in the tournament it wouldn’t be horrible because it is closer to Durham than Manchester and it is closer to its bases in Portsmouth and Rochester. Beyond that, the accessibility from Boston and the major hubs to Portland is better than it is to Manchester because there is limited Amtrak service from Boston and full bus service from Boston. The only issues that might take away its opportunity is its distance from Boston (about two hours drive from Boston). The advantage to me, is when looking around at regionals there is something lacking in most, none of them are destination towns. It may push fans to go up for a weekend to catch hockey in a quaint city ranked near the top in destinations around the country, The drawback other than distance may be the size of the rink, which is only 6800. That would mark the smallest in the east but it would be on the line of some that have recently hosted in the west.

Could it be any worse than Albany has been in the past or some of the other regionals that have flopped? I remember attending a regional final there, the last one before it lost it the first time, and saw a regional in front of say 2500 people. The Maine fans would support it regardless of whether there team was there and there are enough college hockey followers in the region to attend, trust me I live equidistant of Boston and Portland. Want more support? I will leave you with this…

“I think it is an outstanding venue,” North Dakota coach Brad Berry said. “I think this would be an outstanding venue for the tournament. The Maine hockey community, a lot of storied tradition in minor league and pro hockey. If it ever got selected it would be a worthy venue.”

Wednesday, October 14th, 2015 - 8:15 pm | Commentary, ECAC, Notes, Thoughts, Ramblings