Rant of Week: PC's greatest rival?

One of the great frustrations in being an alumni of Providence College is the lack of a true rival. Friar basketball fans might dislike UCONN, Syracuse and Georgetown, but all of those schools have more impressive rivals to feud with and - let's be fair here - PC can't beat any of them on a consistent basis. Except maybe UCONN, and that was only last year. Similarly, URI fans dislike PC with the fire of a thousand suns, but not even I would go out of my way to lavish a similar feeling on the Rams. So finding a basketball rival is a bit of a problem.

A similar situation exists in hockey. I thought I would go down the list of potential rivals. Here are the teams I'm eliminating right off the bat: UML (I actually like them), UMASS (not enough water under the bridge), Merrimack (last year notwithstanding), NU (too much in common), UVM (too new), and Maine (teetering towards complete irrelevance). This leaves the following four schools:

Brown: Bruno makes the cut because the over all series is pretty much dead even (I think the Bears have a one or two game lead) and the results of Mayor's Cup usually have nothing to do with the record of either team. There are several problems here. The first of which is that PC is not Brown's arch rival. That would be Harvard and that particular rivalry dates back to the 19th century. The second problem is that if you compare the strengths of the two programs, PC is out in front by a very wide margin. PC has more ECAC titles that Bruno, and they haven't been in the ECAC since 1984. Third, as horrible as the attendance is for PC home games (probably due to the LOUD SPEAKERS!) the attendance at Meehan is actually worse. That thought always give me pause. How can you lavish hate on a team with a smaller fan base than yourself? The only fans who even deserve a smidgen of dislike are the people in the band. Fourth, and most importantly, I like Brown. And I really shouldn't be able to say that about a rival.

New Hampshire: One of the main motivators for finding a team you hate is jealousy and it's easy to covet certain parts of the Wildcat's program. UNH has a much larger fan base, a lovely rink, a program that's always ranked in the top 10 and gets home ice every year, and a period of competence that dates back to the 70's. The problem with UNH is that "competence" doesn't quite equal dominance. The Wildcats have the smallest series lead of any of the teams PC plays in the Big Four. They also have LESS tournament titles than PC (four is greater than three) and have never won the national title either - even with many more Frozen Four appearances. The other problem is that the days of Kitty fans constantly complainng about how "dirty" the Skating Goons of PC are seem to be in the past. In fact, UNH's constant inability to win the national championship seems to have depressed the entire fan base. How can a team be a rival when their fan base is almost as unhappy as your own? And who in their right mind would want to get rid of Dick Umile?

Boston College: It's much easier to envy BC: better rink, larger fan base (although not as big as UNH), countless conference titles, a massive overall advantage over PC and three national titles. Yet, there's still plenty to dislike. The school considers itself a Football School, which means that as much as some of the fans really like hockey, most of them are more interested in football or even basketball. Also, the band plays "For Boston" about 90 times per game which puts them in the same category as Michigan (but still ahead of MTU and their catchy yet toxic Penalty Kill Ditty). The Eagles seem to enjoy nothing more than ruining my evening, which is an excellent reason to dislike them. The piece de resistance was last year when PC won the season series 2-0-1 against BC only to get drubbed in the playoffs. I hate it when that happens. BC also seems to have at least one completely unlikeable yet insanely talented (and usually diminutive) player on their roster each and every year.
It would seem that BC would be perfect as PC's rival. But there are a few problems. First of all, PC will never be considered a rival with BU around. And certainly not with the Eagles in the ACC. Superfans might take the Friars more seriously if they had a football team. Secondly, we have Jerry York. I have yet to find anyone in college hockey who doesn't love this guy: he's a great coach, a brilliant recruiter and he practically generates class. If the AD at the Heights ever loses his mind and fired Jerry, I will personally drive him to Schneider Arena.

Boston University: The Terriers are the most successful team in the east - nevermind Hockey East - so there's plenty to be jealous of an dislike. The huge fan base, the fantastic rink, the plethora of hardware and that meaningless tournament they keep winning. No team - not even BC - has done more to ruin the Friar's season as BU. If BU isn't actually beating them in the playoffs, they're dragging out the proceedings for two overtimes. It does help that BU has played PC in the playoffs more than any other team. So BU is an excellent choice, even if you disregard the hairy half naked men and Jackie Parker's voodoo mind hold on whatever official Hockey East cares to put on the ice.
But as always, we do have problems. BU has more enemies than any other team in college hockey: ALL of Hockey East, plus Harvard, Cornell, and - for some reason - Minnesota. Clearly, PC is not alone in disliking BU. But the BC rivalry is the biggest in the east - if not all of college hockey. The second problem is the near obsession that the team has with winning the Beanpot. Clearly, it's tough to take a rivalry seriously when your "rival" is looking forward to the first and second Monday in February.

I think that for PC fans, BU and BC are probably the two closest thing we have to "rivals", even if neither team would care to see PC in that light.

Random Rants:
-I'll keep it short... HI MARK!

Hockey East Semi-finals Preview

Once again, Joe Bertagna gets what he wants (well, maybe not a surprise appearance by the Black Bears) and Jon doesn't. You think this would teach me a valuable lesson about watching Hockey East, but it never does. At any rate, here's my break down on the HE semi finals.

UNH vs BC: I don't know how Jerry York is going to deal with having to coach against the team that has a pulse, do you? Normally, I would say BC's playoff experience would carry the day here, but this is offset by the fact that the Kitties have become a juggernaut during the second half of the season. My feeling is that they have too much firepower and Brian Regan is certainly better than Joe Muse. The Kitties advance, but in a closer game than you'd think.

BU vs UVM: The caveat for this game is that if the Catamounts get any kind of lead, Joe Fallon and the neutral zone defense will make it stick. The problem is BU is on such a hot streak right now that I doubt the Terriers will give them that luxury. UVM might be looking for one goal, BU is looking for 3. The Terriers advance.

Finals: UNH/BU: It is rather appropriate that that the two hottest teams in HE would meet in the finals. I think its a close game, but Regan is better than Bennett and that's the difference. The Kitties add the tournament trophy to their trophy case.

Does anyone remember gooning?

Once upon a time, games involving New Hampshire and Providence College, involved lots of cheap shots, controversy, and a lot of complaining. Unfortunately, when Paul Pooley left the PC bench, this evaporated. To be brutally honest, Pooley's teams were exceedingly undisciplined. And UNH fans were much much whinier. Hence the drama. Two incidents stand out: the handshake brawl in 1997 and Jason Platt introducing a mouthy Colin Hemmingway to the glass at the Coffin in 2002. Thus was a great - if irritatingly one sided rivalry born!

Sadly, this is no longer the case. Providence College is now the second least penalized team in Hockey East. New Hampshire is - stunningly - the most penalized team in the conference. the Skating Mother Theresas are now the Skating Goons. You'd think there would be more made of this. But since there aren't that many PC fans on the interenet to begin with, you're never going to get the depth of whining that you'd hear at the Whittemore Center. While I'm certainly no fan of the officiating in Hockey East, I'd be hard pressed to blame any of PC's losses this year on the ref's (okay, maybe the tie at Merrimack was the fault of the officials as PC had two goals called off because the ref was 50 feet away from the net, but that's the most you'll get out of me). The roles are reversed, but not really.

What is important than the perception of goonery is that PC's PWR fell enough to disqualify them from the NCAA tournament. Apparently, UVM - who looked pretty solid from my vantage point - did not count as a quality loss. Losing a game to UNH wouldn't hurt quite as much. If PC can get a split, they could be back in business. It will be difficult to pull off a win, but not impossible. PC might just pull this off after all. Just don't expect the rampatant goonery this series used to have. Unless its a parade of Kitties going to the box... Nice change, eh?

Random notes:
-As you can see, I decided NOT to mock the Beanpot for the second consecutive week. The only snoozer this year was NU/HU and BU did not win. Here's you're reward: non mockery.

-Somebody give the UML fans a hug.

-Tip for WCHA fans: Whining about every non-WCHA team ranked in the top 10 is moronic. It makes you look provincial and stupid and there's no possible way you can prove that Michigan or Miami or even UNH would finish in the middle of the WCHA. Because they wouldn't. I'm sorry, but now that I'm seeing WCHA games every weekend, I'm can't possibly see how the middle of the pack in that conference is vastly superior to everyone else. Especially now that Minnesota is terrible. I don't care how many "cupcakes" you think everyone else schedules. Anyone remember 2003 when the WCHA crowing that Cornell would finish below MTU in the WCHA led directly to the Big Red dismantling MSU-Mankato? Well, it happened. So there.

-Jon's favorite Celtic: Rajon Rondo.

-Tip for non-Giants fans crowing about the Super Bowl. Talk to me when your team even PLAYS in that game.

-Team to watch in the last month of the Hockey East season: BU. I don't like this scenario at all. Team to ignore: Maine. This is kind of funny, huh?

-Helping out PC recently: Michigan, Clarkson, Union.
Not helping: SLU, MSU (!), Brown
Not even remotely participating: Holy Cross
Yeah, I'm paying attention and I do hold a grudge.

-Football Club Northern Tiberon is going UP! Finally. after 5 years of trying to get out of division V, my Hattrick team (http://www.hattrick.org/) is finally getting promoted! And yes, I'm always open to playing a friendly or two. Ahem.

-Might I remind the two or three USCHO posters who keep telling me about Roboshark that this is MY imaginary robot shark best friend! Get your own! (just kidding. Roboshark is very real)

-Hi Mark! Okay, someone tell Mark I'm still doing these...