Work ahead

CC seems to have lost it's scoring identity lately as the Tigers have struggled to score. This past weekend dropped them into 5th place in the WCHA. This coming weekend is extremely important for several reasons, all of which revolve around the opponet. CC will play a home-and-home with DU in the I25 Rivalry and it could be a battle for 3rd place in the conference. CC currently has 26 points and DU with 29. If the Tigers sweep the series (which of course we would love!), they have a chance to pass the Pioneers. However, if North Dakota wins just one of their games, then it would be a tie at 30 points. They take on 2nd place St. Cloud State. CC and ND split both series' this season and, therefore, split the season series 2-2. As the week goes on, I will try to have different things surrounding the upcoming I25 Rivalry.

WCHA
		WCHA						Overall
	Team	GP	W-L-T	Pts.	GF-GA			GP	W-L-T	GF-GA
1	Minnesota	26	17-6-3	37	84-61			35	25-7-3	131-80
2	St. Cloud State	26	14-6-6	34	84-60			32	20-6-6	109-68
3	Denver	26	13-10-3	29	68-65			36	21-12-3	99-82
4	North Dakota	26	12-10-4	28	83-70			34	18-12-4	113-90
5	Colorado College	26	12-12-2	26	71-69			34	16-15-3	100-90
6	Michigan Tech	26	10-11-5	25	63-57			34	15-14-5	81-73
	Minnesota State	28	10-13-5	25	81-99			36	13-17-6	103-125
8	Wisconsin	26	11-13-2	24	56-52			34	14-17-3	75-72
9	Minnesota-Duluth	26	8-15-3	19	63-81			34	12-18-4	95-111
10	Alaska-Anchorage	28	8-19-1	17	62-101			34	12-19-3	85-114
Switch to Winning Percentage order

The free-fall continues

CC entered this weekend with a lot on their side. They were facing a team with a less-than-impressive record, they were coming off back-to-back 3-2 losses to Minnesota and were in a perfect position to get 4 points and move into 3rd or 4th place in the conference. Instead, the Tigers let two extremely important games slip away and dropped into 5th place in the conference and only 1 point ahead of Michigan Tech with the showdown vrs. DU looming on the horizon. The Tigers are probably going to lose the chance to host a first rounder at home for the conference playoffs and may have just been swept out of NCAA tourney selection. Tonight was especially tough since things started out so well. The Tigers held Minnesota State without a shot in the first 12 minutes of the game, had a 5-3 advantage and came up 1 goal just 2 minutes into it. However, the Mavericks used a flurry in the late 2nd and 3rd periods to break it open with 5 goals and win 6-4. The Tigers have struggled of late getting goals and it's shown with an 0-5-1 record in the past 3 weeks. I just hope that this doesn't hamper recruiting because we need some top players to come in and give this team a shot of adrenaline for next season. As for next week, I'm hoping we will pull it together for the I25 Rivalry and use the rivaly aspect to get some motivation and determination for those games.

Promote the games and opponent

While I was reading about the Tigers' OT win against Wisconsin last night, I came up with a few ideas to help the team out and gain more fans. This may sound like I'm rooting against the home team but I'm not, but what about promoting the opponet? Not saying that people should come just to watch, say, Wisconsin, but what about the fact that UW, DU, Minnesota and North Dakota have all won the national title in recent years and they are top tier teams. We could say, come see the #15 nationally ranked Tigers take on 2 time DU Pioneers this weekend in the I25 rivalry. Something that lets people know that a) we are good and b) the opposition in our conference is the toughest and best in the entire country. Another idea is regarding DU, what if we came up with a marketable name for the game, such as The I25 Rivalry? Actually having a name for it, like many rivalries in college football, may increase people's interest and help those games have more of a long standing tradition feel. Any ideas and comments about this (and all) ideas are greatly appreciated!