Tigers win first road series

The Tigers battled the late starts, dark skies and sparse crowds to come out of this weekend with a sweep of Alaska Anchorage and a 6 point lead in the WCHA. UAA was the first team the Tigers have played this season not ranked in the top 15 (they are unranked) and they passed with flying colors. I caught the first 35 minutes last night on the CW but got too annoyed to watch any more. I'm thankful that the Tigers were on TV on the road but oh man, poor coverage. It was UAA's announcing team (which I'm fine with) but they sounded like they were talking through cell phones the whole time with all the static and noise. That was nothing compared to the arena itself...there were ads EVERYWHERE!! Granted, I'm an advertising major but there's a limit, this looked almost as bad as European hockey. There were no less than 8 ads in the neutral zone, at least 4 around the face-off dots in the zones and a HUGE slogan across behind the goalies. If this wasn't bad enough, on every pane of glass all the way around was a 4 inch of so high logo of all the board sponsors. So those who were in the front row got a giant green SUBWAY logo right in their face instead of seeing the ice. From a marketing perspective, this is pretty clever but its so friggen annoying that it might have the reverse effect. If we can see it on TV, there is a problem. Oh and the arena looked virtually empty with bright multi-colored seats showing off their empty glory. I also noticed that, despite all the ads, there was no center-ice logo. Maybe it's because UAA has one of the most hideous logos I've ever seen! Alright, there's my "arena aesthetics" rant. The Tigers head off to St. Cloud this weekend to battle an always tough Huskies team. The Tigers don't return home until January 11 when they again take on UAA. Thank goodness for Bowl Season, otherwise I would be going crazy for the next month-and-a-half!!