NCAA Hockey

If you go to Northeastern University, there really is not much to take pride in when it comes to athletics. The lone bright spot is the hockey team which even then is a middle of the pack team in Hockey East at the best of times. Then again, when you play in a league with annual powerhouses BC, BU, UNH and UMaine, middle of the pack does'nt seem half bad. Since I started there in 2000, the highest NU has climbed in the conference standings was 5th in '01-02 (a first round playoff defeat). So you can imagine my surprise when NU beat reigning national champs and #1 ranked BC (45/50 first place votes) two weekends ago to improve their record to 3-0-1. They followed that up last weekend with a 5-0 and 3-2 win AT UMaine, a very tough place to play where they had lost eight of their last ten games. So now they sit atop Hockey East with a 5-0-1 record (4-0 in conference play) and have climbed to #9 in the national rankings. Knowing Northeastern, this is not going to last so I thought I should take it in while I can...


Speaking of hockey, Tim Thomas has been playing out of his mind and led the Bruins to back to back 1-0 road wins against solid western conference opponents (Edmonton and Vancouver). Can he extend the streak to 183 minutes tonight against Calgary and close out the successful road trip in style? Certainly would be nice...