FOOTBALL??????????

To the roar of a seemingly pre-recorded crowd, mixed in with a few golf claps, the Bulldogs and the Fighting Irish took the ice on Thursday. Yes, on Thursday. Evidently, the games were scheduled so as not to interfere with football, and even with the odd scheduling, no one could really be bothered to attend. Evidently the whole little microcosm of Notre Dame revolves solely around football.

Football? Come on!! You know how I feel about football!!!

Oh right, you don't. Please excuse me.
I don't hate football. I hate futbol, and also basketball. I just can't get behind football. I'm a fair weather fan. I admit it. I'M A FAIR WEATHER FAN! I find it difficult to get excited about football, since it only happens once a week. It doesn't have continuous, exciting action the way hockey does, and it doesn't have the suspense and tension of baseball. A long drive can get exciting, but I just can't get excited about it. And if Notre Dame can't see that hockey is far superior to football, well, they just don't deserve to be on the same ice as the big Dogs.

Anyway, it's nice to see that the refs are getting practice blowing those whistles and making those silly arm movements to signal what penalties they're going to call. They haven't used those muscles in awhile so they've got to test them out, to get back in the swing of things. We don't want them to be rusty!

A tie in the first game wasn't really what I was hoping for. I was hoping for a blow out, a scoring explosion. I was hoping that, when Schwabe meets puck, particles would undergo fission, giving off extra neutrons, which would start a supercritical chain reaction of scoring. This did not happen. Evidently, this happens when Mike Curry meets puck. Isn't he just so cute!??!?!!? I should visit Alaska more often! But Evan, baby, you really need to start scoring. I know you've got an assist, but you're cute too, you should be scoring some points. You don't have Junior to set up anymore. You've got to break out from behind his shadow, just like Ashlee Simpson. She didn't let Jessica's success stop her, she went out and went platinum!! You, too, could be a Hobey Baker. (INCH thinks you could be in the top 10!)

It's nice to see Stapleton on the board with two points as well. I'm going to go ahead and predict he'll have a banner year. He was third on the team in point totals last year. This year I see him having a similar point total (41) but making more goals than assists. Miskovich was really a surprise, too. Didn't he have, like, one goal last year? I'm hoping this wasn't just a fluke. Misky and Hammond are two people I'd like to see make a significant improvement in their offensive numbers over the season. Tim Hambly, too. He had a fair number of points last year, but most of them came from assists. It's great to have assists, guys, but I'd like to see some GOALS, too!

Marco Peluso is absolutely my favorite. He already has four penalties for eight minutes! Smitty has two penalties for four minutes, which is disappointing. I expect more from him! I saw him escorted from the ice during the last regular season game! (I was sitting in the Wisconsin student section, screaming for the 'Dogs, to the chagrin of my friend/ticket procurer.) Justin Williams has three penalties for six minutes. Mike Curry has two penalties, but he got a whopping SEVEN MINUTES!!!! I'm so proud of him.

WCHA SCOREBOARD:
No conference games were played this weekend, but wins are wins.

Thursday:
UMD 2, Notre Dame 2

Friday:
UMD 4, Notre Dame 1
North Dakota 4, Maine 3

Saturday:
St. Cloud State 1, St. Lawrence 1
North Dakota 3, Maine 1
Minnesota 5, Denver 2

Look out for North Dakota, beating Maine twice! The Denver loss is unsurprising, because without Adam Berkhoel, well... I don't want to say they're nothing, but he was absolutely unstoppable in the NCAA Championship game. These other fellas seem more like chain-link fences than walls.

Next weekend, it's all about hockey, I promise!