The Joy of College Hockey
The college hockey national championship game is tomorrow, 5:30pm eastern on ESPN. In the Frozen Four Thursday night, Wisconsin beat North Dakota, 2-1, and Denver beat Michigan, 4-3 in 2OT.
College hockey will always be my favorite spectator sport. The NHL is very popular in Upstate, NY where I grew up. But college hockey was much more immediately in my life. My parents had met at Boston University—more or less the center of the Cawlidge Hawkey universe—so he was naturally a huge fan. And there weren't any NHL teams truly close by; Montreal, Boston, and New York were all 2+ hours away.
But we lived close to both RPI and Union. And our neighbors had four season tickets at RPI. So we went to a ton of college games growing up. RPI won the national title when I was 7. That’ll do it. My first sports hero was Adam Oates—yes, the Adam Oates who later coached the Capitals—who was the star of the ‘85 RPI team.
But, beyond that, college hockey is just the best version of the game.
First, The college rules have always been better. So much better, in fact, that the NHL basically adopted them in the early 2000s in order to improve the fan experience. Pro hockey in the 90s kinda sucked. The 2-line pass rule was always stupid and slowed the game down. The neutral zone trap made it a disaster. The fights were endless. College was always a fast game with tons of breakaways and 2-on-1 rushes. And believe it or not, the lacks of fights doesn't make a difference.
Second, The crowds are way better at college hockey. This is probably true of all college sports, but it's very noticeable in hockey. A totally different experience than the NHL. Most college barns hold 2-6k people, so everyone is on top of the ice. The chant are amazing---here's a band-led sieve chant, and an all your fault chant. These are common at every rink. And there's nothing quite like a horde of drunk teenagers banging on the glass. Tickets are really cheap, too.
Third, Worse players somehow make the game better. College hockey players stink compared to NHL players. It's actually pretty jarring to be watching one and switch to another on TV; if you go from NHL to college, your first reaction is "these players can't pass." If you go from college to NHL, it's "all of these people are magicians who use spells to keep the puck on their stick." But the beauty of college hockey is the relative difference in skill among the players on the ice. Even the most dominant players in the NHL---like Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon---can't really take over a game single-handedly. It's a team effort.
Not in college. There are just a ton of players who simply belong in the NHL but haven't left college yet. Like, what are they doing here? The upshot is that there are Gretzky's everywhere. Guys who simply dominate. Not quite like basketball. But not not like basketball. And that's just amazing to watch. I remember when Union won the national title in 2014, Shayne Gostisbehere was plus-7 in a 7-4 win. Yes. He was on the ice for all 7 Union goals, and not on the ice for all 4 they gave up. Amazing. No other sport is quite like that.