COLLEGE HOCKEY UPDATE:  Last weekend gave us a peak at what had been mentioned in our last post — “tests” of top ranked teams in the form of games against other ranked teams — and one of them was the Mariucci Classic in Minneapolis, in which UMass-Lowell defeated Merrimack College in the championship game, lifting Lowell up a few spots to #6 (Lowell had beaten RIT the night before), while Merrimack held at #18 (Merrimack had beaten Minnesota the night before).  Minnesota beat RIT in the consolation round, and Minnesota dropped a spot to #9.  I did not mention this next game as a test, but almost did, and it was a test indeed — Boston University hosted defending national champion, but only #21 in poll voting, Union College and the two fought to a tie.  In another matchup of a ranked team and a nearly ranked team, Vermont lost to Yale, dropping Vermont out of the top ten to #11, and the win pushed Yale into the top twenty at #19.

Elsewhere, Mankato beat, then tied, Northern Michigan, dropping Mankato a spot to #4, while Michigan Tech split with Wisconsin, which dropped Tech down three spots to #8.  Denver tied Dartmouth and beat Brown, lifting Denver up to #10.  North Dakota notched an exhibition win over the US Under-18 team, and rose up to #1 on BU’s tie with Union, Minnesota-Duluth notched two exhibition win’s over Lakehead, and held at #7, and an idle Harvard rose up to #3 on Mankato’s tie with Northern Michigan.

Denver had huge help last weekend from sophomore forward Trevor Moore, of Thousand Oaks, CA., who notched a third-period hat trick, and added an assist, in Denver’s 5-3 win over Brown.  The 5′ 10″ 175lb forward is tied for first on the team in goals scored, with eight, and is tied for third in assists with ten.  Last year, as a freshman, he made the NCHC all-rookie team, and was first on the team in goals, with 14, and second in assists, with 17.  Before he came to Denver, he scored 32 goals and registered 63 assists over two seasons with the Tri City Storm of the USHL.  In 2012 he played on the US Under-18 Team, and and he led all LA selects with 19 goals and 22 assists in 35 games.  Thousand Oaks is also home to another 129,000 residents, and is in southeastern Ventura County; it sits 34 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles.  The area was first explored when Juan Cabrillo landed on nearby Point Mugu in 1542.  Thousand Oaks was established as part of a development master plan in the mid 1950’s  and was incorporated as a city in 1964.    The average low in Thousand Oaks in December and January is 41 degrees (it’s inland, away from the warm waters of the ocean), and the record low there is 25 degrees.  Not your typical hockey climate, some may say . . . .

Denver is coached by Jim Montgomery, who is in his second season of replacing George Gwozdecky.  In his first season last year, Denver had a 20-game winning season.  Montgomery is a native of Montreal, and came to Denver from three years as the head coach and general manager of the Dubuque Fighting Saints of the USHL.  Prior to Dubuque, he was an assistant at RPI, and prior to that he was a volunteer assistant at Notre Dame.  Montgomery played college hockey for the Black Bears of Maine, and is one of only three players to have their jersey retired at Alfond Arena.  His 301 points, from 103 goals and 198 assists in 170 games, make him he all-time leading scorer at Maine.  He was captain of the 1992-3 team that won Maine’s first NCAA Championship, going 42-1-2.  Montgomery was a Hobey Baker finalist that year, losing out to his linemate, and future NHL star, Paul Kariya.  He played professionally from 1993-2005, with parts of six of those seasons spent on NHL teams.

The University of Denver was founded in 1864 as the Colorado Seminary, a Methodist seminary, and its name was changed to University of Denver in 1880.  It currently has 5,500 undergraduates, and 5,800 graduates, and it sits on a 125 acre campus.  Denver is composed of eleven colleges and schools.  It has the second highest telescope in the world, which sits 14,148 feet high at the summit of Mt. Evans, which was named for the founder of the University, John Evans.  Since 1999 the University has built and opened seven new buildings and two new athletic fields, as the product of a $500 million capital fundraising campaign.  Some names you might recognize as graduates of Denver are Condoleeza Rice, Michelle Kwon, Mary Cheney, Suzy Chaffee, Peter Coors (MBA), Craig Patrick, the assistant coach of the 1980 Olympic Hockey Team, who played on the 1968 and 1969 Denver NCAA Championship teams, Senator Peter Domenici (law), and NHLers Matt Carle, Jason Zucker, and Paul Stastny.  Its sports teams are called the Pioneers, and they wear maroon and gold.  The University has a surprising 29 NCAA championships — 22 in Snow Skiing, and 7 in Hockey.

The University of Denver is in . . . . Denver, which sits at an elevation of exactly 5,280 feet, hence it’s nickname.  It sits twelve miles from the start of the Rocky Mountain foothills, and is home to 650,000, and the greater metropolitan area is home to three million.  Denver was founded in November of 1858 as a mining town during the Pike’s Peak Gold Rush in the western side of the Kansas territory.  Denver was incorporated in 1861, and it flourished in that decade as a mining and agricultural supply and service center, a role it still largely plays today, as well as business center, as a result of its location in the middle of the mountain/high plains region.

This weekend features a great top ten matchup as #1 North Dakota hosts #7 Minnesota-Duluth for two games.  Plus there are two top ten teams that will face other ranked opponents, as #3 Harvard will face #19 Yale in Manhattan at Madison Square Garden, and #10 Denver will travel to play two games at #12 Nebraska-Omaha.  These should all be killer matchups.

This provides the top ten teams, rankings, records, and last week’s results:

[table id=100 /]

That’s all for now.  Stay tuned, and go Terriers!

— Tom