The Time Niagara Bailed the Icers Out

There was once a time when it happened, believe it or not. What could Niagara possibly have done for Penn State? To tell that story is to tell the story of a third team, the Eastern Michigan Eagles (nee Hurons).

EMU was generally a very solid team that finished in the ACHA's top eight every season from 1989-1990 through 2002-2003. For a brief moment in time, they touched greatness. The Eagles came within 1:05 of beating the Icers for the 2000 national championship, before Todd Dakan sent the final to overtime, where Alon Eizenman won it. They rolled to 34-3-2 and a No. 1 ranking in 2000-2001 - a season that was abruptly halted by No. 9 Delaware in one of the great upsets in ACHA tournament history.

So what happened to all of that? Well, uh, this.

The team was suspended from the university club league for four years [in November, 2003] for violating the university's student code of conduct that forbids hazing, according to The Ann Arbor News.

Hazing? How?

Reports indicate the incident occurred Sept. 12, when a public safety officer spotted smoke while on patrol near a house in the 500 block of Pearl Street, according to the paper.

At about 1:45 a.m., the officer saw a man walking across the street in a party dress but found the fire had been put out, the paper reported.

One occupant of the house told the officer the hockey team was initiating new members. No one would identify the residents of the house, except to say they were hockey players, the paper reported. The officer told the paper the residents were apparently having fun with new members, "running through the streets in dresses and receiving odd haircuts." The officer reportedly talked to several men in the house who were wearing dresses. One also had a sexual slur written in black marker on the back of his legs, according to the paper.

Oh, ok, carry on. Or not, if you're EMU hockey. Ultimately, the punishment was reduced from the ridiculously excessive four years down to just the rest of the 2003-2004 season, with a probationary period in 2004-2005, during which the Eagles were ineligible for the ACHA tournament.

All of which is well and good, but what about the Icers, who had the Eagles scheduled for the at-the-time customary home weekend on the first weekend in December, 2003? In comes Niagara, willing to play two at the Ice Pavilion roughly 22 days after the EMU story broke. Without the Purps stepping up to help, the Icers would have gone from Thanksgiving weekend through January 9th without playing a single game. And while those games (5-1 and 9-1 PSU wins) didn't directly lead to Niagara's appearance on the schedule each December, it at least served as a sign of things to come.

The epilogue to the EMU tale: The reduced sentence still decimated the program, to the point where they're well on their way to a fifth losing season in six years, after having one in their entire pre-suspension history. Backlash from former players has led to an "I played for EMU Hockey when they were good" group on Facebook. Just be careful before you join, because Paul Fassbender will ferret out any impostors.

Why is Rob Cupit in this Group. He is still playing. I think they have won 10 games the last three years combined

Ouch bro. You going to take that from a guy who probably wore a dress at some point?

Applying the Purple Nurple

Does the guy in black look like a goalie to you? And how did that guy above the Molson ad get such a good parking spot? Photo: Niagara official site

The Icers close out the fall semester tonight with the sort-of-traditional Friday-only engagement with the Niagara Purple Eagles, or "Purps" as they apparently call themselves. I watch too many cop shows to ever get used to that.

Niagara has served as a stand-alone game at the end of the semester in each of Scott Balboni's five seasons as coach. While the result has generally been an Icers romp, the December 15, 2006 game, a 3-2 Penn State win, stands out as a cautionary tale. Last season, the score was a more typical 10-3, behind George Saad's hat trick, two goals from Tim O'Brien, and a three-point night by Rich O'Brien. Then again, those three have a gongshow that resulted in a defenseman playing goal to thank for their stat padding. Seriously.

The main melee started after Penn State forward Paul Daley went to the ice and was hit by a Niagara player. [Niagara goalie Patrick] Janokowski once again was involved as players on both sides got into altercations.

As referees rushed in to break up the main brawl, Icers forward Tim O'Brien took a Niagara player and tossed him to the ice and skated to the bench.

"There was a little scrum in front of the net and it kind of dragged out towards the red line," O'Brien said. "He had my stick and I just kept pushing him in the head until he let go of it and he never did. It was nothing big."

Janokowski was ejected from the game following the incident and Niagara was left without a backup goaltender. A 30 minute delay ensued as the Purple Eagles sent defensemen Patrick Martin to the locker room to suit up and get in net.

"It kind of baffles me when a team doesn't have a backup goalie, and knowing that, he's still doing that," O'Brien said. "I don't know what he was trying to prove. Obviously it didn't work and the game ended up being 10-3, basically on his shoulders so I don't think he was doing the smart thing at all."

Despite their problems against the Icers, self-inflicted or otherwise, the Purps strike me as a pretty well-run organization, at least in the completely superficial sense. Which is admittedly pretty unexpected in cases where an NCAA team is on campus as well, meaning they're probably not getting the "varsity, just without scholarships" treatment, as at Penn State, Rhode Island, Delaware, Ohio and others. They have an up-to-date website with fresh content, like player profiles. They hosted an outdoor game last year, and will again this year. They even keep everyone up-to-date on recruiting efforts, unheard of in the ACHA. Compared to Towson, which is pretty much the exact opposite of all of that, gathering information on Niagara for this post was ridiculously easy.

A large share of the credit for that is probably due long-time head coach Larry Brzeczkowski, a guy who has a better understanding of Icers history than you might think, as a player at Buffalo State, a former archrival of PSU's, back in the early 90s. Brzeczkowski has assembled a large staff to keep things running smoothly - one that even includes a team dentist [insert bad "toothless hockey player" joke here].

The Purps (do I have to do this for the whole post?) have also had more on-ice success than failure, as they presently sit at 11-8-0. They opened the season with a big upset in an overtime thriller at Liberty, and shortly after found themselves on a seven-game winning streak. However, that all came to an abrupt halt with an ugly 7-0 loss at Pittsburgh. The slide continued with four more losses, including a weekend sweep at the hands of Youngstown State, thanks largely to a flu epidemic within the team. Since the hot start, Niagara has lost five of the last eight to fall out of the ACHA rankings after achieving a season-high No. 24 in the November 5th edition - although they did win their last game, 11-4 over an abysmal St. Bonaventure (Note: The stats I'm about to use exclude that game).

If any kind of turn back in the right direction is to continue against the Icers, it will probably fall heavily on their offense, which averages 5.79 goals per game and has only been held under three twice, while scoring seven or more six times. A lot of that offense comes from Joe Baldinelli (12 goals, 26 assists), who impressively carried a 4.0 while leading the team in goals last season, Marc Degiuilio (14 goals, 11 assists) and junior captain Trevor Kenney (10 goals, 22 assists), who recently bagged his 100th career point. Incidentally, Kenney also participates in that quintessential hockey player pastime of golf on a pretty serious level. The forward group is also supported by a strong freshman class, including former A(tlantic)JHLers (and roommates) Carl Lehtola and Erik McKown (16 combined goals).

Dane Wakefield is the expected starter in goal, and while his stats (4.41 goals against, 0.869 save percentage) aren't great cosmetically, I'm willing to bet that's due at least in part to Grant Fuhr Effect, with the amount of offense in front of him.

In front of Wakefield, defenseman Tyler Guarasci - another freshman - is out with a broken hand suffered last weekend. Another steady defenseman, Pat Roth, missed last Saturday's game with the infamous upper body injury. While Niagara does look to have good depth on D, it will certainly be tested tonight, with WUG Team USA member Kevin Morrison, George Antzoulis and Drew Mencer logging significant minutes. Morrison and Antzoulis add some offensive punch, while Mencer is of the stay-at-home variety.

Next stop: the dead zone. Although with the WUG tune-ups and Ohio looming (as well as a total of seven of eight on the road in January), I suspect that we won't run out of stuff to talk about.

Outside Reading

Steve Penstone finds that the team has a healthy outlook following last Saturday's ugly loss.

The Collegian offers reinforcement for that and also lets you know what the team's been up to this week, both on and off the ice.

Payday Memorabilia: Bill Downey jersey

First off, the essential playing career details.

Bill Downey
Right Wing
Born May 12 1981  -- Pittsburgh, PA
Height 6.01 -- Weight 180 -- Shoots R

                                        --- Regular Season --- 
Season   Team                    Lge    GP    G    A  Pts  PIM
--------------------------------------------------------------
1999-00  Chicago Freeze          NAHL   47    4   11   15   49
2001-02  Pennsylvania State U    ACHA   26   12   16   28   29
2002-03  Pennsylvania State U    ACHA   32   15   20   35   21
2003-04  Johnstown Chiefs        ECHL    4    1    0    1   18
2003-04  Pennsylvania State U    ACHA   37   21   30   51   20
2004-05  Wheeling Nailers        ECHL    5    0    0    0    0
2004-05  Asheville Aces          SPHL    4    0    1    1   20
2004-05  Johnstown Chiefs        ECHL    2    0    0    0    0
2004-05  Richmond Riverdogs      UHL    15    2    2    4   21

2005-06  Wheeling Nailers        ECHL   44    4    3    7   13

2006-07  Reading Royals          ECHL    2    1    0    1    4

2007-08  Reading Royals          ECHL    1    0    0    0    2

--------------------------------------------------------------

Downey wore the blue and white with great distinction, averaging well over a point per game for his career, serving as captain in his senior year of 2003-04. And of course, there's those three ACHA national championships in 2001, 2002 and 2003. He was truly one of the great Icers of his era. Four years after his last game at Penn State, he returned as an assistant coach in 2008, a position he held for two seasons.

He left Penn State for a second time to become Harvard's director of hockey operations this season, the latest step in what's been a very successful (and mobile) post-playing career. It probably isn't logically deficient to think that Penn State will meet the Crimson for a weekend set or two come 2012. PSU, of course, will have dates galore available in those first two seasons as an NCAA D-I independent, just ask Alabama-Huntsville.

Oh, right, the jersey itself. As you can see from the patch on the back hem, it came from MeiGray, which is a great place to look if you want an Icers-related jersey that's a little bit different from the third jerseys and 1998-2000 models that everyone else wears - Curtiss Patrick and Justin DePretis are among those with pro jerseys on the site.

The Wheeling Nailers have one of the best, most recognizable logos in minor league hockey, and this jersey manages to avoid the usual pitfalls of minor league jerseys. Somehow, it even managed to escape that staple of jerseys in the ECHL or lower: the giant Best Western (or comparable) ad below the number - I'm sure this being a road jersey didn't hurt on that front. Borrowing the numbering style of the Penguins is a nice way to nod to the parent club without going overboard.

I have it on good authority that this particular jersey is from 2004-2005, not 2005-2006, which explains the fact that it has almost zero wear, as Downey only played five games with the Nailers that season. I'll be honest though, I very rarely wear it because it's a parachute. It's a 56, but from back when 56 meant something.

New Page Addition

While working on my pre-Niagara post for Friday, I couldn't remember if the Purple Eagles had made the ACHA national championship tournament in recent years. I didn't think so, but I wasn't sure. So naturally, I used that as an excuse to develop a list of tournament appearances by team. It goes back to 2003 for now, because that's as far back as the internet allowed me to go easily, but I hope to continue to build it backwards at least a couple more years.

As with the other pages - the Icers numerical history and the results by opponent - the links are located on the right side of the main page, just under the Twitter boxes.

Some interesting factoids that popped up while putting it together:

• Penn State, Ohio, Illinois and Iowa State are the only teams to make each tournament since 2003.
• A Robert Morris (IL or PA) has been in the tournament each year since 2005, but both have never made it in the same year.
• Oakland had the worst title defense since 2003, finishing 11th in 2008 after winning it all in 2007.
• Kent State has the most tournament appearances - five - without winning a single game on the championship track.
• Lindenwood and Illinois each have two championships, but the Icers have arguably been the most productive team with an average finish of 2.75 while appearing in every tournament. Buffalo and Rutgers sit on the other end of the spectrum, finishing (and starting) 16th in their only nationals trips. Penn State-Berks gets a nod there too, as they were a probable 16th-place finisher in their only visit, had their consolation game not been cancelled.

Why I'm Optimistic

In my post covering the Delaware games, I tried to take a positive tone, which I felt was appropriate, even though I'm sure it violates some blogger's code somewhere or something. The cold truth is that the Icers split, and as ambiguous as a split can be, I have a hard time taking it as a disaster when the split is with a team that is ranked eight slots higher. If Penn State loses Friday and wins Saturday, or wins 7-0 and loses 3-2, you might feel better about it, but it's 1-1 no matter how you slice it. Don't agree with me? Well, Paul Daley does:

“In perspective, it’s not that bad of a loss. We split with a team ranked ahead of us, knowing we didn’t play our best the second game. We have to go back to what we do.”

Put that together with the Towson weekend and beating Niagara (hey, I'm not on the team, I'm allowed to do that), and the Icers will have won four of five to close out the semester after the disaster at Rhode Island. Not exactly juggernaut stuff, but certainly something to build on. That spring schedule still looks imposing with Ohio (in Athens), Delaware (in Newark) and Rhode Island looming. However splits in those three series, combined with taking care of business against West Chester and Bobby Mo - and I believe that PSU has proven capable of that - get Penn State's final nationals resume to 22-8-0, including five wins against likely top 10 teams. Not the best we've ever seen, but probably enough to at least wear white jerseys for the first round. And given recent history (Central Oklahoma, Liberty), I'm okay with being an underdog in the second round.

More than anything else though, the reason I'm optimistic is because I caught a glimpse of the team's capabilities on Friday with a fully-stocked roster for the first time all season. Four lines that can hurt you, including the Icers' "best player" on the presumptive third line. The Icers' worst line Friday (Cerutti-Morrone-Collins) had been the best the week two weeks before, so we know they can play. A defense corps that might be coming together as the season goes on (the mistakes have been fewer and less glaring in my observation, anyway). A young goaltender who has been a revelation, despite a rough patch on Saturday - and if the other, more experienced goalie finds the form that we've seen before over the semester break, PSU is once again deep there. A power play with too much talent to go 0-for-the-weekend very often, as has happened twice this season.

Lost in the fact that we had so many injury returnees was the lineup shuffling that had to be done as a result. Meaning that things will only look better going forward as guys learn and re-learn how to play with each other, at least according to Taylor Cera (and me, which is why I'm including it).

The main factor going forward will be chemistry, Cera said. Now healthy, the Icers will need to get a feel for each other on the ice, while continuing to learn to play together.

“We need to keep building off what we have,” Cera said. “It showed early what we’re capable of. We had a couple of goals in the first couple minutes.”

So there you have it. A finally-healthy team that will only continue to improve. And while it's unlikely that the Icers will sit in their customary position as one of the two or three favorites come March, it certainly seems possible that they'll be playing their best hockey at the right time and be one of those teams the favorites hope is on the opposite side of the bracket. None of that sounds all that horrible to me.