Men's Hockey Log: Two (Refs) Good To Be True, Says PC Coach Tim Army

Right about now is the time for all collegiate puckheads/debate enthusiasts to strap on the rope burn-proof gloves and rev up the tug of verbal war. After all, that’s what all of the bystanders of professional hockey have perpetually engaged in ever since the NHL took on the two-referee system nearly a decade ago.

Earlier this summer, after using it as sparse experimentation throughout last season, the NCAA has opted to go with the four-head zebra crew full-time in Division I hockey and has not ruled out doing the same for Division III in the not-too-distant future.

The pro v. con contests that have periodically stormed hockey talk shows, columns, and fan forums –always with the same sort of ammo for both sides, it seems- hasn’t left the college game untouched all this time. As far back as 2003, the likes of Maine head coach Tim Whitehead have come forward to make a case for change. That year, the then nine-member Hockey East coaches’ panel put forth five yays, two nays, and two indecisions to bring on the second ref.

“The two referee-two linesmen system would give us better ice coverage and it would also allow us to add some young referees to the old boy network,” Whitehead said at the time to the Bangor Daily News. “We felt one referee can’t cover the entire ice sheet and the two assistant referees were being distracted by their multiple responsibilities so they were missing some icing and offsides calls.”

Somehow or other, though, the popular vote found no fertile ice, primarily owing to a lack of similar innovatory interest amongst fellow Division I conferences. When the topic resurfaced again last year as chiefly nonconference contests gave the two-ref format test runs, it was taken for a surefire insititution come 2008-09, which it will now be thanks to the June ruling by the NCAA Men’s and Women’s Ice Hockey Rules Committee.

PC men’s coach Tim Army, who experienced the NHL’s advent of the system as a Washington Capitals’ assistant, is “thrilled” by the college game’s option to finally follow suit.

“This system will allow for a stricter enforcement of the rules, thus enhancing the overall speed of our game,” he said this week. “The emphasis on speed will create more open lanes that can be exploited with quick puck movement. Speed and possession will produce better transitional and cycling play which will increase offensive activity in the scoring areas resulting in greater goal production.”

Chances are, Army is thinking beyond the one night last season that his Friars had two orange-armed officials presiding the action, an 8-0 pillaging of Brown. Greater goal production, he says? Touché.

Then again, the nub of a dissenter’s case was in full throttle that night. Brown, a team that averaged 7.13 penalties per game in 2007-08 was whistled for a hefty 13 two-minute minors in the Mayor’s Cup. The Friars were flagged nine times, an even four above their game-by-game median of five.

Doesn’t that presage a menacing nightly rate of whistle-stops? Not in the long run, Army prophesies.

“At first there will be a rise in penalties,” Army conceded. “But eventually coaches and players will make the necessary adjustments. Most importantly, the game will be impacted by the most highly skilled players as the ice will open up for their speed and intuition.”

For what it’s worth, the PC women attested to that philosophy when they took a double-dose of two refs last November over a two-night visit to Ohio State. Game 2 of that series saw a gratifyingly slim three Friar penalties after there were twice as many the previous night.

The skeptics are bound to persist with the contention that –increased calls or not, sharp determent of daring infractions or not- an additional set of skates on the ice will inevitably clutter the action. There’s that, and the notion that a pair of refs might breed the danger of deterimentally differing interpretations of the rulebook. But as Army’s viewpoint underscores, people have been saying that since 1998 and all the while the NHL has pressed on with no standout pimples.

“That has not been a problem in the NHL,” he said. “With that representing the best league in the world, I am certain that won’t be a problem in the NCAA.”

This article originally appeared in the Friartown Free Press

Track Log: Friars Send Annual Sprinkling To NCAAs, Each With An Extra Rung To Grasp

Something mystical -or, if nothing else, years of simple building upon building- worked tangibly for Ahmed Haji at the climactic turn of his fourth and final PC track season.

By sheer grace, or a hefty dollop of drive, or an exponentially escalating package of proficiency, or all of the above, the track spirits finally gleamed in approval at an all-seasons runner of an endless cross-country trophy case but an inverse shortage of equivocal track and field accomplishments.

After he had snuffed out on his first three stabs at a ticket to the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, Haji made a charm out of the fourth attempt and is set to take one last hustle in PC attire a good month after he was handed his degree. Together with female associates and outdoor championship veterans Katie DiCamillo and Danette Doetzel, he will represent the Friars in Des Moines, Iowa, on the campus of host Drake University (yesterday's home of PC's new men's basketball skipper, Keno Davis).

Haji and DiCamillo will each run through their respective 5,000 meter semifinals Wednesday evening, the ladies going first at 8:10, the men to follow at 8:50. Doetzel will carry out her one-shot deal in the 10,000 meter dash Thursday night, the cue-gun going off for her group at 8:10.

Should either Haji or DiCamillo advance, they will hang about for Friday's meter finals, the women to go at 9:15 p.m. and the men immediately following at 9:35.

Haji, a four-time veteran of the NCAA cross country championships, earned his passport here on April 24 with a nip-and-tuck finish at the Penn Relays, where he hadn't earned any glamour since he went there in 2004 as a senior with Conard High School. Coming back in the form of a ripe collegian, he finished sixth among 31 5,000m dashers, logging a flashy 13:57.01 running time.

Between PC's four student-athletes of the year (Haji was distinguished under the male individual sport heading), Doetzel is the only one with still another year to work with in Friartown. And between this year's trinity of track elites, she's the one branding the progressive archetype.

In the not-too-distant past, Doetzel has made 5,000 meters her specialty. She went 12th overall in the final round of that very event a year ago in Sacramento with a 16:27.67 finish. Three months ago, accompanied by the Friars' mile-run connossieur Hayden McLaren, she clocked in at 16:36.04 to finish 13th in a final pool of 16 at the Arkansas-hosted indoor championships.

She has, more or less, "graduated" in the short time since. In Arkansas, she was one of the final 16 standing in the 5,000m event, where she finished 13th overall within 16:36.04.

Since then, during this outdoor season, she has laid claim to the Big East throne for 10,000m competitors. Doetzel completed that venture in a matter of 33:27.64 for first place in the conference final May 3, plenty to fulfill the NCAA qualification criteria.

Earning the option of a double-dip in both the 5,000 and 10,000 runs this week, Doetzel chose the latter option by itself. And so, she leaves the 5,000 legacy solely in the hands of DiCamillo, who fell a few gusts short of joining her in last year's finals.

DiCamillo, who at the 2007 indoor bonanza logged an identical 13th-place finish in the indoor 5,000 meter run (16:23.28 time), stamped her passport to Des Moines less than two weeks ago in the East Regionals. She claimed fourth-place by means of a 16:48, only fifteen seconds ahead of a fifth-place, shortcoming Friar friend in Krystal Douglas.

DiCamillo, Doetzel's fellow junior and a cross-country ace like Doetzel and Haji both, will look to better last year's semi-final run of 16:26.13, which placed her 12th in that tour and on the sidelines to watch her teammate, who finished twelve seconds and a slim three slots ahead of her.

Softball Splits With Notre Dame, Retains Playoff Hopes

Report based on CSTV’s Gametracker

Notre Dame, Ind.- In a matter of 79 minutes, the potent Notre Dame Fighting Irish docked Providence College back to conventional reality through a hastened 10-1 shellacking in Game 1 of Saturday’s doubleheader at Melissa Cook Stadium. At the interim portion of the day, PC was 0-11 all time on this particular field.

But the refined Friars pounced on the resultant jumpstart to Game 2 (first pitch thrown at 1:44, a good 16 minutes ahead of the listed start time), conjuring a 4-0 lead on a set of doubles by Gina Rossi and Teresa Bertels and kneading that edge to an eventual 5-3 triumph.

With that, only one year and 12 days removed from halting their franchise-old futility against the Irish through a split at Raymond Field, PC extracted its first ever victory on the fabled Indiana campus, where in 2006 they were promptly abolished from their only appearance in the Big East quarterfinals.

Incidentally, Saturday’s resilience also propped up the Friars’ hopes for a return trip to the playoffs as they kept their .500 transcript (8-8) and grip on the eighth seed stable. They will seek to finally step up a few rungs in their Sunday visit to DePaul, who at 10-5 stood fourth in the conference midway through their Saturday series with Connecticut.

Nothing was stable about Saturday’s venture, though. Even as the Friars sculpted their early edge, the Irish nibbled at starter Jennifer Maccio from within, accepting four walks in the first three innings and barely stranding two runners in each of those frames.

After Bertels had guided Rossi and Justin Stratton home on a distant double to left center, Notre Dame hurler Jody Valdivia finally gave way to Brittney Bargar, who came into Saturday No. 2 in overall Big East pitching and #1 in terms of strikeouts with 188. In a practical fingersnap, the wound was compressed and the Irish finally hatched their run-scoring egg on Maccio in their half of the inning.

A two-out triple courtesy Katie Fleury brought Erin Marrone home before Sarah Smith plopped a soapy bunt that third baseman Katelyn Revens couldn’t handle, allowing Fleury to tap the dish and reduce matters to a 4-2 deficit.

By the time the Irish had again let two runners dissolve in the fifth (right after PC had stranded three in their half) Maccio had thrust the ball 88 times. She lasted merely four more in the sixth, eventually authorizing a single Brianna Jorgensborg before the Friars’ called upon their own ace, Danielle Bertollette.

Bertollette, who took the two-cheek slapper earlier in the day, started her second shift with a draining, seven-pitch walk to Fleury. The Irish proceeded to inch Jorgensborg all the way home on a pair of worthwhile sac grounders.

But Christy Becker drove home an insurance tally in the Friars’ half of the seventh, whacking a two-out, straightaway single far enough to let Revens complete the tour from second base, which she had wisely stolen after her leadoff single. (Revens expanded her league lead in the SB column to 25).

Bertollette needed to squeeze out 20 more tosses en route to her first save of the year, but ended up stamping it on Marronne’s full-count fly to Rossi out in left.

Game 1: Bargar explicitly out-aced Bertollette in the early fixture, wherein PC submitted to a mercy rule after a mere four-and-a-half innings.

Discounting to the Friars’ redressing Game 2 victory, four of the last five get-togethers between these two schools have not through the standard seven inning schema.

Bertollette (3.1 IP, 9 H, 5 ER) was uprooted in favor of Kathryn Sullivan upon Samantha Pittmann’s one-out error at second base which let Katie Laing hustle home from third and stationed Jorgensborg and Sarah Smith on first and second. Sullivan let Christine Lux into the equation through a five-pitch walk before Ashley Ellis leveled a grand slam over left field.

The Irish massacre strung its 10 runs on as many hits whereas the Friars spilled the bulk of their opportunities, affording only one run on seven hits and stranding five runners between the second and fifth innings.

In the second, with Notre Dame already up 3-0, Pittmann nailed a first-pitch, one-out single to push home Christy Becker and Gina Rossi –the lone Friar to muster two hits on winning hurler Brittney Bargar- to second. Both runners snuck into scoring position on Bertels’ sac bunt but saw their chance to knot the game zapped on Julie Fowler’s subsequent strikeout.

In the bottom of the third, the Irish stretched their edge to 5-1 only after Bertollette had singlehandedly retired her first two challengers, putting out both Laing and Lux on grounders. Linda Kohan –who had stolen home for her team’s third run in the opening frame- and later gave way to pinch runner Christin Farrell after Ellis (5 RBIs on the day) walked on four straight pitches. Designated hitter Beth Northway belted a distant double to bring both runners home.