Beyond the Scoresheet

NFL playoffs digression

Let me talk football for a moment. What a series of games the NFL had this weekend! Between my high school sports coverage, my Sunday soccer league and my occasional social life, I haven’t watched a ton of football this year. But I managed to watch three of the four games this weekend, and they were all terrific. The fourth one – Green Bay’s win on Saturday – was played in one of the crazier snowstorms in NFL history. Quite a weekend!

Tonight, I had arranged to DVR the Giants-Cowboys game and watch it later this evening with one of my old roommates, a Cowboys fan. Driving into my apartment complex, I caught a glimpse of a neighbor’s TV and thought I saw somebody in white being interviewed. So I spent the whole game thinking the Giants were going to lose, only to see them pull it out in the end! Holy crap! I still can’t believe the Giants won that game after being completely unable to stop the Cowboys for most of the game.

Having been in Texas Stadium when the Giants beat the Cowboys in the fall of 2006, I can appreciate just how quiet that place got and how big it was for the Giants to win a game in that rivalry. I’ve hated the Cowboys since I was a little kid and they got the best of the Giants every year, it seemed, after Super Bowl XXV. So it’s nice to be on the other side of that.

Now I just wish I could be at Lambeau on Sunday.

Thursday update

A couple of results from Wednesday games that are worth noting. First of all, and most importantly, East Side got a win! The Red Raiders beat St. Rose 5-4 on Thursday for its first win since beating St. Rose 7-1 on Feb. 1, 2006. Of course, that’s only about five games ago, since East Side did not field a team last year. Next time these teams meet (Jan. 14), I’ll root for St. Rose.

I also wanted to point out an article most people may have missed on Delbarton’s 6-2 win over two-time defending Rhode Island state champion Bishop Hendricken.

I’ll be flying back to New Jersey for a brief holiday stay on Friday night, which means Saturday will probably be my only day of checking out N.J. hockey games this year. Any suggestions as to where I should go?

Thursday update
Just to explain several updates to various schedules … I’m told Hackettstown and Hudson Catholic had five players EACH given game disqualifications in their Dec. 17 game. That’s from one skirmish, in which I’m told no punches were thrown, and both coaches were baffled by the referees’ decision. It happened in the first period, and Hudson Catholic played the rest of the game with only six players, total.

Due to mandatory two-game suspensions (which will also yield state tournament ineligibility for both teams) for roughly half of its players, Hudson Catholic has chosen to forfeit its next two games: Friday against High Point and Sunday against Dumont. Assuming my schedules are up to date, that could save Dumont from playing on three consecutive days, which it should be noted is NOT legal. Dumont, Nutley, and Parsippany are all teams in danger of playing three games on three days at some point this month. This is a violation of NJSIAA rules and has, in the past, been punished with forfeits.

NJSIAA posts public split

As you can probably tell, I’m fascinated by the state’s process in splitting the public tournament. The NJSIAA has posted the list of teams that will be classified as Public A or Public B. The list is available on Page 11 of this document (which always makes for interesting reading anyway).

I haven’t done a 100 percent cross-check, but here are a couple of things:

Woodbridge and JFK Iselin are on this list, but Monroe is not. Odd, considering Monroe fields a varsity team, and Woodbridge and JFK Iselin do not.

Co-ops are listed with the enrollment of one school (Whippany Park, Point Pleasant Boro, Tenafly, Jonathan Dayton, Verona) only. This leaves all five as Public B teams, when a combined enrollment figure would have pushed Point Pleasant, Tenafly and Park Regional into Public A.

I was originally told Nottingham would be Public B, but apparently the split has been amended to place Nottingham in the Public A classification.

I don’t know if these are mistakes or if the NJSIAA has reasons, but I really feel this should have (a) been fact-checked better and (b) been released much, much earlier.

MONDAY EDIT: I have been informed that the NJSIAA will likely re-release the list in the coming days, presumably with some of these mistakes corrected.

TUESDAY EDIT: The NJSIAA has added Monroe and fixed the enrollment of various co-ops. This led to me discovering that Pascack Valley and River Dell are both co-op teams. Why does nobody tell me these things? The only kink that remains involves Verona and WWPN. I’m trying to get it sorted out.

Explaining the public tournament

Thanks to a frighteningly early deadline (before practices even begin), I’ve been working on my HNIB preview (including a Top 10, of which you might see a sneak peek soon) all week and talking to coaches.

This afternoon, I finally broke through and got hold of NJSIAA Assistant Director Jack DuBois, who confirmed the particulars of the public tournament split. I’ve heard a lot of information from a lot of people on this one, but nobody seemed really sure. So here’s what I’ve got:

According to DuBois, the 95 public schools playing varsity hockey (I’m not sure if that number includes East Side and Monroe – I’ll check when I get home to my personal computer tonight) will be classified before the season as either Public A or Public B (the terminology is not finalized, but that’s how DuBois referred to them.) Hamilton (10-12 enrollment 1,013) will be in Public A and Nottingham (enrollment 1,010) will be in Public B. DuBois iterated that the at-large process will remain the same, which seems to mean three private and three public, regardless of class size.

I’ll try to have more analysis of this later.

On a private school note, great to see New Jersey prep seniors representing in the DHI Cup – Mike Morreale had a quick recap at njice.8m.com.

Public tourney split approved

As first reported here in the summer and reported today in the Newark Star-Ledger, the NJSIAA Wednesday approved the split of the public ice hockey tournaments into two divisions.

I can only imagine what the NJSIAA will call it (hopefully not the Large School Championship Subdivision and the Small School Championship Subdivision), but I’m going with Division I (small) and Division II (large) for now. When I get to a computer with my full listing of teams and have some free time, I’ll try to finalize a breakdown of which teams will be which.

I also heard today that the Shore Conference is changing the way its schedule works (again.) I’m getting pretty tired of this, quite frankly. All the northern conferences had their schedules done in July, and we don’t even have preliminary Shore schedules here in September. Meanwhile, it’s non-hockey people making poor decisions about a sport that has very specific scheduling issues. I’ll let you know if and when we get a decision on this.

that’s awesome

Forgive me for a second, but that’s just awesome. I’ve known George since I was in the seventh grade and was completely awestruck when he was in the same conference block (think study hall) I was. To see pictures of him (‘stache and all) getting his day with the Stanley Cup and taking it home to our school was just awesome. Wish I could’ve been there.

This is also neat:

East Side back in the game?

Keith Veltre contacted me today and let me know that East Side does intend to field a varsity ice hockey team in 2007-08 after not playing on the varsity level in 2006-07. Veltre has been the East Side coach for several years and has tried to build the program’s numbers through youth hockey. After merely practicing last year, Veltre said he expects the Red Raiders to play 10-15 games this year as an independent.

East Side was 3-13-1 while playing in the Northern Blue Division in 2005-06, beating Hackensack twice and St. Rose. Before that, the Red Raiders were 2-14-2 in 2004-05, 0-12 in 2003-04, 1-12 in 2002-03 and 2-10-2 in 2001-02. That’s as far back as my records go.

While never an on-ice power, you have to love East Side coming back. One of my great regrets on the hockey scene is that I have never been to Ironbound Rink or seen East Side play. I doubt I’ll get to break that streak in the short time I’m home this winter, but you never know. Besides, maybe they’ll play at The Rock.

Assuming Wallkill Valley and Monroe do compete on the varsity level this year (still unconfirmed), that makes 99 public schools. It also means Nutley is the school on the bubble between Division I and Division II if the public state tournament split is confirmed.

In other news that is completely unrelated to high school hockey, I’ve been promoted to sports editor at my newspaper group, which is a nice bump in responsibility (and, not that it’s saying much, salary).