Monday Tidbits

- The Alexandria Blizzard named Doc DelCastillo as their new General Manager/Head Coach. Read the article here: http://www.nahl.com/news/story.cfm?id=1022 .

- The North Iowa Outlaws named Garrett Strot as their new Head Coach. He served as Assistant Coach with the Outlaws last season under Jeff Crouse. Read the article here: http://www.nahl.com/news/story.cfm?id=1018

- Former Express defenseman Anthony Orange finished last season with the Illinois State Redbirds. Anthony left the Express shortly after the Showcase last season, and I lost track of where he ended up. This article explains the circumstances: http://www.illinoisstatehockey.com/news2.php?news_id=142423 . Anthony was a well-behaved, polite, and very strong kid, and I'm happy he landed in a good situation with the Redbirds.

- Tryout camp season is in full swing for both the NAHL and the USHL teams. The Express Open Tryout Camp is only 17 days away, but if you need a hockey fix, there are camps every weekend within an hour of Owatonna. It was interesting to see some familiar names pop up at USHL camps last weekend.

- My final topic for discussion on this post is something I have been holding off on for a few days. The anger it brought up in me was not going to lead to a very nice article, but now that I have had a few days to process it, I will give you my $0.02 worth. Former Express defenseman Kevin Wright is getting a royal screw job by the NCAA. This article explains the situation: http://www.gazette.com/articles/wright-55153-hockey-ncaa.html .

My take: I got to know Kevin back in 2005/06 after he was injured early in the season. As the rest of the team was skating and working out, all Kevin could do was ride a stationary bike. This provided me an opportunity to shoot the breeze with him, and Kevin quickly turned into one of my favorite players. When he finally returned to the lineup, he was just a role player on the team. He came back for the 2006/07 team, and played a big role as that Express team made a second consecutive run to the Robertson Cup tournament. He played well enough to earn a Division 1 offer from the Air Force Academy. What should have been a happy ending for him, has now turned into disappointment after the epic display of stupidity on the part of the NCAA.

Barely a day goes by without some sort of scandal happening in the kingdom that the NCAA oversees. Big time basketball and football recruits getting paid under the table, or "student" athletes that can barely speak english and write their own name passing the SAT/ACT tests. You don't have to even leave the state of Minnesota to see how messed up the situation is. Jan Ganglehoff wrote how many papers for Gopher basketball players to keep them eligible?? Gopher football players (some of them already convicted felons before arriving at the U of M) committing a litany of crimes in our own backyard. At the University of Iowa alone, Hawkeye athletes were charged with 22 separate crimes in a 19 month period between April of 2007 and August of 2008. For an encore, need I remind you that the NCAA is responsible for the BCS bowl system.

All of that stuff going on, and they choose to end the playing career of a kid with a 3.67 gpa while serving his country at a service academy. At some point, you would think common sense would come into play and the right decision would be rendered. All this situation is going to do is weaken college hockey by driving more good players into the Canadian leagues.

Bad move NCAA, pull your head out of its hiding place and let Kevin finish his playing career on the ice where he belongs.

See you at the rink.

--Big Kahuna