OT: Ohio State Hockey
I was perusing USCHO.com and noticed there is an article about Ohio State hockey, which got me thinking: why does Ohio State continue to sponsor hockey/why has the team not been dissolved? This might seem crazy, but here me out:
Ohio State does not draw very many fans to its games, and let's be real the fans do not care about hockey. Hockey is not engrained in the culture and there has been no effort for hockey to be important.
Ohio State has had hockey since 1963 and has made only ONE Frozen Four. Yes, ONE (1998.) Surely for a school of the size of Ohio State, it should be able to make more than ONE Frozen Four. For reference, other major D1 schools with hockey include Michigan and BC (24 Frozen Fours), BU and Minnesota (21 each), Wisconsin (12), MSU (11), and Harvard (12). Ohio State, from 1971-2013, won only ONE CCHA regular season title...in the first year (71-72)...which they shared with now defunct St. Louis. In that time period, St. Louis, Michigan, Michigan State, Miami, Bowling Green, Ferris State, Notre Dame (which also has been surprisingly bad until recently), and Northern Michigan all managed to win more than one CCHA title. Only Western Michigan had been in the CCHA for a similar amount of time and not win a CCHA title. OSU also only won TWO ever CCHA Playoffs, in 72 and 04. Again, in that time period, Michigan, MSU, Notre Dame, Lake Superior State, Bowling Green, St. Louis, and Northern Michigan managed to win the same (ND) or more titles. They have never won an NCAA title game, let alone appeared in one. In that time Michigan, MSU, Northern Michigan, Bowling Green, and Lake Superior State all won national titles while even Notre Dame, Miami, and Ferris State appeared in national title games.
Overall what I am getting at is OSU is bad at hockey. But my question is: why? Is it purely because nobody there cares about hockey. Even then, why do they keep it up? Surely it can't be profitable, is it just because they want to at least field the same team Michigan and MSU do? All the other Big Ten schools (excluding Penn State) have strong histories of hockey, but not OSU. Thoughts?
The state as a whole does not give a shit and the resources are lacking. I have family there that did care about any hockey until the CBJ made the playoffs in 2009. They also told me that they would have to drive over an hour to get to a skating rink. For comparison, I live in Michigan and I can get to 4 rinks in less than 20 minutes,
I feel like I can shed some extra light on this topic and didn’t want my post to get buried below. I coached in the AAA program in Columbus and also working with the Blue Jackets staff for a couple of years so know a lot about the scene down here and I think it’s 2 factors.
1) Terrible coaching: From former players I’ve heard Markel was terrible to play for and they kept that mediocrity around for 15+ yrs. Then Osiecki comes in and never recruited any of the guys from our program. Meanwhile we had kids flourish at other schools, most of them Miami. That’s like Michigan not recruiting Cass Tech… at all.
2) Terrible rink: Like buckeye john ross touched on below, they get some crowds but you can’t put 4-5K in the Schott. Makes no sense and creates a terrible atmosphere. If they did something like Miami and built a great 3-4K seat facility and made it a hard ticket to get then I could see the atmosphere improving and it would be a hockey only facility. This will never happen though unless it’s private money as I’ve heard Gene Smith hates the hockey program.
Having gone to Miami myself one of the best aspects of the program is the size of the rink. Goggin only holds like 3500 people so they always fill up and it is built so that the arena gets so loud during games. If OSU were to do something like that maybe that could give them some sort of advantage. But coaching overall is what separates those programs for sure.
Some people in Michigan dismiss the talent level coming out of Ohio, but it's there.
A lot of good players are coming out of Ohio, especially from the Cleveland Barons program. Big names in hockey right now like Sonny Milano, Tim Gettinger, Nick and Drew Magyar. Jake Hildebrand. Alex Nedeljkovic.
It's not on the level of Michigan, Minnesota, or New England, but there is good talent.
The Chiller?!
There's no way in hell they can drop the sport now. The B1G exists in Hockey because there are 6 teams.
I wouldn't be opposed to the B1G adding affiliate members like they do in Men's Lacrosse with Johns Hopkins. Bring in North Dakota, Miami, Denver and Colorado College. Then change the name of the conference to the WCHA.
PSU will reach a Frozen Four before OSU does again.
A big problem is that they don't have an actual hockey arena. This is where they played until the k-mart arena was built:
Yeah. No, I'm not kidding. They even played a CCHA Tournament series in 2013 there due to a scheduling conflict. High school wrestling apparently has more priority there than their actual university-sponsored Hockey program.
Their fans are an absolute embarrassment. They don't even attempt to support their team. They already curtain off the upper bowl at their cavernous arena, but they had to tarp off the endzone seating last week against PSU because literally no one was there. Even their student section was empty save the front row. I watched on BTN, I'm not exaggerating.
I mean, it's not like they were playing Alabama-Huntsville. It was a B1G team.
Per this little link, last year, Ohio State had more total people attend hockey games than Michigan did. However, that's with the benefit of more games.
So I don't know, man.
Michigan averages about 1,000 fans more per game. I wouldn't call the difference of 5,500 v.s 4,500 an "absolute embarrassment." Especially when Michigan hockey, is, you know, good.
And especially when Michigan, as a state, has a hockey culture far more advanced than Ohio.
I'd argue Michigan's support of football this year was far more embarrassing than OSU's support of hockey.
OSU fields more D-1 teams than anyone. They have the richest or second richest AD in the country. They have money to burn. Why not have a hockey team?
And to the OP's question, is Michigan hockey even profitable? Are any D-1 hockey programs self sustaining? This link says no, but I don't know the accuracy of it, so that's why I'll ask. I'm assuming most D-1 sports get paid for by football and that's about it.
Michigan hockey nets $2-3mm per year from every source I've seen (Title IX reporting should back this up if you want to go looking). For M at least, football is responsible for the lions share, I believe upwards of $80mm in a $150mm budget is directly football related. Basketball and TV payouts make up most of the rest and hockey puts a little bit back in the pot.
I'm pretty confident on everything above from memory, but there have also been rumors out there of a two million dollar payout from BTN to the hockey schools that haven't been substantiated, at least from what I remember.
1. That USCHO data is probably as accurate as it's going to get, but just like football attendance those numbers can be misleading. I would say Michigan definitely draws substantially more than OSU per game (these rinks hold a pretty small amount of people anyway so 1,000 or so less is a big difference). But, the OSU program has survived there for as long as the OP said, so they must not be totally worthless. Why should any school have a field hockey team, or a golf team, or a hockey team or whatever? I dunno, some do, some don't. The state of Michigan is quite a ways ahead at hockey participation at youth level (maybe partially why football recruiting is so much better in Ohio? Eh, that's a little too goofy an explanation). But, they have an NHL team in Columbus and several minor league programs. If the Jackets can ever have some version of success I think that could push Ohio into having some hockey tradition. Pennsylvania was kinda the same way before the Flyers came along.
2. If I had to guess I'd say a school like Minnesota or North Dakota definitely has a revenue generator in hockey. Michigan's program probably comes close to breaking even. Football likely pays for most of Ohio State's. Which is fine...I'd guess BGSU or wherever is the same way. Not sure if I buy that link but I also doubt the schools would make that information easily available.
I don't really know what the OP is getting at. Rutgers isn't just gonna cut basketball because they suck. Ohio State isn't just going to cut hockey.
when the league was first announced. I believe Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin all make $1-3MM/yr off hockey. MSU is slightly under the line, and OSU is further down than that. I'd imagine PSU is making money now. All may make more per year with summa dat BTN money
Everything you said about football attendance was not true. I was there for all those games. It was junior and senior years. Late arriving student sections sure, but the stadium was no more or less full than usual. And there certainly weren't swaths of 100 seats at a time available on Groupon.
Your hockey point is valid. No doubt you could sell more tickets with a bigger arena.
Michigan Football was at a serious crossroads last year and we still largely filled our massive stadium; OSU hockey is what it is, plus Ohio State fans in and of themselves are extremely embarrassing, so I definitely do not agree with your second to last paragraph.
Sick burn.
It's just such an unbelievably dismal argument. Were we supposed to bury our heads in the sand (like you guys are wont to do about so much...) and come out in droves despite Brandon and Hoke's incompetence? We didn't -- instead we demanded change and got it, and now Michigan has one of the game's truly elite coaches and a fantastic AD. Attendance will be restored to its previous heights from here on out.
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
That post wasn't angry at all.
Not my problem.
Nobody is making you post here.
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
Yes, because PSU has Terry Pegula's spare millions floating around to build a program from scratch. Very few schools have that. Silly comparison.
Just because OSU doesn't have the hockey tradition of Michigan and Minnesota in particular but even of Wisconsin and MSU, doesn't mean their program is a total waste. Being compared to a small number of teams in the Big Ten amplifies it. If the CCHA were still around no one would complain about OSU.
The Big Ten previously stated they were open to affiliate members for hockey, so if OSU were ever to fold (very unlikely at this point) I'm sure the B1G would snatch up someone in a hurry to keep the league at 6 teams. Probably even more likely they convince Nebraska or Illinois to move up in that event
BGSU is also in a conference of teams that no one else wanted.
I don't buy any teams from the "WCHA". Not when that conference has the Alaska schools and Alabama freaking Huntsville in it.
Yeah and Tech also swept us when we were healthy. Minnesota-State looks pretty for real-I think you are way too harsh on the WCHA.
That was way back in October. The B1G isn't much better than that league, either.
usually agree with ya WD but you're wrong on this one at least this year. WCHA has performed very well out of conference and that's why they might get 3 teams in the tourny. Need to handle your business out of conference for the pair wise or you've got no one to blame but yourself.
I believe Tech and MSUM's wins are slightly inflated due to the conferences weaker members, but they're still clearly nationally relevant. Tech bombed us in Houghton and MSUM took down Minnesota. I'm not sure either should truly be in the conversation for the #1 overall seed, but they're clearly 2-seeds at the very, very worst
Their attendance numbers aren't terrible. It may look worse due to not filling a bigger arena. If they're not making money, they certainly aren't wasting as much as the most of their other sports, of which they have many. OSU fields the most varsity teams in the nation. So that might answer the "Why?" question. Hint: It's the same reason for saying "THE Ohio State University."
Frankly, I enjoy seeing OSU suck at playing the greatest sport in the world.
You can look at D1 football and basketball and see that a lot of the schools that are great and recruit well have been good for decades. It's just how it seems to work. Even in the midst of Michigan being awful for a decade and Oregon being as good as they've ever been, Michigan just crushes Oregon on the recruiting trail. But Oregon obviously has done well anyway despite their history by getting great coaches and pouring money into their program.
Similarly and not similarly, Ohio State missed the boat on being an elite school decades ago. Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin all used to be in the WCHA which was the elite western conference frankly up until the NCHC/B1G happened. Even MSU which wasn't even a Big Ten member till later was able to join the WCHA. The trials of being in that league have paid off for those four schools as each has multiple national titles since their WCHA days. Meanwhile, Ohio State was in crappy leagues until the CCHA was formed. If you go look at their historical schedules, they were playing teams like Dayton, Buffalo, Lake Forest, etc. which I believe were a mismash of DI and DII teams largely. Ohio State was effectively DII or DIII for their first two decades with the CCHA really being the first time they became truly DI. (Go back and look at how they fared vs. the other Big Ten teams in the 50's and 60's. The scores were often things like 12-0, 8-1, etc. Non-competitive)
I think the fact that they started in a mid-major league for their first few decades really set the tone for their program as they never managed to overtake even the mid-major Michigan teams of the CCHA in their 40 years in the league. They've always been a bad DI team.
However, Ohio State clearly has the national draw and resources to actually be a great DI team if the school or their fans actually cared. I think playing in Value Mart Arena hurts them a lot as it's a terrible environment. Wisconsin gets away with the dual basketball-hockey arena but they have a storied history with a mass of fans. It's not really conduisive to building a fanbase playing in an empty arena.
All you need to look at to understand Ohio State's failures is Penn State. Penn State did it right - with a significant about of Pegula Bucks. They built a good sized arena for them. It's decent sized, not too large and as a result they have a good home environment already (I've been to a game there). They also opened their pocket books and poached Gadowsky from Princeton who is a very good coach. Their first steps set them up to recruit very, very well for a new program and they're already reaping the rewards. They were already in the conversation for the Big Ten title this year - just three years in - which is something Ohio State will probably only do once every 15-20 years without a significant change.
So tl;dr. Ohio State missed the boat early so they don't have a history to lean on, and since then they haven't cared enough to spend the money to make themselves good (like a PSU or Notre Dame).
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
I didnt know they cared so little about hockey. They probably think we're like Canadians or something.