I spent Friday night moping and Saturday on tenterhooks. That’s right, tenterhooks.
I arrived at Stetson West Sunday morning, and I waited. I watched (for the first and last time) a tractor pull, being broadcast by ESPN. I leered at others to whom our beloved mascot had bequeathed a newly assembled Thunder Mug. (You’ll rue the day you crossed me, Paws.) I listened to Boston University head coach Jack Parker talk to ESPN analysts John Buccigross and Barry Melrose about his top-seeded Terriers, whose road to the Frozen Four runs through Bridgeport, Conn. I yelled at him to get off the phone.
Then, not long before noon, it was announced that Northeastern would play its first and (potentially) second-round games in Grand Rapids, Mich., site of the Midwest Regional. A first-round matchup with intra-conference rival and third-seeded New Hampshire stopped a trip to Manchester and the Northeast Regional. Like the Huskies, Yale earned the right to play as a No. 2 seed, and they were bound to play in Bridgeport as host of the East Regional. The Huskies might have been sent to Mariucci Arena, location of the West Regional in Minneapolis, Minn., had it not been for second-seeded Minnesota-Duluth’s qualification as WCHA conference champion.
Although none of this will ever be verified by the selection committee, they do openly acknowledge their preference to avoid pitting conference foes against one another to begin the tournament, and to place hosting schools that qualify for the tournament at their home sites (New Hampshire in Manchester and Yale in Bridgeport). They also prefer to keep teams close to campus whenever possible (Minnesota-Duluth in Minneapolis).
So the Northeastern men’s hockey team will travel to Grand Rapids. If I made a list of ‘places I would like to visit,’ Grand Rapids would probably rank somewhere near Charlotte, N.C., or Milwaukee, Wis.; nice cities, I suppose, but places in which I have no particular interest.
In three years, I’ve passed on trips to Vermont, to Maine and even to New Hampshire, where the Huskies play at least once each year. I’ve never traveled beyond Amherst for a Northeastern hockey game, despite the fact that Hockey East boasts some of the best facilities in all of college hockey. For the most part, home games at Matthews Arena have always been enough. And, they’ve always been free.
I haven’t been willing to make the sacrifices necessary to spend a weekend in Burlington or Orono, even though I know how much fan support can affect a game. But I do know this school values its athletic success, and so I make the following proposal to the administration: Why not create a fund for dedicated athletic supporters who want to follow their teams to Vermont, Maine or even Grand Rapids? Or better yet, create a scholarship for students who are willing to devote themselves entirely to the athletic program, thus helping it to succeed and boost the school’s visibility.
Meanwhile, I’ll be scraping by on peanut butter and jelly during my weekend in Grand Rapids.

‘- Jared Sugerman can be reached’
at [email protected].