Sept. 29, 2010
Farmington Hills, Mich. – The coaches and media in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association (CCHA) couldn’t agree on who they thought would be the top team in the conference this season, but both groups did agree to rank Notre Dame fifth in their preseason polls announced on Wednesday.
For the third time in the last four years, the two groups disagreed on the top spot with the 11 coaches selecting Michigan as their top team while the media covering the CCHA selected Miami.
The coaches gave Michigan eight first-place votes on the way to 108 points. Miami was second in their poll, getting the remaining three first-place votes and 103 points overall. Third place in the coaches’ poll went to Alaska (81 points) with Michigan State taking fourth with 75 points. The Irish were one point behind the Spartans in fifth place with 75 points in the coaches voting. Northern Michigan, Ferris State, Ohio State, Lake Superior State, Western Michigan and Bowling Green rounded out the voting done by the league’s coaches.
The media saw things a bit differently as 75 members from around the league were involved in the voting. The writers, radio and TV announcers and electronic media gave Miami 57 of the 75 votes for a total of 877 points. Michigan was second in their poll with 17 first-place votes and 825 points. Michigan State got the final first-place vote and had 651 points. Alaska was fourth with 618 and Notre Dame rounded out the top five with 567 points. After that, Ferris State was sixth, just 21 points behind the Irish and the Bulldogs were followed by Northern Michigan, Ohio State, Lake Superior State, Western Michigan and Bowling Green to round out the media voting.
The actual results of both polls:
CCHA Coaches Poll (1st) Points Media Poll (1st) Points1. Michigan (8) 108 1. Miami (57) 8772. Miami (3) 103 2. Michigan (17) 8253. Alaska 81 3. Michigan State (1) 6514. Michigan State 76 4. Alaska 6185. NOTRE DAME 75 5. NOTRE DAME 5676. Northern Michigan 65 6. Ferris State 5467. Ferris State 64 7. Northern Michigan 5368. Ohio State 56 8. Ohio State 4289. Lake Superior State 35 9. Lake Superior State 31210. Western Michigan 29 10. Western Michigan 22511. Bowling Green 29 11. Bowling Green 190
The CCHA coaches also selected preseason all-Conference teams for the `10-’11 campaign and only senior left wing Calle Ridderwall received recognition from the league’s coaches as he got one first-place vote and finished with 19 points.
The two teams were dominated by Michigan and Miami as both schools had four players selected to the preseason teams. Michigan’s Carl Hagelin was the lone unanimous selection as he received 10 first-place votes and 50 points. He was joined on the first team by forwards Andy Miele of Miami and teammate Louie Caporusso from Michigan. The defense was made up by defenders Zach Redmond of Ferris State and Chris Wideman of Miami while RedHawk goaltender Cody Reichard was the first-team goaltender.
Named to the second team were forwards Carter Camper of Miami, Andy Taranto from Alaska and Matt Rust from Michigan. The defense had Michigan State’s Torey Krug and Michigan’s Chad Langlais with Pat Nagle from Ferris State closing out the team.
Ridderwall, who was named an alternate captain for the Irish earlier this week, is the team’s top returning scorer as he had 19 goals and eight assists for 27 points in 2009-10. Eleven of his goals came on the power play and over the last two seasons, the Stockholm, Sweden native has 36 goals and 22 power-play markers. In `09-’10, he tied for fourth in the CCHA in goals and led the league with his 11 power-play goals. His 22 career power-play goals place him in 10th on Notre Dame’s all-time power -play list. Ridderwall was named Notre Dame’s team most valuable player last season and also was the team’s offensive player of the year.
2010-11 CCHA Preseason First Team 2010-11 CCHA Preseason Second TeamPlayer, Yr., School (1st) Totals Pos. Player, Yr., School (1st) TotalsCarl Hagelin, Sr., UM (10) 50 F Carter Camper, Sr., MIA (3) 34Andy Miele, Sr., MIA (7) 44 F Andy Taranto, So., UAF (3) 31Louie Caporusso, Sr., UM (6) 39 F Matt Rust, Sr., UM (0) 21Zach Redmond, Jr., FSU (8) 46 D Torey Krug, So., MSU (3) 30Chris Wideman, Jr., MIA (5) 38 D Chad Langlais, Sr., UM (3) 27Cody Reichard, Jr., MIA (8) 46 G Pat Nagle, Sr., FSU (1) 20
Honorable mention (next six point totals, regardless of position with first team votes in parentheses): Joe Sova, Jr., D, Alaska (2), 23; Greger Hanson, Sr., F, Northern Michigan (2), 20; Calle Ridderwall, Sr., F, NOTRE DAME (1), 19; Scott Greenham, Jr., G, Alaska (1), 16; Drew Palmisano, Jr., G, Michigan State (1), 14; Justin Florek, Jr., F, Northern Michigan (1), 12.