Tough luck hits Spartans in series loss to U-M

Excuses, excuses, excuses. How do you figure that we were playing our best hockey of the year coming into this weekend? We were on a two game winning streak…after sweeping powerhouse LSSU. We had just lost our star defenseman, who happeend to be our captain, and was already playing our backup goalie. Call it like it is, we showed up to play, and MSU didn’t, especially Palmisano.
Aren’t you also the same genius who defended Tropp and Conboy for their atrocious actions last year, even when a majority of your own fans wouldn’t? Karma sucks doesn’t it? Hopefully this is the way Tropp ends his career. Glad to see you’re back to your normal unbiased journalistic ways.

Have to agree with the U-M fan above. Michigan was ripe for the taking playing a backup goalie and with a captain out and MSU looked like they were 2008-09 all over again. They couldn’t even break the puck out of the zone.

I understand MSU is a younger team (well, class- wise, not necessarily birthday-wise) and yes U-M outplayed the Spartans in the CCHA quarters there’s no debating that. But the irksome issue for Spartan hockey here is that the Green and White fans have stopped caring about MSU hockey. Why? It points back to one thing: Time to make it exciting again and change the coach. Ron Mason built this program up in the 1980s. Near the end of Ron’s time at MSU, the program went into some peaks and valleys but was still a top program, always getting to the CCHA semifinals and NCAAs, for the most part. Rick Comley is a good coach and seems like a good guy. But sometimes you’ve gotta change it up. I will always support Spartan hockey, but short of cutting ticket prices, you can’t be humiliated like that on your home ice with no fan support. Bad all around for MSU. Shame on you MSU. A new coach injects some life and some new talent into the program. He can rebuild the student support and fan support which has gone noticably missing. The program hasn’t built on the ’07 title. In the future, a new rink may even be a good drawing card for fans and recruits. Munn Arena is a wonderful place to see a game, but it’s hardly a threatening environment to the visiting team. Time for a change, Spartan Nation. Either that or why continue to have hockey?

Derek Berry
MSU ’94

Dear UofM person named David who commented first:
I think it’s really sad that you would wish a career-ending injury on Corey Tropp. He’s a kid (a really nice, normal kid, actually), doing something he loves and is clearly passionate about…why would you wish for anybody to have a huge part of their life come to an end like that?
He made a huge mistake last year and I was just as p***ed off at him as everyone else was, but Kampfer appears to have recovered just fine and he and Tropp appear to have left the past behind. It’s time for you to do the same thing. We know, you guys won, you played the better game even though a couple of your best players were out. You beat us, fair and square. So why do you still feel the need to knock our school’s program and the reporting of a student sports reporter?

My apologies, meant it to mean his Spartan career, assuming he has some sort of professional hockey career. It would undoubtedly be the perfect way for Tropp to end his Michigan State career to have to watch Kampfer celebrate a playoff victory on Tropp’s home ice, as Tropp sits helplessly and can do nothing to prevent it. Perfect that Tropp had led the team so brilliantly throughout most of the first half, but then doesn’t even make it to the Joe and probably not the NCAA tournament. Perfect that it happened in warmups on the flukiest of all possible plays. If Comley had disciplined him properly (suspending him for the remainder of a season that the rest of the team had already quit on was meaningless) then maybe there wouldn’t be a burning hatred of Tropp among the entire Michigan fanbase.

Where exactly do I knock your school’s program in that comment? I could if you would like. It’s sad that your fanbase, three years removed from a national championship, could be so utterly nonchalant about a sport you guys take so much pride in. You could try to compare it to Michigan basketball, but even when we were awful, when we played “playoff” games (NIT), our fans showed up and filled up the arena. Seeing those seats empty, and the sit on your hands attitude of the MSU fans was just sad. If Michigan fans weren’t there starting chants, the place would’ve been a library.

Why do I knock Alex’s “reporting”? All I’m going to say is last year he defended the actions of Tropp and Conboy, which were despicable at best. It makes me question his journalistic integrity, and that won’t go away.

David wolverine fan – Tropp was suspended all last year. U-M coach Red Berenson agreed to put the issue to rest. I think karma and justice have been served. Give it a rest sir. The Michigan hockey team is classier than to sit and dwell on the Tropp incident. It was ugly and Conboy, who was the worst culprit in it, is justifiably gone.

BTW – David, uh, I watched some of those U-M NIT games at Crisler Arena…and uh, your arena was ‘not full to the rafters.’ In fact, I watched a nationally televised game this year when Michigan played Indiana and the place was EMPTY. Better do some good research before you spout out alleged facts like that. I agree Munn gets to be a library and probably would’ve been (thanks for spending $$ in East Lansing and on the MSU campus!) but Crisler is too.

I was at all of the home U-M NIT games 6 years back or so. I know it was full to the rafters because I was in the second to last row for a few of those games. Tropp was suspended for the last 2 months of the season, at which point the MSU season was more or less over. Now, karma and justice has been served, this last game did it perfectly. Of course Crisler is empty this season, but if we were in 2nd place in the Big Ten and we had a home playoff game, I can guarantee you the place would be full (I was at that Indiana game and yes it was about 50% empty, but it was a conference game between two teams in the basement what would you expect). Luckily I don’t spend money in East Lansing, just drive in for the game and drive right back out. It’s just ridiculous that MSU routinely does not punish their players for on and off court incidents until it becomes a recurring issue (Conboy, Winston). But no, it looks like you did great research as well.

It’s definately time for a new hockey coaching staff at MSU. Restore the pride and tradition that has always been Spartan Hockey.