The First WCHA Blogger Poll Results!

Recently I participated in the first ever WCHA blogger preseason poll. This idea comes from bloggers at 60 Minutes. No Alibis. No Regrets and Running with the Dogs. The final results are:

Teams:

1. North Dakota (12) 177
2. St. Cloud (2) 158
3. Duluth (1) 154
4. Denver 125
5. Minnesota 117
6. Wisconsin 113
7. Nebraska-Omaha 81
8. Colorado College 77
9. Bemidji State 73
10. Minnesota State 39
11. Michigan Tech 30
12. Alaska-Anchorage 26

WCHA Player of the Year:

Jack Connolly-Duluth (6)
Garrett Roe-St. Cloud (5)
Jacob Cepis-Minnesota (1)
Chay Genoway-North Dakota (1)
Jason Gregoire North Dakota (1)
Matt Read-Bemidji (1)

WCHA Rookie of the Year:

Jaden Schwartz-Colorado College (6)
Beau Bennett-Denver (2)
Derek Forbort-North Dakota (2)
Nick Bjugstad-Minnesota (1)
Erik Haula-Minnesota (1)
Matt White-Nebraska Omaha (1)
Mark Zengerle-Wisconsin (1)
Sam Rendle-Bemidji (1)

As you can see these blogger results are very similar to the results from last weeks coach's and media polls. This WCHA blogger poll is not "perfect" though. Some schools were represented by three voters (like UW and UND) and others were not represented at all (like MSU and CC). Despite this fact, I think that this bloggers poll is a fairly accurate (well as accurate as preseason polls can be). You can see the full list of voters and other details here. I found the breakdown to be interesting. If you look at the points that each school received you can see a fairly universal break down.

• Top Tier schools: UND (177), SCSU (158), UMD (154)
• Upper-middle schools: DU (125), UM (117), UW (113)
• Lower-middle schools: UNO (81), CC (77), BSU (73)
• Bottom Tier schools: MSU (39), MTU (30), UAA (26)

I was glad to see that my WCHA blogging peers also placed SCSU high in this poll and that Garrett Roe was also selected very high to be one of the best players this year. Below you can see my ballot:

1. St. Cloud State University (SCSU)
2. University of North Dakota (UND)
3. University of Minnesota- Duluth (UMD)
4. Denver University (DU)
5. University of Wisconsin (UW)
6. University of Minnesota (UMN)
7. Colorado College (CC)
8. Bemidji State University (BSU)
9. University of Nebraska- Omaha (UNO)
10. Minnesota State University- Mankato (MSU)
11. University of Alaska- Anchorage (UAA)
12. Michigan Tech University (MTU)

WCHA Player of the year: Garrett Roe, SCSU
WCHA Rookie of the year: Jaden Schwartz, CC

As you can see, my results, although not the exact same as the blogging poll, does follow the same universal breakdown of the schools.

What do you think of the First Ever WCHA Blogger Poll?