Playoff Roster, Attendance, Robinson Article

Todd Robinson has 920 career assists ranking him 10th all time - photo by SceneByKimberly.com

Hope you had a chance to read the profile of Todd Robinson in the Dallas Morning News yesterday. It is available on line and the article has a title of "Former WHL teammates Brenden Morrow and Todd Robinson have both become hockey stars -- at different levels" Take a look if you get a chance. Some very interesting things in the article including a quote from Brenden Morrow (they played together for two years) saying Todd had one of the best hockey IQs of anyone he has ever played with and he saw the game differently than other players. Robinson really is a legend in minor league hockey. So why didn't Todd ever get a chance in the NHL? It was really about size as the rules and style of play back then made it difficult for a 5' 8" 175 pounder. I looked up Todd's stats for the two years he and Morrow played together for the Portland Winter Hawks (WHL) and it proved Morrow's point. In 1996-1997 Robinson had 38 goals & 96 assists for 135 points to lead the team. Morrow had 39 goals & 49 assists for 88 points. In 1997-1998 Todd once again led the team with 35 goals & 74 assists for 109 points while Morrow had 34 goals & 52 assists for 86 points. By the way finishing third in scoring that year was a guy named Marian Hossa with 85 points and yes, they did win the Memorial Cup that year.

Robinson is 10th all time in minor league hockey in assists and 23rd all time in points. To put that in perspective, he has collected more points than any player at any level of hockey, including the NHL, over these last 14 seasons.

 - I found this attendance analysis on chlforums.com (I highly recommend this site for you avid CHL fans) which was posted by Avsrule_2002.

So, attendance at the halfway point of the season this year averaged 3461. Final average was 3706 for a jump of +245. Every team in the league finished with a higher average than they did at the halfway point of the season except for Rapid City (-45), Allen (-91) and Denver (-44). Wichita (+811) and Quad City (+596) had the biggest jumps in second half attendance. This pretty much supports the idea that 2nd half attendance is better (for the most part) than the 1st half.
On the other hand, only 3 teams finished the season with a higher average attendance than last year. Bloomington (+244), Arizona (+110) and Missouri (+68).
The rest of the teams finished with lower attendance than last year. Wichita (-727), Ft. Worth (-570), Tulsa (-344), Quad City (-273), Allen (-179), and Rapid City (-38).

 I have to say our (Allen) numbers are disappointing to me.  With the publicity about new ownership,  the attention Modano, Belfour, Ludwig brought to the team,  Matvichuk as a coach, and being in first place for the entire year I expected a big jump in attendance. Here are the average attendance figures for Allen for all four years along with how we ranked:

2009-2010 - 3810  8th

2010-2011 - 3986  8th

2011-2012 - 4336  7th

2012-2013 - 4147  5th

Let's hope the playoffs bring out bigger crowds. I think the first round is going to be tough to draw crowds because of the short amount of time to market the games. I am especially encouraging the people at Heritage Ranch to attend the Thursday game as getting folks out for that game will be the hardest.

PLAYOFF ROSTER:

Just heard the playoff roster and here is how it all came down:

 - Garrett Clarke was put on season ending injured reserve (IR) so he will not play in the playoffs

-  Chris Doyle was placed in the playoff  IR spot so he will not play in the first round of the playoffs

-  Maiani & Berube are on the roster so they should play on Thursday

-  Justin Kirsch is one amateur and the second amateur has been signed but named not released yet