Sports

Maciver, Cup, and twin rings spark UMD weekend

Last weekend was about as big as it can get for UMD athletics, with the football team winning an enormous Homecoming game, the women’s hockey team opening its season with two rousing victories over an outgunned Connecticut team, the volleyball team sweeping two more matches to defend its No. 2 national ranking, and the men’s hockey team extending the weekend to Monday night with an explosive 7-1 victory over Lakehead University.

The whole thing started, and was highlighted, by Norm Maciver’s presentation of the Stanley Cup. Maciver, who was a standout defenseman at UMD in the 1980s, is now the standout assistant general manager of the Chicago Blackhawks.

Tradition has it that everybody on the winning team gets one day with the actual Stanley Cup, and Friday was Norm’s day with the sparkling silver chalice. He came home to Duluth which allowed him to visit his family and also to give Duluthians a chance to get up close and personal with the Stanley Cup.

Later he brought the Cup out to Heritage Arena where his son was practicing with Denfeld’s team, but the biggest presentation was at AMSOIL Arena. Before UMDs women faced Connecticut to open their nonconference series, Lord Stanley’s glorious cup stood at the west end of the concourse, while fans and interested spectators circled three-fourths of the entire concourse waiting for the chance to see and get photographed with the Cup.

The Cup is a wonderful spectacle on its own, with all the teams, and all their players, inscribed on ring after ring of space. Everyone knows what the Stanley Cup looks like, and everyone who earns the right to handle it can tell endless stories of weird things that have happened to the prized trophy while in the hands of individual players. But can anyone think of a trophy for professional baseball, football, basketball, or anything else, that approaches the Stanley Cup for class and elegance?

It’s the second Cup for the Hawks while Maciver has held a key position in player selection and assignment, and it’s typical of his class that he wouldn’t forget his adopted home. Just as intriguing is the pair of rings Norm displayed, signifying the two Stanley Cup championships. Maciver put one on the ring fingers of either hand, and held them out. I kidded him that it was about as much weight-lifting as he is required to do these days to put both rings on and simply lift his hands.

Maciver stayed beyond his scheduled time with the Cup at AMSOIL, although he did finally have to take it and depart for other commitments and leave a few hundred fans in line. As he stood off to the side, talking with old friends, acquaintances and former teammates, I couldn’t help but ask Norm if he didn’t get a little weary of the long day of being such an attraction.

“No way,” he said. “How many times in anyone’s life do you get the chance to do something like this? Typical. Norm Maciver could have put the Cup on his back deck and entertained his closest friends and family in a private day with the most impressive trophy in all of professional sports, but he never considered that. It was his time to share, and give back, the highest honor in hockey to Duluthians.
   
CUP RUNNETH OVER
   
Maybe the Stanley Cup gave special motivation to all the sports teams at UMD, Maciver’s alma mater. The women’s hockey team hammered Connecticut 7-0 on Friday and 6-1 on Saturday, amassing a 109-38 edge in shots in the two nonconference games. The Saturday victory was Shannon Miller’s 350th as the only coach of the Bulldogs. That free-scoring weekend may serve the Bulldogs well as they head for Grand Forks this weekend to face a North Dakota team that is ranked as a contender in the WCHA, while UMD is not.

On Saturday, the UMD football team broke from a rain-drenched 7-0 deficit in the second quarter to an amazing eruption of points and a 44-7 victory over a St. Cloud State team that looked like possibly the better team through the first half. Still ranked No. 11 in the nation among Division II teams, the Bulldogs will hit the road with renewed confidence in their running game and their defense and play Saturday at Minnesota State-Moorhead.

Immediately after the football game at Malosky Stadium Saturday, it was possible to go across the parking lot and inside the warmth of Romano Gym to watch the No. 2 ranked UMD volleyball team disassemble Winona State in three straight games for the Bulldogs second victory in as many nights. And then, there was time to dash down to AMSOIL Arena to catch the second UMD-Connecticut women’s hockey game. That all-victorious weekend spilled over to Monday, when the UMD men’s hockey team opened its season with a game that went from a close encounter to a 7-1 blowout victory over Lakehead.

That will pump up the Bulldogs for this weekend’s official season opener with a pair of nonconference games against Michigan Tech at AMSOIL. Tech, of course, was one of UMD’s first Division I rivals back in the 1960s, when UMD first moved up to D-I, and after such a long-standing rivalry, it’s great that the two schools can stay involved on a nonconference basis now that Tech remains in the WCHA and UMD splits for the great unknown of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, where the Dogs were picked sixth out of eight teams. Maybe Norm can find a way to come home every weekend to spark the Bulldogs teams. And he should bring the Cup and those rings.