Darling Niki

Junior Alex Nikiforuk is off to an absolutely SMOKIN' start for the Nebraska-Omaha Maverick hockey team. In Monday night's exhibition game against Manitoba, Nikiforuk scored on a 1 on 3 breakaway that was just plain SICK.

So what does he do for an encore in the season opener against Army? He gets the hat trick in a 3-2 victory against the Black Knights of the Hudson.

Tonight, the Mavs take on #8 New Hampshire at 8 pm for the Stampede Championship game. It will be interesting to see what kind of a crowd shows up tonight, with the Husker game going on at the same time, not to mention the other 2 hockey teams in town having home games as well. (Talk about bonehead scheduling...)

A few thoughts about the changes at UNO hockey games.

• The curtains are an attempt to deal with the problem of playing hockey in a large arena in a town with an oversupply of hockey games to attend. They may not look the greatest, but it looks better than empty seats, and it does help with the noise level. The crowd was louder last night than the crowd at a Creighton basketball game I attended last March.
• The nets suck. I understand why they are there. I may get used to them. But it makes it hard to follow the action at the other end of the ice.
• The UNO athletic department needs to partner with the Department of Fine Arts on designing some custom graphics for the scoreboards. There is a lot of untapped potential in the ribbon boards that is being wasted.