Cannon awarded 2017 ncaa skiing championships

[AdironRider]

Is that a more recent development with the Euros? Seems like things have changed in the 10 years since I graduated.

Hockey has been that way for much longer it seems, the vast majority of the SLU hockey team was like 28 year old Canadian "freshman".

Damn good hockey players though, so from a spectator standpoint, its actually probably better.

 

[tree_skier]

it has been going on for a while. This isn't saying US skiers can't race at the D1 level many do. However the top teams Especially the western teams have many older skiers. What it does do is for the championship is it gives you the best races that aren't the world cup, better then the nor-ams or the Europa cup. So you have a kid who is winning Vermont cups, within 2 seconds in FIS races suddenly is 20 seconds out trying to break out of the bottom 20% of the field in the Carnival's and no going to qualify for championships

 

[Puck it]

Is that a more recent development with the Euros? Seems like things have changed in the 10 years since I graduated.

Hockey has been that way for much longer it seems, the vast majority of the SLU hockey team was like 28 year old Canadian "freshman".

Damn good hockey players though, so from a spectator standpoint, its actually probably better.

You went to the "Country Club"! I played for the Golden Knights in the early 80's.

Yeah, D1 has had old freshman since the 90's. It is even in D3 now and even Club.

 

[tree_skier]

You went to the "Country Club"! I was played for the Golden Knights in the early 80's.

Yeah, D1 has had old freshman since the 90's. It is even in D3 now and even Club.

My son is at Clarkson now. Enjoys going to the hockey games

 

[SkiRaceParent]

Figured I'd chime in give my recent experience.

It's a bit different for young women and men. Young women who physically mature more quickly than men, are able to ski division 1 at 18/19. However, you have to be really, really good (i.e., top 15-20 for your age in US). Almost all american div 1 skiers went to an academy (GMVS, Stratton, Burke, CVA, etc.) or an equivalent program out west (Vail, Aspen, Sugar Bowl, Squaw Valley, etc.)

For young men who for the most part physically mature more slowly, even if you are top 20 for your age at 17, most are now doing a PG year at an academy or for a private ski team and are not doing div 1 racing until they are about 20.

If you look at most div 1 programs with a few exceptions (Denver, Utah, etc.) most of the athletes are still Americans but more and more (~35+/-%) are internationals, who in some cases are getting their entire colleges funded by their national program. These are potential future world cup athletes and they have made NCAA a good training/education ground for their athletes who want the combined program. Still, I think the top 2 or 3 in each of the major alpine countries are not doing NCAA, perhaps #'s 4-9 are doing so. Norway is very aggressive in this regard.

Lastly, Europa skiing is still far faster than NCAA's, top to bottom, but perhaps NCAA skiing is the third fastest circuit in the world (after World Cup and Europas, it's probably better top to bottom, than Nor Ams.)

Note: I am not including a few Div 1 fringe programs in there that aren't very competitive, really looking at it under the lens of top 10 Div 1 programs nationally.