Wisconsin News and Sports
Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) members voted Tuesday to pursue expanding it's men's hockey league to 12 teams.
The league currently has 10 teams and includes the Wisconsin Badgers .
Bemidji State (Minn), which reached the men's Frozen Four this past season, presented its case for WCHA membership on Monday. The WCHA membership didn't take a vote and aren't expected to do so until they find a 12th member. League officials are hoping that will happen sometime this summer.
The Pittsburgh Pirates can't wait to get out of Milwaukee. The Brewers came from a 5-1 deficit to rebound for a 6-5 win over the Pirates at Miller Park on Tuesday night. Bill Hall and Rickie Weeks homered in the 6th inning to cap off the comeback.
It marks the 14th straight win against the Pirates overall and the 17th straight over the Pirates at Miller Park.
The games all-time saves leader marched out of the bullpen to work the 9th for the Brewers, this time doing so without a 5-run lead. Hoffman coaxed a game ending double-play to pick up his first save as a Brewers and the 555th of his career.
The Brewers will go for the sweep today when they close out the series against the Pirates (12:05pm) at Miller Park. Yovani Gallardo goes for the Brewers (2-1 3.71 ERA) against Pittsburgh's Ian Snell (1-2, 4.50 ERA).
The United States Hockey League (USHL) will have two new teams in the league in time for the 2009-10 season.
The USHL has awarded an expansion franchise to Youngstown, Ohio, for the 2009-10 season. They'll join the National Training Development Program
(Team USA) to give the league 14 teams for next season. Both teams will join the league's Eastern Division, which is where the Green Bay Gamblers currently reside.
** The season is over for the Green Bay Gamblers . It ended in Indianapolis last night in the Clark Cup Semifinals where the Gamblers lost the game 5-3 to the Indiana Ice falling in the best-of-5 series 3 games to 1.
Bicyclists were out in force at the state Capitol on Tuesday, for a 'Ride on the Capitol' sponsored by the Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin. Leaders of the state's bicycling industry joined cyclists for the lobbying effort, and touted their industry's benefits to the state.
Chris Fortune, CEO of Madison based Saris Cycling Group, said 4,000 persons are employed by the industry in Wisconsin, generating more than a billion and a half dollars of economic activity. Fortune said there's a significant opportunity to expand the state's economy through cycling. Trek Bicycle Corporation President, John Burke, said cycling presents a real solution to health problems such as the national epidemic of obesity. “We really need to create an infrastructure so that people can ride bikes, get out of cars, and the health benefits are really extraordinary,” said Burke. “Almost forty percent of car trips are two miles or less. In 1970 – an amazing statistic – fifty percent of people either walked or biked to school. Today that number is less than five percent.” Burke said safe biking routes could encourage more children to ride to school.
David Vogt of the Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin said the lobby effort also sought to push for an end to budget raids on the bike fund. “If you look at neighboring states like Minnesota, we actually have half of the funds,” said Vogt. “Even though bike and pedestrian trips make up nine percent of all trips in Wisconsin, we have only 1.4 percent of our transportation dollars being spent on them.” Vogt said they're asking legislators to support 'complete streets' legislation, which would require all users be taken into account when streets are rebuilt.
Ken Peterson of Middleton knows a thing or two about riding the streets. The 57 year-old Middleton man has being biking as his primary means of transportation for the past five years. ” I figure I could get almost anywhere in the world, if I wanted to, on a bike,” said Peterson. “It is practical. You can ride a bike any time of the year, if you dress for it.”
The cyclists also advocated for safety legislation, specifically a bill to make it illegal to open a car door in front of a bicyclist, which was passed by both the Senate and Assembly on Tuesday.
As of Wednesday it's been 100 days since President Barack Obama took office. President Obama has set out a very ambitious agenda so far, according to UW political scientist David Canon. While Obama hasn't had as much success with Congress as Franklin Roosevelt during Roosevelt's first 100 days, Canon says it's not a fair comparison because Congress is much more polarized now than it was 75 years ago.
Canon says Obama's biggest achievement so far is passage of the economic stimulus package but says the president has also mapped out a "very ambitious agenda" on health care and energy policies.
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