Hello and welcome to the new and improved Western College Hockey Blog. I hope frequent readers from the old site have found their way over here, and I also hope we've added a few hockey fans from the SB Nation community.
First, to those not familiar with this site: Western College Hockey was created in 2005 to cover the Western Collegiate Hockey Association and Central Collegiate Hockey Association-- two of the biggest conferences in college hockey--and since then has become one of the most popular college hockey blogs on the internet. In addition to these two leagues, we also cover just about anything tangentially related to college hockey. That means there is a lot of focus on things like recruiting, Minnesota high school hockey, junior hockey, and the NHL Draft. Stylistically, it's not all that different from SB Nation's flagship hockey blog From the Rink, in that it may not break down every single game and have every score and stat, but picks out interesting and entertaining bits of information to share. It's basically an ecclectic mix of whatever I feel like.
For those that are already familiar with the blog, not much will change in the way of content. The biggest difference, and the reason I'm excited to move over to SB Nation, is more opportunities for reader-generated content. Standard commenting after posts is still available, but there are other options for expressing yourself.
First are FanPosts which are longer posts about whatever you want to write about. It can be game previews, game recaps, opinions, whatever. I've even seen people re-post their own blog posts in hopes of reaching a different audience. Second are FanShots, which are like FanPosts, but much shorter, and usually just contain a video or short except of something.
Other users can then recommend FanPosts and FanShots and I can choose to bump them up to the front page. This all means the end to anonymous commenting, but really, registration for an SB Nation account only takes a minute and should definitely be worth it if you're a follower of this blog. I know some people wish to remain anonymous for professional reasons, but if you have something you want to share, the best way to do so would be to email me at westerncollegehockey@gmail.com and I'll be sure to keep your name off of any information that you pass along.
SB Nation has a helpful Welcome Guide to help get you started if you need more guidance.