ARMY-AIR FORCE HOCKEY GAME TO BE TELEVISED BY CSTV

January 5, 2004

Courtesy of Army Media Relations

Contact James Zuhlke

WEST POINT, N.Y. - The first of two Army clashes with service academy rival Air Force on Friday, Jan. 16 at Tate Rink inside Holleder Center will be televised nationally by College Sports Television (CSTV) as part of the station’s college hockey “Friday Night Game of the Week” package. Faceoff for the game, which was originally scheduled for 7 p.m., has been moved to 8 p.m. to accommodate the television coverage.

Army and Air Force will renew acquaintances in a two-game weekend series Jan. 16 and Jan. 17 at West Point. It will be the 37th and 38th meetings between the two academies. The Black Knights walked away with a pair of 2-1 decisions at Air Force a year ago.

Army will be making its first television appearance since the now-defunct Military Channel aired the Army-Air Force contest on Feb. 28, 1999 in Colorado Springs, Colo. It will also be the first appearance on CSTV for any Atlantic Hockey Association school. The Black Knights have been on TV twice since the early 1990s, with the other occasion coming on Feb. 23, 1996, at UMass-Lowell when a local station in the Lowell area televised the game.

CSTV, currently available to DirecTV subscribers who have purchased the sports package, will air on channel 610. The fastest growing independent cable network with over 15 million subscribers, broadcasts a college hockey “Game of the Week” each Friday at 8 p.m. Eric Frede and Dave Starman will handle play-by-play and analyst duties, respectively. Frede covered the Black Knights and head coach Rob Riley in the early 1990s while the sports director at Time Warner Cable 6.

CSTV, the first 24-hour college sports network, has long-term programming and marketing agreements with 27 Division I athletic conferences and is dedicated to providing the most in-depth coverage of college sports for more than 1,200 universities.

Riley picked up his 300th career victory on Saturday. He stands 14th in wins among active NCAA head coaches. Riley and his father, Jack, are the all-time winningest father-son coaching tandem in college hockey history with 842 wins to their credit. Jack Riley stands ninth all-time on the NCAA career wins list with 542 victories to his credit. He guided the Army hockey fortunes for 36 years (1951-1986), before turning over the program to his son, Rob.

The Black Knights (6-7-2/2-6-2 AHA) return to Atlantic Hockey play Friday and Saturday with a home-and-home weekend series against American International. Friday’s contest at Tate Rink is scheduled for a 7 p.m. start.