Varsity hockey at The University of Alabama in Huntsville is a 32-year tradition, and the Huntsville community deserves an opportunity to bolster the finances of the program without Portera summarily ending the program before the 2011-12 season starts.

With the University in tough financial shape, Portera has all but decided to kill the program, which is quite expensive. Portera vastly underestimates the promotional and cultural value of the hockey program to the University and Huntsville communities. Mack Portera doesn't understand Huntsville. He's fighting to get his hand-picked candidate in as President, going right in the face of the Huntsville business community. Now he's seeking to take the only Division I varsity program and fling it on the scrap heap of history. Tell him NO!

We're not saying that changes don't need to be made with how the program is supported financially. We've finally gotten within the last month a $500k yearly figure of the support needed to keep the program. We're ready to charge forward to get that support lined up, but Portera is telling people all over town that he'll end the program by October. Tell him NO! We deserve the chance to make this work. This is the Hockey Capital of the South, and Mack Portera just doesn't understand that.

-- Geof Morris and the other fine folks at Save UAH Hockey, also on Facebook and Twitter.