Not every day do you see both men’s and women’s hockey teams own the highest point-producing line in their respective conferences. So I turned to a Twitter poll.

Question: “Which first line is more directly related to their respective team’s success?”

The results: Out of the 22 Twitter users who voted, 12 elected to go with the men’s hockey top line of Shawn Hulshof (3-9-12), Alex Botten (3-10-13) and Kenny Neil (6-5-11). The other 10 voted for women’s head coach Diane Dillon’s top line of Olivia Ellis (5-11-16), Alexa Aramburu (7-7-14) and Jacquelin White (8-6-14).

Putting aside the difference in gender of the sports, the question was based around both teams not having their top line and what team would be able to continue to have more success than the other, if, for whatever reason, either team found themselves without its top line.

Hulshof, Botten and Neil currently hold a slight lead in points in the SUNYAC over SUNY Geneseo’s top line of Stephen Collins, Trevor Hills and Anthony Marra. The Collins-Marra-Hills trio has amassed 34 points, compared to the Hulshof-Botten-Neil line who have a combined 36 points seven games in.

Could the men’s team still win games without these three? Lets hope we do not have to find out, but there certainly seems to be enough secondary scoring on that roster to still be competitive. This is not saying that the men’s team would still be the No. 1 team in the nation without these three, obviously they would not, but the men’s team has the secondary scoring to keep them in games, and it is tough to argue that the women’s team does.

It is hard to see Dillon’s roster being able to beat many teams in the ECAC Women’s West without the brilliant top line of Ellis, Aramburu and White. After those three, the next highest point total is seven from junior forward Andrea Noss. That big disparity in points would leave the women’s team without a pure goal scorer in the lineup.

Men’s head coach Ed Gosek’s roster only has a one-point drop off from the fourth leading scorer in Stephen Johnson, and a three-point difference from the next two scorers, Matt Galati and Chris Raguseo. With freshman like Jody Sullivan emerging as a forward that can get on the scoresheet with regularity, and junior Mitchell Herlihey producing at a point-per-game pace in his first five games back after an injury, the men’s team should be able to at least compete in the SUNYAC without its top line.

Johnson currently leads all Laker defensemen in points and is tied for the top spot in SUNYAC with SUNY Geneseo defenseman Cam Russell with 10 points to lead that category. Raguseo has seven points and is fifth in the SUNYAC among defensemen in scoring as well.

The 44 combined points tallied in 10 games from Ellis, Aramburu and White is what is making this team a must-watch on the weekends. The three have the ability to take over a shift whenever they please and take over games as well, but without them the rest of the lineup would not be able to sustain enough offensive pressure throughout 60 minutes to beat many teams.

Ellis, Aramburu and White are pretty much irreplaceable at this point in the season. This leads me to believe that the top line on the women’s team is more directly related to the success of their team and without those three, the offensive production and win total would dip drastically.