The ANN ARBOR NEWS ran the following article on Sunday,
confirming what most of us knew, or believed, to be true.
 
NCAA ADDS MORE BERTHS TO TOURNEY
Both regular-season and tournament champions will
receive invitations.
by Dan Gretzner II
 
  The Colorado College hockey team can take some
satisfaction -- even if it's one year too late.
  The NCAA adopted what many are calling the "Colorado
College rule" after the Tigers were not one of the 12 teams
invited to the NCAA Tournament last season.
  CC won the Western Collegiate Hockey Association
regular-season title but faltered in the league playoffs, won
by the Minnesota Golden Gophers.
  Since CC was one of the top teams in the nation, many
felt the Tigers were robbed of a tourney berth.
  Before the new rule, the four major Division I leagues could
choose either the regular-season champ or the playoff
winner for the league's automatic NCAA bid.  The WCHA
and Central Collegiate Hockey Association opted for the
playoff champion.
  The new rule says both the regular-season and playoff
champion from each of the four leagues will get an automatic
berth.  That only leaves four at-large berths available unless
the same team wins both titles in a league like Michigan did
last season.
  "First place teams should get an automatic bye into the
NCAA," U-M coach Red Berenson said.
(end quoted material)
 
*IF* this "old rule" was truly in effect, the WCHA really blew
it.  *Assuming* that Minnesota would have been in via the
RPI numbers, the WCHA could have sent Colorado College
via the auto bid, thus eliminating Western Michigan (I believe)
from the tourney.  The bottom line is, if the above "rule" is
true, it appears the WCHA could have had another team (CC)
in the tourney last year at the expense of a non-WCHA team.
Since the 1994 tournament selection criteria was quite clear,
the WCHA needed only to "punch out the numbers" to
realize this.
 
I'm interested in hearing from those in the know.  I was under
the impression that the conference tournament champs got
the auto bid, NOT that the conference was allowed to choose
between them and the regular-season champ.  If the former
is the case, disregard the previous paragraph. :-)
 
 
John Haeussler
Univ of Michigan
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