Reza writes:
>What are the eligibility rules for playing college hockey here in the
>US?  More specifically I am interested in knowing if there are any
>restrictions as to the age of a player in the league.
 
I confess that a lot of what's written below is plagiarized from earlier
postings by Stephen Roth and Mike Machnik on this subject...
 
To my knowledge, there is no NCAA rule that directly restricts how old a
player may be and still remain eligible.  However, a hockey player's eligi-
bility may be reduced due to the "20-year-old" rule, which states that if a
player participates in non-college organized hockey (like the Junior
Leagues) past his 20th birthday BEFORE enrolling at a college, each such
season of participation reduces his college eligibility by one year.
 
>                                                       Somewhat
>related to this, are graduate students permitted to participate in the
>varsity teams?  Has there ever been a graduate student playing college
>hockey?
 
Under certain circumstances, graduate students may play varsity hockey, or
for that matter, varsity any-other-sport.  Except in special cases like the
"20-year-old" rule above, college athletes have four seasons of eligibility,
and they are given five years in which to use them up.  Thus, they could
conceivably "take a year off" for certain reasons like red-shirting, a
serious injury, sitting out the required one season after transferring, and
so on.  If a hockey player does sit out for a year, and he does his under-
graduate work in four years, then he could very well use up his last season
of eligibility by playing while he is a first-year graduate student.  This
has happened a number of times.  Last year, Mike and Chris Lappin played for
St. Lawrence, and they were both graduate students.  Both had transferred to
St. Lawrence earlier in their careers and had sat out for a year.  Joe
Juneau also played his last season with RPI as a graduate student, having
missed almost a full season earlier with a back injury.
--
Bill Fenwick
Cornell '86 and probably '94
LET'S GO RED!!
I know some people believe in astrology -- but do they follow it this closely?
"Balance that checkbook; it's easy, now that Mercury's touring Taurus..."
-- Joyce Jillson, horoscope for May 11, 1992