Or they could follow the easiest choice of all, which is drop the
program.  This might be their only choice, because I don't see how any
conference could justify absorbing them "for the good of the game."
Unless your name is Notre Dame non-conference affiliation is suicidal,
particularly in this economic environment.  And if I were a taxpayer
from the Great State of Alabama I would be asking why we were supporting
such an endeavor in the first place.

It may seem sacriligious on this forum that a poster with such a strong
allegiance to college hockey would support such a move, but I don't
think A-H is loaded with options here.  Maybe they could scale back to
D-III?

One more thing.  The two Alaska schools can't join one league, because
their opponents would resist two trips to the Last Frontier in one
season.

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Mount Ida College
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-----Original Message-----
From: - Hockey-L - The College Hockey Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Hampton, Nathan E.
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 3:46 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: is the WCHA paying attention?

Imagine being at Alabama-Huntsville. You have a choice to join a
conference that requires a trip to ALASKA, Colorado (twice), Minnesota
(five times if including Bemidji), North Dakota, Wisconsin, and the UP.
Another option is to join some other conference requiring you to go to
New York, Massachusetts, and other New England areas, particularly to
maintain whatever CHA rivalries may exist. Which would you choose not
only in terms of travel cost but other amenities?

Now imagine you are a player being recruited by UA-H. Are you more
likely to go there if they are part of the WCHA or if they are part of
the alternative option? I would think your probability of going there is
enhanced by the latter option.

So should UA-H be part of the WCHA for the good of college hockey? The
only way for them to be part of the WCHA is to apply, which is something
they probably would not bother to do.

Nathan


On 3/31/09 1:21 PM, "David Parter" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Clearly, the best choice is to have the WCHA absorb the two CHA teams.

Well, no. That is not clearly the best choice. That is a convenient
choice for everyone else. If "take them for the good of college hockey"
is the argument, the same argument can be made for some conference
realignment, "for the good of college hockey."

Scheduling an 11-team league in a fair manner, given the various
constraints is almost impossible. It is not clear that scheduling a
12-team league with the same constraints is really any easier.

This would all be a lot easier if the WCHA arenas were all within
slapshot distance of each other, but they aren't.

Even ignoring financial cost, is Alabama-Huntsville a good fit for the
WCHA? I don't know. Sometimes it is hard to figure out what the WCHA
really is, given the mix of schools.

Bemidji has a much stronger case -- location, tradition, similarity to
the other Minnesota state schools...

But lets talk about financial cost. For some of the WCHA teams, their
budget depends on the "big draw" games for home ticket sales (I believe
some schools charge more for the tickets to those games too). Diluting
that further by adding teams that displace high income home games could
be a disaster.

Does adding either school make the WCHA more attractive to sponsors and
TV? Bemidji is probably attractive enough to sponsors who are already ok
with the various Minnesota schools. TV? Again, BSU probably works in the
Minnesota/North Dakota (Grand Forks) market as well as anyone.
Huntsville? Not so much.

   --david

ps: and the obligatory Big 10 conference talk, since no one else took
the bait: it doesn't really help other than forcing realignment (or at
least change) on the WCHA and CCHA.