At 7:00 PM 4/17/96, Lee Urton wrote:
>I think the WCHA would jump at the opportunity to play more non-conference
>games. Why not? Their record in non-conference games is healthy (the few
>that they have). They have an opportunity to make a little more money for
>important matchups (i.e. currently Minnesota-Wisconsin vs
>Michigan-Michigan State or Anchorage vs Fairbanks). Other than attempting
>to make the four game per conference opponent schedule work out, is there
>any evidence that the WCHA is actively interested in reducing
>non-conference match ups?
 
I don't know that this is evidence of the same, but in 1989, the WCHA had
an opportunity to reduce the number of games it played against WCHA
opponents in order to keep the interlocking schedule with Hockey East
alive.  It decided to end the agreement and continue to play four games
against each league opponent, with St Cloud coming in.
 
Actually, at the time, that decision did reduce the total number of
conference games the WCHA played, since WCHA teams played each of the 7 HE
teams once and each of 7 WCHA opponents 4x (35 games).  In 1989-90, the
WCHA played 32 conference games.  But all were against WCHA teams.
 
A few years later, the WCHA did opt to switch to the 7x4 - 2x2 schedule
when it accepted UAA, maintaining the 32 game league schedule.  At that
time, it also could have cut back its conference schedule, by doing
something like 6x4 - 3x2 or whatever.
 
It does look to me as if the WCHA learned from the interlocking schedule
with HE that more conference games is better.  I don't necessarily disagree
with this.  It is always nice to have the big in-season matchups like
Maine-Michigan and BU-Minnesota.  But there aren't that many of these
matchups.  The lesser teams suffer because they rarely get to play the big
names in NC action; it's a case of the haves playing the haves.
 
I can say that after several years of watching the situation from the
Merrimack standpoint, it is definitely true that the HE games seem to mean
more and draw more interest.  It is nice to play teams from other
conferences and go to different places, but the games usually don't seem to
mean as much.  This could be different for teams that are seriously vying
for NCAA tournament bids, where they know that every game is important.
But despite Merrimack finishing last in 1995-96, they went 4-1-3 in their
NC DivI games (and have done extremely well out of conference since 1989) -
yet there still isn't that air of anticipation as with HE league games.
 
The interlocking schedule with the WCHA (which was in place when I was at
Northeastern) was nice because everyone had to play everyone else.  What I
would like to see is some kind of agreement where, say, groups of HE teams
rotate playing a couple of teams from the WCHA or CCHA, such that after a
few years everyone would have played everyone else in NC games.  But I
don't think this is likely.
 
>Going to two divisions in a conference in which any team plays an
>unequal number of games with a significant portion of other teams in a
>conference makes having a conference worthless at best, and absurd at worst.
 
I don't like any unbalanced schedule.  The WCHA already has problems, I
think, because the regular season standings are decided after just such an
unbalanced schedule.  For example, would CC have finished first in 1994 (by
one point) if they had to play Minnesota 4x instead of only twice?  (Maybe
they would have been better off not finishing first and drawing MTU that
year, but that is another story.)
 
HE's experiment with an unbalanced schedule caused problems.  The league
was divided into divisions of 4 for scheduling purposes only, and teams
played 4 teams 3x and 3 teams 4x for 24 games.  But the divisions were
based upon the combined league records for the couple of years prior to the
experiment, and they stayed that way both years.
 
It would have been better to change the divisions each year, at least.
Because of the way it worked out, Northeastern and Merrimack were stuck
playing BU and Maine 4x each.  In 1992-93, Merrimack went 0-8 against BU
and Maine, and 8-8 against everyone else.  And the standings were based
upon the entire schedule, even though some teams played 8 games against BU
and Maine and others played only 6.
 
I believe that when the ECAC split into three divisions in the late
70s-early 80s, teams played divisional opponents twice and non-divisional
opponents once.  And standings were kept by division, although playoff
seeding was a little unusual (I think each divisional winner was guaranteed
a slot in the top 4 for home ice in the quarterfinals, regardless of
overall league record).
 
Another issue with the WCHA's format is that it seems that only some teams
benefit from playing at UAA (and thus getting to pick up two extra games).
When Minnesota and Wisconsin have only had to play UAA twice in a season,
they have always gone to UAA.  Thus, it seems that they will play in Alaska
every year and get to keep both of their lucrative NC tournaments
(Mariucci/Badger and Showcase).
 
Does everyone else also get to go to UAA when they are only scheduled to
play UAA twice that season, so that they can also schedule two extra games?
You'd think that over 9 years, everything would even out and everyone
would play UAA twice each, with one set in Alaska and one at home (thus you
lose the exemption once).  But Minnesota, for example, has already had two
years in which it played UAA only twice, and both times Minnesota went to
UAA.
 
Now, if I remember correctly, one of those times Minnesota was due to host
UAA and they opted to play on the road instead so that they could get the
exemption.  I don't know if the league had to okay this, and if all of the
other teams also have that option.  I doubt anyone else would complain if
someone wanted to give up two home games with UAA to play them in Alaska.
 
But you still have the problem with some teams playing both of their two
game sets against tougher teams while comparable opponents - ones they are
fighting with for similar spots in the standings - end up playing both of
their two-game sets against weaker teams.
 
Of course you cannot easily predict ahead of time how various teams will do
in order to try to balance out the scheduling (play one good team only
twice and one weak team only twice).  And this is why once you go to an
unbalanced schedule, however it is done, you almost have to split into
divisions for fairness.
 
>Hockey East and the ECAC are thinking of an
>"interlocking schedule" in the next few years, and Hockey East and the
>WCHA had one as well. It doesn't require all the teams be in one conference.
 
I'm not sure that the HE-ECAC rumor will come to pass (that each team would
play a group of 3 or 4 from the other conference, thus playing everyone
over three years).  I haven't heard anything official about it.  It could
be one of those things that some people said would be nice and then it
became a story.  At any rate, I don't think it would be a true interlocking
schedule, since the games would not (and should not) count in the standings
as with the HE-WCHA agreement.
 
BTW, I think that once I asked HE Commissioner Bob DeGregorio about the
idea of setting up such an agreement between HE and another conference, and
he said that it was a nice idea but (at that time) the league did not get
involved in scheduling NC games for the members.  This situation would
presumably have to change for a HE-ECAC or any other agreement to come
about.
 
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                   [log in to unmask]            *HMM* 11/13/93
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