At 7:10 PM 10/31/95, Anthony Frolik wrote:
>On Tue, 31 Oct 1995, Deron Treadwell wrote:
>> According to Maine Coach Shawn Walsh, the NCAA told him that they will NOT
>> count the Maine/Michigan game in their selection of the NCAA Tournament
>> participants, effectively making the game an exhibition.  Walsh said that
>> the Hall of Fame Classic game falls under the NCAA's exception?
>> Can anyone confirm or deny this, Jeff Weiss perhaps??
>
>The Hall of Fame game has always been an exhibition.
 
Yes, but it does not have to be.
 
I have spent a lot of time poring over the NCAA Manual and the rules
regarding games in hockey, in recent years.  I can tell you without a doubt
that the following is true according to the manual:
 
* The NCAA has limits regarding the number of games that teams in each of
the three divisions can play, in total.  That limit in DivI is 34.  The
games that must count towards the limit are all games - scrimmage,
exhibition or otherwise - that are played against an outside team,
except...
 
* The NCAA allows certain games to be exempted from counting towards the
limit.  Some well-known exemptions in hockey are games played in Alaska,
games played on a certifiable foreign tour once every four years, and one
game each year in which you play a "foreign team" in the US.  Many teams
take advantage of the latter exemption to play a Canadian team.  Some teams
count such a game in their overall record, some do not.  More on this
below.
 
* Another exemption allowed by the NCAA goes to the two teams playing in
the HoF Game.  This exemption is listed among all of the others in the NCAA
Manual.
 
* This is most important: the NCAA has NO rules governing which games must
be considered exhibitions and which must not.  There is nothing that says
that exempted games or any other games must be exhibitions.  For evidence
of this, look at the fact that when teams travel to play at UAF or UAA,
they usually exempt the games from the limit but the results are still
counted in the records and are considered towards DivI tourney selection.
 
There was never any rule that required that the HoF Game be an exhibition.
I believe that tradition was the reason why this was done.  However,
traditions are made to be broken.
 
There is no difference according to the NCAA's rules between a game played
between, say, Minnesota and UAA in Alaska which is exempted from the limit,
and a Michigan-Maine HoF Game which is also exempted from the limit.  The
NCAA rules make no stipulation that the HoF Game must be considered an
exhibition.  I am absolutely certain of this.
 
I would like to know what rule the NCAA people can point to as evidence for
not allowing the Michigan-Maine game to count towards tourney selection.  I
can point to section 17.10 of the NCAA Manual as my evidence to support my
contention that it should be allowed.
 
Those who are interested can obtain from the HOCKEY-L archives a file
called NCAAMAN EXCERPTS which contains this entire section from the 1994-95
Manual.  The file is not complete, but it does contain the entire
applicable section which has changed only slightly for 1995-96; the changes
made do not affect this particular situation.
 
If you wish to obtain the file, send this command to [log in to unmask]:
 
  get ncaaman excerpts
 
It is important to understand that the term "exempted" means nothing more
than that a game does not have to be counted in a team's total games played
for purposes of determining whether or not that team is in compliance with
the 34 game limit.  Nothing says that an exempted game must be an
exhibition or that an exempted game cannot count towards tourney selection.
 
It is also important to realize that the status of a game as an
"exhibition" is determined solely by the teams and/or their conference.  A
good example is the exempted games that various teams play against Canadian
teams.  Most Western teams choose to count these games in their overall
records, while most Eastern teams do not and call them "exhibitions".
 
Why?  I believe it is simply because of the approach different teams take
towards the games.  In a game that you call an "exhibition", you can bend
the rules a bit, such as being allowed to play additional players.  For
example, early this season Merrimack hosted McGill and counted the game in
its record.  The next night, Lowell hosted McGill and called the game an
exhibition.  Lowell played an additional three players above the normal
limit of 18 skaters, and Merrimack could not do this.  Lowell used the
exhibition status of the game to get a look at those additional players.
But they were not required to call the game an exhibition by the NCAA.
 
Lowell will play a total of 35 games this year, with the McGill game
exempted from counting towards the limit.  Merrimack will play only 34, and
I believe the fact that they could not schedule another "countable" game
also played a part in their deciding to include the McGill game in their
season record.  However, this is of negligible effect since games vs
Canadian teams are not considered in tourney selection.  The Michigan-Maine
game is different.
 
If the Michigan-Maine game is to be considered an exhibition, I believe it
could only be because of an agreement between the two schools and/or their
conferences.  I believe strongly that neither the NCAA nor the NCAA DivI
Tournament Selection Committee has a rule on the books that *requires* this
game to be an exhibition or which prevents the game from counting in the
records and towards tourney selection.
 
I "argued" my point of view with Jeff before the season when the game was
originally announced as an exhibition, and I provided excerpts from the
manual that supported my case.  At the time, it looked like I was correct,
as the status of the game was changed to a regular nonconference matchup
before the game was played, and Jeff mentioned this in his CCHA release.  I
still believe that this is correct, but I will be very interested to hear
what the reasoning is if this is not the case and if I am wrong.
 
To close, I will note that the only strike against the status of the game
that I could find was the line in the NCAA Manual which said that the
exempted HoF Game was to be played "at" the US Hockey Hall of Fame.  Taken
literally, this would mean that since the game was not actually played at
the HoF, then maybe it didn't fall under the exemption.  I believe Jeff
told me that the NCAA had okayed the use of the exemption anyway.  If this
literal wording of the rule *did* prevent the teams from taking the
exemption, then the game would have to count towards the 34 game limit and
I believe both Michigan and Maine would be in violation of NCAA regulations
with 35 countable games.  This would also have been the case last year
when, as Tony says, UMD and Wisconsin played their HoF Game away from the
HoF, but I have to believe that the NCAA okayed that too.
 
If anyone can shed further light on this, please do.  Certainly, Maine
won't mind if the game doesn't count since they lost :-), but I would think
that other teams including Michigan in particular would be justified in
questioning this.
 
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                   [log in to unmask]            *HMM* 11/13/93
>> Co-owner of the College Hockey Lists at University of Maine System  <<
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