Maybe I am simply missing the point, but I have to pose this ques-
tion anyway. Why is Alaska being added to the CCHA? It seems unfair
to me to ask the athletes in the CCHA to travel for such a long dis-
tance and time all the way to Alaska to play hockey. Don't get me
wrong, I have nothing at all against Alaska, I have been there my-
self and it is quite a beautiful place. However, there is no denying
the fact that it is isolated. This issue appears to have been ignored
by the CCHA in adding to the league in the same way that the Big 10
ignored the travel time issue in adding Penn State to the Big 10. I
know that the conferences are out to make money and they no doubt
make more money by adding additional teams. This is what it is all
about, no doubt, money. That is a really sad statement that the CCHA
and college athletics in general overlook the mission of a college:
education of its students. When a league/school forgets about the
detriments of this travel time on a student's academic life for the
sake of increased revenue to the league and school, it shows leagues
and schools increasingly for what they are becoming: greedy, money-
mongering institutions that do not care about the welfare and edu-
cation of the students, athletes or not. I might understand how im-
portant the revenue generated by a huge spectator sport like football
is to the general welfare of the student population, but let's face
it; no matter how much we all love hockey, it remains a second-tier
spectator sport at most schools that does not generate even a
fraction of the revenue that football does. I would venture to say
that hockey generates almost no revenue to most division I schools
and should never override the academic obligations of students at
the university. Let us not forget that the hockey players remain
students like all the others at a university, no matter how much
they are recruited (paid??...) ;-)