Clearly, the ECAC is the weakest of the four conferences this year and has
been in most of the last decade.  I do still maintain that the four
conferences are closer in talent than the various conferences are in
basketball, football, and probably any other collegiate sport.
 
What is the reason that the ECAC is the weakest conference?  Nothing
that I am going to be saying is particularly new as this topic, as is the
case of many others, gets rehashed periodically.
 
1) I think that the number one cause is that only four of the 12 teams
gives athletic scholarships.  While, I understand why each of the teams
that doesn't give athletic scholarships has made the decision (well I
don't understand Union), this means that some players do not chose the ECAC.
I think that the teams that do give scholarships are also at a disadvantage
on the national recruiting front because the decision by some league members
not to give athletic scholarships causes potential recruits to view even the
schools that do give athletic scholarships in the light of the rest of the
league.
 
2) number of games played.  Yes, the non-Ivies only play two less games than
the other leagues.  However, this is the case only on the surface.  The
difference is typically more than two because the other leagues always
manage to get exemptions to increase their total from 34.  I haven't paid
attention to every situation that has come about, but has any ECAC team ever
played more than 32 regular season games in a year?  I know that when RPI
wanted to get an exemption a few years ago, it was not approved by the
league.
 
3) Academic standards of the teams.  Yes, some people don't want to hear this
any more, but the only data that I have seen on this on Hockey-L was posted a
year ago (two years ago?) by Luiz Valente and it showed that the ECAC, viewed
as a group, was more above the other three leagues than they are below the
other three leagues on the ice.  I don't remember the details, but I recall
that even if you throw out the Ivies, the other six teams, on the average,
were higher ranked academically than any of the other leagues.  The problem
here is obvious -- there are prospective athletes who might consider one of
the ECAC schools, but the schools can't admit them.
 
What is the solution to this problem?  Well, I imagine that the
administrations of the 12 schools don't think that this is a problem.  I
understand this opinion.  RPI has gone through this debate on a couple of
instances when it considered switching to Hockey East.  For the life of me,
I can't understand why a school that is Div-III in all other sports chooses
to go Div-I in one sport and then cripples themselves to this degree.  The
argument that being in a sports league with the Ivies rubs off academically on
the other six schools has never washed with me.  Just how many prospective
students attend RPI because they play hockey in the same league as the Ivies
et al?  It has been mentioned several years ago, this does give RPI (and I
assume the other five non-Ivies) name recognition in the Boston area but I
wonder what the impact on the student body really is.
 
I haven't given a solution above.  I certainly don't want the schools to
change admission standards, so I cannot see a way around this problem.  It
would be easy to allow teams to play the same number of games as the other
leagues, but this would require agreement of the Ivies.  Similarly, I don't
expect the Ivies to suddenly offer athletic scholarships.  It was a positive
step when SLU recently started to give athletic scholarships.  I can't
understand why Union made the decision to go Div-I and then doesn't give
athletic scholarships.
 
 
Sorry for the rant, but two flat tires on my bicycle yesterday made me miss
the first two periods of the BC-CC game.  I did get to see the third period
twice as well as a between-game episode of The Three Stooges (in honor of
refs everywhere? :-) )  [Actually, I thought that games were quite well
reffed.]  Also entertaining was Mike Baker's (WNVT-53's number one hockey
fund raiser) complete lack of knowledge of what has transpired this year in
collagiate hockey.  Since, I had to be entertained by Mike Baker between
periods when interviews and other features were shown, I missed most of
these. I am curious if among the highlights of previous tourneys they
showed anything from any of RPI's games in 1985?  Anyway, thanks again
to 53 for picking up the games.
 
Congrats to Hockey-Ler Joe LaCour for being the first person to contribute
to WNVT-53's hockey broadcast on Friday.
 
 
Ralph Baer
RPI '68, '70, '74
 
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