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Fri, 18 Oct 1991 17:29:29 CDT |
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My first reaction is that a CCHA/WCHA merger would be a good
idea. An interlocking schedule is a weaker idea. Of course, the
implementation details of either move would make a big
difference.
Here's what I think would work. Please remember that this is 100%
unofficial, just based on what I heard on the net and my
imagination...
1. 21 teams: 9 current WCHA teams + 9 current CCHA teams
+ Notre Dame + Alaska-Anchorage + Alaska Fairbanks
2. 4 divisions: 3 divisions of 5 teams each, 1 division of 6
teams. How to align the divisions would be one of the biggest
sticking points.
3. Schedule: I like the friday-saturday series format that the
WCHA uses. I also HATE unbalanced schedules.
5-team divisions: Each teams plays
all 4 teams in the division
in 2-game home series 8 games
all 4 teams in the division
in 2-game road series 8 games
16 games in the division
7 teams not in the division
in 1 home game each 7 games
another 7 teams not in the division
in 1 road game each 7 games
2 teams not in the division
in 0 games 0 games
14 games out of the division
__
30 league games total
6-team division: Each team plays
all 5 teams in the division
in 2-game home series 10 games
all 5 teams in the division
in 2-game road series 10 games
20 games in the division
5 teams not in the division
in 1 home game each 5 games
another 5 teams not in the division
in 1 road game each 5 games
5 teams not in the division
in 0 games 0 games
10 games out of the division
__
30 league games total
4. Points: all games are worth 2 points
5. playoffs: I see lots of possibilities:
a. division regular-season winners in a 4-team playoff
b. division regular-season winners and runner-ups in an
8-team playoff
c. division regular-season winners and the 4 next best
teams in an 8-team playoff
PROS (vs. doing nothing with the current conferences):
1. Overhead savings: The resources that currently go into two league
offices could be saved, or directed to new projects (better league
publicity, etc). This probably isn't a lot from the financial point
of view (compared to the team's budgets), but is a lot in terms of
getting hockey people coordinated in their efforts, and not oding
duplicate and possibly competing work
2. solves the 34-game limit problem
3. gets the Alaska teams into a league
4. Fans will be exposed to more teams: 11 league teams at home and 7 on
the road (for the 5-team divisions)
5. opens up 2 more non-league games
6. preserves a reasonable balanced schedule (not perfect)
7. (most likeley) preserves most of the current "traditional" rivalries
8. Division play is worth more points than non-division play
CONS
1. Scheduling will be harder, especially working in the 1-game matchups
and 2-game series (friday-saturday for 2-game series and friday-sunday
for 2 1-games matches in a week?)
2. Aligning the conferences will be tough.
3. Some traditional rivalries will probably be lost
4. Not everyone plays everyone, so some teams will have a tougher
league schedule than others, just on the basis of who they play,
where
5. Travel expenses will probably go up, no matter how the divisions are
aligned.
6. Loss of the two conference championship tournaments (replaced
with one new tounament)
any comments?
--david
ps: VERY Soon we can talk about actual games....
--------
david parter [log in to unmask]
university of wisconsin -- madison computer sciences department
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