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While waiting down a thunderstorm in Toronto last week, I found this article in the Toronto Library: CCHA May Jump to 12 Teams With Eye on NCAA Playdowns The Central Collegiate Hockey Asspcoatopm could expand from five to as many as 12 teams next season with a new organization structure and a comissioner as its top administrator. Athletic directors and faculty represenatitives from more than 10 schools met in Chicago during the mid-January NCAA convention to establish the CCHA as a conference governed by faculty representatives from each school and a commissioner. The conference, currently consisting of defending champion Ohio State, Bowling Green, St. Louis, Ohio University and this year's newcomer and leader, Lake Superior State, will eventually request the right to have its post-season tournament champion receive automatic qualification in the NCAA hockey tournament. The present NCAA tournament format consists of two teams from both the Western Collegiate Hockey Assn. and ECAC Division I. In 25 years, no team outside those leagues haas received a berth in the tournament. "From our discussions in Chicago," explained Dick Young, Bowling Green Athletic Director, "it was decided that the CCHA would be a conference of schools with compatible interests who do not aspire to rival the high powered hockey programs at some of the schools in the WCHA and the top division of the Eastern Collegaite Athletic Conference. It was the belief of those present that the CCHA should seek a level of competition comparable to the one that the Mid-American Conference enjoys when compared to the Big Ten. This does not mean that any of the current hockey programs among our CCHA members would be curtailed in any degree from the level at which they are now operating." Young indicated that the conference structure next year would feature two divisions and be dependent upon the caliber of hockey played at the competition schools. The first division would be for schools that currently fund their hockey programs with 16 or more scholarships with a maximum of 20 full scholar- ships over four years as the only limiting factor. The WCHA permits 24 full scholarships over four yeaars, but the NCAA recently ruled that the total be lowered to 23 in another year. Based on the information meeting, Young said that Bowling Green, St. Louis, Lake Superior and possibly Ohio State would be teams competing in Division One during the 1973-74 season. Schools definitely interested in forming Division Two include Buffalo, Northern Illinois, Western Michigan, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Illinois-Chicago Circle, Ohio University, Iowa State and the Air Force Academy. The WCHA currently consists of 10 teams-Denver, Michigan Tech, North Dakota, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan State, Michigan, Notre Dame, Minnesota- Duluth and Colorado College. THe WCHA voted at its last meeting in April, 1972 to freeze further league expansion. Bowling Green had applied for membership and both Lake Superior State and St. Louis had shown interest. --Hockey News, February 10, 1973 Interesting to see how times of changed. 24 scholarships. Interested in being a lower league. This never came to pass. The Division I schools played in the league, with Western Michigan joining in 1977 and UIC (then Chicago Circle) in 1981. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Mike Burger | [log in to unmask] | Univ. of Mich.-1990, Colo. State-1993