Kevin writes: >My understanding is that the ECAC or any of the other leagues did not give >an automatic bid to the regular season champ until last year (after then #1 >Colorado College was snubbed when it lost to #10 team). The bid has >always gone to the tournement champion. This is correct -- prior to last year, the NC$$ handed out only one automatic tournament bid per conference, and each conference awarded that bid to their own tournament winner. Last year, the NC$$ gave each conference two automatic bids, and all the conferences elected to give those bids to the regular-season champ and the conference tournament winner. Note that the NC$$ hands out auto bids, but does *not* say who they have to go to -- as far as I know, there isn't any reason a conference couldn't decide to give their two bids to the tourney winner and runner-up (or the fifth-place team and consolation-game winner, for that matter). But that decision has to be made in advance, and in fact, I think the conferences have to decide what to do with their auto bids before the season starts. Bill Fenwick [log in to unmask] HOCKEY-L is for discussion of college ice hockey; send information to [log in to unmask], The College Hockey Information List.