Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

[Alton]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

Isn't the ncaa Baseball season longer than hockey? Their tourney alone takes like 2 months.

Actually, no. NCAA baseball is 19 weeks from the first permitted day of play to the last possible day of the CWS. NCAA hockey is 28 weeks from the first permitted day of play to the end of the Frozen Four.

This is why hockey is such a target. They cut about 4-5 weeks off the baseball season (then they added 1 back on) over the last few years. Hockey kind of sticks out right now if you list the season lengths.

Hopefully the point about less missed class time (and that hockey is a revenue sport for several schools) can over-ride that. The fact that hockey is competing with a professional organization for student-athletes might also help defeat this proposal.

It's pretty early in the consideration process right now, but now is also the best time for somebody (like new "Hockey Czar" Paul Kelly) to help put a stop to it.

[Puck Swami]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

I don't they'll save much on jerseys. And I highly doubt other equipment makers would like seeing schools they have contracts with having their teams decked out in Nike for example. BC has a new contract with UnderArmour. Notre Dame has Adidas. I think Wisconsin also had Adidas? Either way, this would create big problems. And the jerseys are still customized so you're probably not going to save on costs among a few other reasons why this isn't that helpful of an idea.

If the NCAA did this, it would have to be implemented over time and in stages, to allow schools' existing equipment contracts to expire and then migrate them to the new sponsor. The biggest help would be to those schools that don't currently have sponsor contracts and have to pay out of pocket for equipment. This would save the less rich schools money by giving them free stuff, and by granting eventual category exclusivity for all 58 schools to the sponsor, you could charge a premium price to the sponsor. Sure, some schools might complain, but it's kind of like revenue sharing in the NFL. They'd adjust.

[Slap Shot]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

If they play X number of games, does it really cost more to play them over the course of 18 weeks versus 22 for instance? Perhaps it's due to ice time for practices? If that's the extra cost factor place a restriction on total ice time over the course of a season.

[GreatLakerMohawk]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

Baseball is a mess because tons of schools in the north still feel like they have to have a program and then they send their teams to Florida for two weeks to get in a good chunk of their schedule where the weather is good enough to play.

Hockey's season is so long because it can be and because it has to be, from a physical well being standpoint.

[Alton]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

If they play X number of games, does it really cost more to play them over the course of 18 weeks versus 22 for instance? Perhaps it's due to ice time for practices? If that's the extra cost factor place a restriction on total ice time over the course of a season.

If you go back and read the proposal as it is now worded, it is to reduce both the length of the season and the number of contests. Nothing specific in the proposal yet; the full Cabinet will have to decide whether to sponsor this as an official proposal and just what the details will be.

[Goon]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

If you go back and read the proposal as it is now worded, it is to reduce both the length of the season and the number of contests. Nothing specific in the proposal yet; the full Cabinet will have to decide whether to sponsor this as an official proposal and just what the details will be.

I can see the WCHA, CCHA and HE not going for it.

[Goon]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

It is linked here. Note item 2 from the top of page 2 of the PDF: "In men’s and women’s ice hockey, consider reducing the length of the season and number of contests."

Your link is not working.

[kdilks]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

1) Keep the same number of games, but start in November instead of October. There are plenty of bye weeks in the current schdeule that can fill up so you don't lose the games. Most fans hate going two weeks without a game, and the player can easily play twice a week for five months instead of six.

Excluding the two weeks in December that typically coincide with finals and Christmas (and will thus almost assuredly never have games), many teams only have one bye week.

[Alton]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

I can see the WCHA, CCHA and HE not going for it.

The other thing that hockey has to deal with: not a single member of the 31-person committee who will be considering this proposal is from a school in those conferences. Only Holy Cross & Princeton have representatives on the cabinet, the other 29 members represent non-hockey schools or conferences.

edit: Sorry, Goon; try here:
http://web1.ncaa.org/web_files/DI_Ch...1%20Review.pdf

[Ralph Baer]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

The other thing that hockey has to deal with: not a single member of the 31-person committee who will be considering this proposal is from a school in those conferences. Only Holy Cross & Princeton have representatives on the cabinet, the other 29 members represent non-hockey schools or conferences.

edit: Sorry, Goon; try here:
http://web1.ncaa.org/web_files/DI_Ch...1%20Review.pdf

And Princeton, being in the Ivy League, already starts later and plays fewer games.

[northeastern]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

Cutting 4-6 hockey games will save how much for Ferris State or Northeastern? Do schools like this break even finacially on their hockey programs?

..i don't know about Ferris, but Northeastern does fine with their hockey $$$.. in fact last season most (home) gms were revenue /+ Of course with the recent $12 million renovation to their home arena.. you're talking sometime before ROI..

Cutting home gms.. we would then lose money

[DETBrass27]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

Get rid of bouncy ball.

[Red Cloud]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

The NCAA should be responsible for the health/expansion of the sport, not the individual programs, or their conferences.

That seems to be a contradictory statement considering how well we know the collective member institutions (NCAA) cherish hockey and muck up things with idiotic rules and red tape, but making conferences responsible for bringing in orphan programs is not economically feasible. They have enough to concern themselves with their own programs already.

(Anastos has already stated that, for instance, he is comfortable staying with an 11 team CCHA league next season and is evaluating methods to cut costs that the conference is responsible for... such as the 4th official, the shootout, etc. so economics seems to be a pretty big stick now.)

You took what I said and went off on some tangent. I didn't say anything about those schools and conferences needing to "take in" anybody, those programs didn't fold because they didn't have a home, they folded because they wanted to. Well, Wayne State didn't have a home, but I think they quit too early. Whatever.

[Red Cloud]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

Hopefully the point about less missed class time (and that hockey is a revenue sport for several schools) can over-ride that. The fact that hockey is competing with a professional organization for student-athletes might also help defeat this proposal.

It's pretty early in the consideration process right now, but now is also the best time for somebody (like new "Hockey Czar" Paul Kelly) to help put a stop to it.

Some very, very good points here, Alton. I immediately thought of the NCAA/CHL "war" and Paul Kelly's organization when I saw your first post.

[du78]

Re: Look out, college hockey: The NCAA has noticed us again.

Excluding the two weeks in December that typically coincide with finals and Christmas (and will thus almost assuredly never have games), many teams only have one bye week.

Denver had 1 bye in November and 1 in January, they also did not play for 2 weekends in December. They played 4 weekends in October including a single exhbition game the first weekend. Dump the exhibition game and give them one weekend off at Christmas with a 10-day break. That is 4 less days than they got this year for Christmas break before returning to practice. They would be back on the ice with 2 to 3 days practice before New Year's weekend games. By doing this the season could be started the first weekend of November and still play the same amount of games.