NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

[4four4]

NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

Great article. Hopefully, we see one or two more schools in the decades ahead who may want to add hockey.

[Kepler]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

I've never been a big fan of college expansion, fearing that hockey will be ruined like football and basketball were, but it would be fun to have a D-1 program at say UT-Austin and/or UCLA someday. Quality schools -- not SEC meatheads -- and also non-traditional areas where the youth game is expanding.

[LynahFan]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

Looking like we’re going to need to add more than 1-2 new teams per decade just to keep up with attrition and maintain 60 teams.

[JohnsonsJerseys]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

Want to help college hockey? Plenty of places the NHL can help existing teams without having to search for places to dump their money with useless studies. Here is how the studies go:
Do you currently have a D-I hockey team on your campus? - No.
Does anyone on your campus want a team? - Yes.
"In summary, our study finds that men's hockey would be a great addition at XXXXX university/college. Many alumni, students and staff at XXXXX university/college are "very excited" about the prospects of having a D-I hockey team. We fully expect the program will be successful and will start play just as soon as they can find/build a suitable facility for the team and raise the necessary funds to start the team and pay the coaching staff and set a budget to keep the team going and start another women's sport to comply with Title IX..."

• How about they bankroll ASU a real hockey rink like they kept the Coyotes afloat for so many years?
• Why can't the NHL subsidize the AK programs to keep them on the ice?
• UAH is right down the road from Nashville. Where is the Predators' support for the Chargers if the NHL cares so much about D-I college hockey?
• Why is only men's hockey being evaluated? How about a women's D-I team in Michigan? Currently SEVEN men's programs in the state and none for women.
• Maybe a Kraft Hockeyville type award for D-I teams and give $100,000 to a college team each season based on program infrastructure needs?

Alaska has two teams on the brink of dropping their programs, but no NHL team there so they could care less. ASU is FIVE years into D-I hockey "with half a million alumni" and is still playing in a rink most HS teams wouldn't touch. Their "press box" has expanded metal mesh for the floor and a sprinkler water main pipe running through the middle of it four feet off the floor. Clearly hockey is a "huge" priority at ASU. UAH is in Alabama where only college football matters and the NHL already failed next door in Georgia (twice).

But yes, let's keep spending money on studies with predictable outcomes to tell budget crunched colleges with no money they should go find $100M to add men's hockey and another women's sport. Off the record, I'm sure the NHL would much rather spend their money on the Canadian Junior talent pipeline. But let's be honest, talking up US College Hockey is a better PR strategy for the NHL since most of their teams play in US cities.

[Rightnut]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

The PAC 12 should be relatively easy. UCLA, USC, Stanford etc have no shortage of multi millionaire/billionaire alums. Money is available. The Ducks owner is a UCLA alum and has bought all the rinks in So Cal. What they should do for the PAC 12 is organize these alums so that the schools can start the process of getting the money, building the rinks etc at the same time. Recruiting will be a piece of cake. Just look at ASU. There are more professional hockey teams in California between the NHL and AHL than anywhere in the world, except maybe NY ( I didn't add them all up). The interest is there.

[LynahFan]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

Not too many years ago, the answer to which state has the most pro hockey teams was Texas, due to all the CHL teams (Ft. Worth Brahmas, Austin Icebats, etc). Not sure if that is still true.

[joecct]

Not too many years ago, the answer to which state has the most pro hockey teams was Texas, due to all the CHL teams (Ft. Worth Brahmas, Austin Icebats, etc). Not sure if that is still true.

I believe they all went to the NAHL. Pretty much the same revenue stream, but you don't have to pay the players.

As a graduate of a D3 playup,I worry about the influx of more Power 5 schools into the D1 hockey mix. They tend to throw their weight around and I wonder if (when) the P5s will kill playups from playing in their pond.

[ScoobyFanClub]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

Want to help college hockey? Plenty of places the NHL can help existing teams without having to search for places to dump their money with useless studies. Here is how the studies go:
Do you currently have a D-I hockey team on your campus? - No.
Does anyone on your campus want a team? - Yes.
"In summary, our study finds that men's hockey would be a great addition at XXXXX university/college. Many alumni, students and staff at XXXXX university/college are "very excited" about the prospects of having a D-I hockey team. We fully expect the program will be successful and will start play just as soon as they can find/build a suitable facility for the team and raise the necessary funds to start the team and pay the coaching staff and set a budget to keep the team going and start another women's sport to comply with Title IX..."

pretty accurate. The studies are useless. And the idea that the NHL is "bankrolling" anything is very misleading.

[JohnsonsJerseys]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

The PAC 12 should be relatively easy. UCLA, USC, Stanford etc have no shortage of multi millionaire/billionaire alums. Recruiting will be a piece of cake. Just look at ASU.

ASU has an advantage now as the only team in the desert Southwest. Many teams are happy to make that occasional warm-weather, non-conference trip. However you put three or four teams in that same geographical area / climate, the non-conference road trips (and recruits) suddenly start to dry up because ASU won't have the exclusive lock on that appeal. Adding teams in Southern Cal would put a big dent in ASU's program. Suddenly you can be in sunny-warm, ocean side LA/Hollywood vs Arizona... AZ no longer looks that attractive. It might be warm but you're still in the middle of the desert. If I'm ASU, I'm not pulling for an entire conference of warm-weather teams. I'm hoping to get a rink built and find a conference home before anyone else in the region comes along.

[Rightnut]

ASU has an advantage now as the only team in the desert Southwest. Many teams are happy to make that occasional warm-weather, non-conference trip. However you put three or four teams in that same geographical area / climate, the non-conference road trips (and recruits) suddenly start to dry up because ASU won't have the exclusive lock on that appeal. Adding teams in Southern Cal would put a big dent in ASU's program. Suddenly you can be in sunny-warm, ocean side LA/Hollywood vs Arizona... AZ no longer looks that attractive. It might be warm but you're still in the middle of the desert. If I'm ASU, I'm not pulling for an entire conference of warm-weather teams. I'm hoping to get a rink built and find a conference home before anyone else in the region comes along.

You might be right about schools travelling to ASU versus So Cal but I disagree relative to recruits. ASU will still recruit well. Have you been there and seen the coeds? You think there will be a shortage of recruits from bad weather places who wouldn’t love ASU even if there is a PAC 12? It’s the non desirable location schools that would need to be worried about their recruiting.

[JohnsonsJerseys]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

ASU will still recruit well. Have you been there and seen the coeds?

If recruits are picking the campus to play on based on the coeds present, those are not the players you want on the roster. At that point you're taking players away from the bottom 10 in the pairwise. The ones with talent are thinking about the NEXT level, what program gives them the best development opportunity and how to make it to the next level. There are plenty of puck bunnies in any hockey town.

Hey babe, can I get your digits, ehh? You know, by the way, I play on the hockey team.
OMG! You play for the Coyotes! You are kinda cute.
No, the other hockey team.
Oh, like you mean the Roadrunners? That's like cool, you might make the NHL some day you know?
No, the ASU Sun Devils, you know, OUR team. We're D-I, and everything, ehh.
Oh, sorry, wow, like I didn't even know we like, had a hockey team... besides isn't that like on ice and everything? That's really, like, cold and stuff. We normally go watch the ASU beach volleyball team on the weekends anyway so we can like, work on our tans, sorry big guy.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Not too many years ago, the answer to which state has the most pro hockey teams was Texas, due to all the CHL teams (Ft. Worth Brahmas, Austin Icebats, etc). Not sure if that is still true.

This reminds me of an idea I’ve started to explore: correlating USA-Hockey registration figures (loosely correlate to “demand”) with the average attendance figures for all pro/college/junior teams in the US (“supply”) on a state by state basis.

Basically wanted to see the ratio of “USAH registrations in a state” to “sum of all team average attendance figures in a state” as a baseline and look at it from there.

Got most of the data (current as of a few weeks ago) on a recent slow Friday at work. Still trying to figure out the best way to digest it. Might put my preliminary thoughts in a separate thread and see what the board thinks of it.

[Sol Diablo]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

This reminds me of an idea I’ve started to explore: correlating USA-Hockey registration figures (loosely correlate to “demand”) with the average attendance figures for all pro/college/junior teams in the US (“supply”) on a state by state basis.

Basically wanted to see the ratio of “USAH registrations in a state” to “sum of all team average attendance figures in a state” as a baseline and look at it from there.

Got most of the data (current as of a few weeks ago) on a recent slow Friday at work. Still trying to figure out the best way to digest it. Might put my preliminary thoughts in a separate thread and see what the board thinks of it.

I believe a linear regression is the technique you would use. The main null hypothesis of a regression is that there is no relationship between the X variables (state registrations) and the Y variable (attendance average for all teams in that state); in other words, the Y values you predict from your multiple regression equation are no closer to the actual Y values than you would expect by chance. You have to have a p value of less than 0.05 to then claim there is a 95% probability of a correlation.
You maybe then could also analyze by junior or NHL or college attendance to see if one does have a higher correlation.

[Split-N]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

I believe a linear regression is the technique you would use. The main null hypothesis of a regression is that there is no relationship between the X variables (state registrations) and the Y variable (attendance average for all teams in that state); in other words, the Y values you predict from your multiple regression equation are no closer to the actual Y values than you would expect by chance. You have to have a p value of less than 0.05 to then claim there is a 95% probability of a correlation.
You maybe then could also analyze by junior or NHL or college attendance to see if one does have a higher correlation.

My head just exploded.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: NHL Bankrolls College Hockey Expansion As Youth Game Explodes

Yeah, I have no intention of regurgitating my old stats textbook for any of this.

It is a good idea to try plotting them against each other to see if there’s a correlation first, but I’m expecting only a loose correlation. There are a lot of factors that would influence this (unsold seats at the arenas, how much various teams charge for tickets, popularity of non-hockey teams in the area, local GDP/capita, availability of local rinks to support registration, etc all are not going to be consistent) and I’m not doing this professionally so I won’t be bothered with trying to account for all that.