norm1909
Larry Normandin
Maybe if LVC had stayed, maybe they would have joined the ECAC-West --
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The SUNYAC hockey league has been set at nine teams since 2006-07 when Morrisville State joined as a provisional member moving up the next year to a full-fledged participant.
That number will change in a few years as the SUNYAC as a whole will be welcoming in a new member — Canton — who has a hockey team.
“I think it’s great,” Fredonia coach Jeff Meredith said. “Personally, I’m really excited that we can expand our league.”
“All the coaches are welcome to the idea of Canton coming in,” Plattsburgh coach Bob Emery said. “It gives us more conference games which is great. Any time we can hold more games within our league adds excitement to the schedule.”
Like Morrisville’s entry, Canton will have a long road to tread as they move their program from an ACHA Division I institution to NCAA Division III. Beginning in the 2010-11 academic year, Canton will begin the first four years as a provisional Division III member.
The first two years, the NCAA expects a new program to need the time to slowly learn and understand their policies and regulations. For that reason, the NCAA gives provisional schools some degree of leeway in meeting these regulations. However, afterwards, the college is expected to be abiding by all NCAA regulation in years three and four.
Upon successful completion of this four year period, the school then becomes a candidate for full accreditation as a member of the NCAA. As long as those four years go well and they meet the necessary criteria along the way, full accreditation will not be a problem.
“There is a fast track,” Canton’s Assistant Athletic Director Matt Metcalf. “If years one and two go well, three and four can be combined into a single year.”
Thus, three years is the soonest that Canton can start competing for the NCAA playoffs. But, what about the SUNYAC? Canton has every intention of entering all their appropriate sports into that conference.
“Everything is moving in the right direction,” Metcalf said. “They need to know when they can handle adding a member. SUNYAC ideally wants to wait till we clear years one and two of provisional period. I’m hoping they bring us into the conference as sort of a corresponding member for scheduling purposes.”
Canton cannot officially enter the SUNYAC (or any other conference) until after the first two years of the provisional period. However, even after that time, Canton will not be allowed to compete in the SUNYAC playoffs in their second two year provisional period (but their games may count in the standings for the other schools) because they
cannot be the SUNYAC representative in the NCAA playoffs. Whether Canton will be allowed to compete in the standings for any regular season honors has not yet been decided.
The biggest problem with any new school trying to fill out their schedule is that during the provisional period, the other teams’ stats and records don’t count when playing Canton. However, the NCAA is trying to help out as much as possible.
“Games against us don’t count in the primary criteria,” Carroll said about the selection process. “But they do have an effect on the secondary criteria. This was a bone thrown to provisional members to help scheduling.”
“Our conference is scheduling them as much as possible,” Damore said.
Thanks to the close knit community that is college hockey, that is one program that Canton is having an easier time with their schedule.
“It’s working out very well,” Canton coach Eric McCambly said. “Everything happens for a reason. Over the past eight years, we’ve been able to put a lot of players on SUNYAC teams, so I have developed a very good working relationship with the coaches.”
“We all believe let’s lead the way to getting them games,” Meredith said. “If we don’t schedule them, nobody else will.”
Already, four schools (Brockport, Buffalo State, Fredonia, and Potsdam) have committed to two games against Canton next season with the other four schools committing to one. The following season, every team will play Canton twice.
“But we realize that even though they are helping us out, we also have to help them out by making sure the SUNYAC remains very competitive,” McCambly said.
The addition of Canton may gives SUNYAC sports an number of teams at 13, but it means an even number of hockey schools. The travel partners works may need to be realigned with the addition of Canton, with Canton likely joining neighbor Potsdam.
“We’ll likely loose our travel partner,” Emery explains. “We will probably have to work out with Morrisville, or maybe a total realignment of partners.”
That’s the way it will work for all the schools. Though they could arrange home-and-home series on the same weekend for the closer schools, don’t expect to see that since it will make the overall SUNYAC schedule uneven in number of home and away contests.
Just how well will Canton do on the Division III level? McCambly is under no illusions the task will be easy. “The SUNYAC is an outstanding league,” McCambly said. “Last time I looked, we had three teams in the top 15 in the nation. Obstacles we face are excellent schools, new arenas, and long established programs.”
That, and convincing potential recruits to come to a school that has no way of making the playoffs for four years. “Trying to put that out of my mind,” McCambly said. “Every school has its strengths. We are going to have to find the right type of kid who wants to come here. You have to tell them you are going to be coming in to build a college hockey program.”
The other coaches think Canton handle these problems with ease.
“They have a great coach already in hand,” Emery said. “Eric is an established coach on the junior college level. He’s a hard worker. He’s everywhere recruiting. I think it will be easier for Canton to make the transition than just any school who is building their program up.”
Meredith agrees: “Anybody who knows Eric knows he’s a tireless worker. He built that program from nothing to a national championship contender year after year. I think he’ll make that transition very easily.”
“Its good enough to compete with the other schools,” McCambly said. “I’m really happy to be getting into the SUNYAC.”
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