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The end of leagues as we know?

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Re: The end of leagues as we know?

scsutommyboy said:
Right now they make money because they draw well and make a lot of money on home games. If there is a new conference they won't make as much because they won't draw as well and other conference teams won't want to play them for pairwise reasons. So going to Alaska won't make sense unless the Alaska schools pay for some travel costs which they don't do any more in the WCHA.
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UAA spends exactly the same amount on travel costs today as it did when it joined the league (your school get's slightly less now due to expansion). The Alaska teams have always been amenable to paying travel expenses. We know we're a long freaking way away and understand that financial considerations are sometimes necessary.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

dggoddard said:
DU was at 90% capacity last season averaging 5,500 per game with the second highest ticket prices in the WCHA. That was 9th best in the NCAA.

DU also sells around 9,000 season tickets with a majority being Friday or Saturday night packages.

The problem for DU lately has been season ticket "No shows" against non-name brand opponents. No doubt season ticket sales, attendance and interest will go up with the new league.

However the real winners financially should be CC, WMU and especially UNO. I'd expect the other five schools to be close to 100% capacity for every game.
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Boy are you in for a surprise.
 
Bale said:
Fair enough, I had never heard that it was actually official that he was interested. I think the problem would still come in when they would have made him the highest paid employee of the university and doubled Jutting's salary. I don't know how well that would have been received. That being said, it could have been worked through. It would have passed over given enough time.
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I don't doubt that salary was a consideration.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

manurespreader said:
Boy are you in for a surprise.
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Let him have his fun with his bad idea. They're basically taking Minnesota and Wisconsin and replacing with Notre Dame. To the average Denverite I bet Miami and Mankato are fairly interchangeable., but don't tell them that.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

UAA may spend the same $$$ as when they joined but they aren't cover the same number of flights. I know that from a conversation I had with michigan tech's AD when I was still a student.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

dggoddard said:
The problem for DU lately has been season ticket "No shows" against non-name brand opponents. No doubt season ticket sales, attendance and interest will go up with the new league.
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So DU's inability to put butt's in the seats from a metro area of 1.5 million is solved by leading a charge to change that could spell the end or more than one other college hockey program. Now we know what school Condeleeza Rice went to.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

uaafanblog said:
UAA spends exactly the same amount on travel costs today as it did when it joined the league (your school get's slightly less now due to expansion). The Alaska teams have always been amenable to paying travel expenses. We know we're a long freaking way away and understand that financial considerations are sometimes necessary.
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Ok. my mistake I thought they stopped that a few years ago.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Shirtless Guy said:
UAA may spend the same $$$ as when they joined but they aren't cover the same number of flights. I know that from a conversation I had with michigan tech's AD when I was still a student.
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That would be Northwest/Delta Airlines fault for charging more per ticket, we just pay what the contract says to pay.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Handyman said:
But in reality it doesnt really improve their situation all that much. Financially speaking they aren't going to make more (this conference wont be playing at the X for their tourny that is for sure) and most likely their costs will rise. As we hear all the time from our DU friends the fans in that town dont exactly latch on to the Pios anyways while being in the WCHA all of a sudden Miami and Western are gonna bring in the bacon?

I dont know about the CCHA schools but the WCHA schools that are going in for this are cutting off their nose to spite their face. I hope they enjoy their conference tourny being at the Ralph every year because that will be their pinnacle. (no way the Pepsi Center will take them) That means less money to split despite some of the schools (UND and UMD) probably spending more on flights to Ohiogan.
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While I agree with most of what you say, a conference tournament at the Ralph could potentially bring in more money than what the schools would make at the X. Since the new conference tournament revenue would be split among 8 teams instead of 10, that would mean that it would take fewer butts in seats to equal the same goal. If the Ralph were to sell out at $50/game (that is what they charge for "premium" games as it is), that equals $600,000/game. I'm assuming that they would have four games, so we're looking at $2.4 million. When we chop that up, that's $300k/school (obviously these are just raw numbers). In order to get the same revenue at the X from a 10 team WCHA they would have to generate $3 million in revenue. That's approximately $600,000/game, or 12,000 at $50/ticket. If we use current Final Five ticket prices of $160/package for 5 games that equals $32/ticket. In order to equal $600,000/game at $32/ticket they would have to sell 18,750 (nearly a sell out). In my opinion, I think the max that the X would sell would be 14-15k. At $32/ticket, that is $448k-480k/game, and $2.24m-2.4m overall. Given that, I think the conference tournament would be one of the selling points to those who want to rake in more cash, assuming they would hold it at the Ralph.

Again, I am on the record saying that this idea of a Super League is not a good idea, and would ultimately hurt college hockey as a whole, including the teams that are leaving for the Super League.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Handyman said:
Never gets old :)

And I said the Ralph was the pinnacle...whether the conference schools agree to give UND that kind of advantage remains to be seen.
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If they wanted to make more money than they would in the WCHA at the X they would give it to the Ralph. In my opinion they could charge $60-75/ticket at the Ralph and people would pay it. That would net another 480k-1.2m for the schools.
 
As someone from UAF told me today, it's going to be nuts. But, I'd like to think that this presents UAF and UAA a new opportunity to be leaders in a new conference, instead of frozen afterthoughts. From every dark cloud comes opportunity, or something like that.

And I'd send Forrest a box of chocolates if he told North Dakota to **** off from the 2012 Goal Rush.

Jimjamesak said:
So looking at this from a "Leftovers" perspective, this is really petty and really silly. Just seems to me that UND and DU are trying to keep up with Joneses and using Notre Dame for their ends. College Hockey is a terrible TV draw nationally. The NC game gets about the same ratings as an MLS game on ESPN, God knows what kind of attention this new Super 8 conference would get. Maybe a deal with FCS at best, with games still getting bumped for something like Davidson basketball. As for recruiting, players want to go where they can win, you look a whole better scoring 25 goals for an NCAA team then playing 3rd line for PSU or OSU sitting 5th/6th in the BTHC (or even worse playing for a 5th place DU/CC in the Super 8). I think it would be more useful to DU and UND to keep in the WCHA and keep winning and making the NCAA's to drive interest and recruiting then the likely possibility of not making the NCAA's regularly and keeping interest at a similar level or interest dropping off a bit.

As for the rest of us, Ferris, Bowling Green, and LSSU are probably crapping a brick, St. Cloud, Bemidji, and Mankato are likely the same, UAA, UAF, Northern, and Tech are probably plotting the next move as they are they ones likely to survive. Ferris and BG are the ones likely to left out in the cold, I don't see the Minnesota schools joining up with them. The Minnesota schools and UAA, UAF, Tech, and Northern will probably form up with possibly LSSU along with. But that is all conjecture and rumor on my part.

From a UAA perspective, all we need is a conference with an autobid to play in and we're fine.
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Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Has anyone actually been given a list of the 8 schools or is it just a guessing game? What if Air Force or one of the Alaska teams is asked instead of Western Michigan? The Atlantic Hockey Western Division teams have desired scholarship increases and schools like BGSU, FSU, WMU and AH could find a home with them if they split from the Eastern low scholarship teams. Maybe Notre Dame would like to join a Catholic Division of Hockey East with BC, PC, Merrimack and add Holy Cross as the 12th team. They are rumored to be the Eastern AHA team that wanted to up the scholarships and UConn is said to be against it. There are lots of possibilities out there for what could happen.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

Squarebanks said:
As someone from UAF told me today, it's going to be nuts. But, I'd like to think that this presents UAF and UAA a new opportunity to be leaders in a new conference, instead of frozen afterthoughts. From every dark cloud comes opportunity, or something like that.

And I'd send Forrest a box of chocolates if he told North Dakota to **** off from the 2012 Goal Rush.
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That's why I said just give us a conference with an autobid and we're ok. Both of our schools' attendance and revenue isn't affected by opponent too much, but winning does.
 
Re: The end of leagues as we know?

dggoddard said:
Teams in college hockey hockey generally schedule home and home non-conference agreements. If you are bringing in a cupcake without a recriprocal game you may kick in for their hotel or a small airplane subsidy.
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Generally speaking, road trip guarantees come close to paying for a trip...(hotel and plane)...but not all of it. Somewhere between $15K and $20K...generally speaking. This is what BSU received in the past (while a member of the CHA). ..unless it was a home and home...then no money changed hands.

As for schools invited...what I heard last week (but couldn't get anyone to confirm them) was exactly what was reported by Pates in Duluth.

UND, DU, UNO, CC, UMD, ND, Miami, WMU.

As for why Western would be included? They have 25,000 students...and they're a bus ride for ND and Miami (might be a long bus ride...but it's a bus ride).
 
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