Many people have been emailing us at TJHN asking for updates on the Big Ten proposal made to the NCAA that would penalize players who delay their initial college enrollment more than two years after their high school graduations. The rule change would eliminate one year of NCAA eligibility for every season played of junior hockey after that two year window.
Many have asked if this would also have the same effect on those athletes who are also gifted enough to graduate as 17 year olds from High School. The answer is yes. The proposal does not discriminate for age, and is based upon traditional High School graduation ages and statistics. So, in this case, it would not be advantageous for a player to graduate early, it would likely be a disadvantage.
Many people have also asked if this rule change would be immediate. There is no definitive answer for that. No one knows how it would effect those players entering college in 2016 or 2017 who may have been told by the school to delay enrolment in order to gain more development time in junior hockey.
What we do know is that the proposal made by the Big Ten will be voted on next month at the April meetings.
We also know after speaking to a majority of NCAA coaches that the proposal will get a lot of resistance from the majority of NCAA programs.
Coaches in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC), and Coaches in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) are unanimously against the proposal.
The majority of Coaches from the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC), Atlantic Hockey, and Hockey East are also against the proposal.
The vast majority of all NCAA Division 1 Hockey Coaches are completely against the proposal and feel as though the Big Ten is trying to “jam this down our throats”.
The problem with the Big Ten proposal that no one is talking about is that the proposal itself would not have made a tremendous impact on incoming freshmen players if it had been in effect this year. The Big Ten argument for the proposal is not supported by the evidence.
Of the 490 Freshmen playing NCAA Division One Hockey this season, only 132 of those players were 21 years old as of the NCAA season start on October 1st. Roughly twenty seven percent.
The Big Ten basis for the proposal is that they are not as competitive on the ice because they recruit younger players and they are forced to play against older players. The numbers clearly do not support their argument as the overwhelming majority of NCAA hockey player freshmen are under 21 years old.
The truth behind the Big Ten’s struggles to compete on the ice is that they only recruit the “Blue Chip”, or big name prospects and those prospects leave school for the NHL or Major Junior too often. The Same can be said about Boston College and Boston University who also support the Big Ten proposal.
Examples of this are easy to find in Dylan Larkin, Jack Eichel, Noah Hanifin, and Jake McCabe who all left early for the NHL.
Off the record many Coaches are saying the Big Ten proposal is driven by their desire to recruit saying they put more players into the NHL than the other teams, yet when players leave for the NHL early, they want to complain about competitive imbalance. Simply put, they want their cake and to eat it too.
The proposal penalizes players who develop more slowly than some of those “Blue Chip” players. The easy solution is simply for those programs who keep losing players early would be to join the rest of NCAA Hockey in their recruiting of older players and be more patient with player development.
That unfortunately would be too easy and make too much sense when it comes to recruiting. It would also make too much sense because it could easily restore any competitive imbalance the Big Ten is complaining about. And that competitive imbalance is costing the Big Ten teams money.
Less ticket sales are a direct result of not winning National Championships. Lack of revenue forcing a reduction in Big Ten Hockey games broadcast on the Big Ten Network is also a result of not winning.
The Big Ten proposal is such an inherently bad idea for the game, and for college bound athletes that they had to make the proposal without the support of the majority of NCAA programs. It was essentially an end around bully tactic to try to force other programs to conform to the Big Ten “will”.
The proposal itself does not even consider the expansion of NCAA Division One Hockey that several schools would like to have happen. Expansion, combined with limiting a player recruiting pool would dramatically water down the on ice product. That would eliminate all the gains the NCAA has made in developing NHL players. 55% of all NHL free agent signings last year came from NCAA players.
The NHL has said that it likes the NCAA development model because the players coming out of its programs are more physically and mentally mature. That comes with age.
There is also no consideration given to how this proposal would effect Junior Hockey immediately or in the future. It is simply a selfish and self serving proposal that is bad for the game as a whole.
In the end though, it is the Big Ten. While they shouldn’t be able to make this proposal on their own, they can. Will it be passed next month? No one knows for sure, but when a majority of Coaches do not want a rule change, Athletic Directors voting on the rule change will certainly remember their Coaches opinions.
Please participate in the poll below and express your opinion on the matter. Tweet and republish and we will send the results to the NCAA.
Joseph Kolodziej – Publisher
