For us puckheads, Michelle Obama's selection of a dress to wear to her husband's inauguration next week isn't even a blip on the radar, because a far more important decision is coming out of Washington soon.
A vote by faculty representatives from Western Collegiate Hockey Association schools today on whether to lift the league moratorium on expansion carries far greater significance for a lot of us.
At stake is the future of hockey -- and a planned
$65 million rink and events center -- for our good friends at Bemidji State. It will take a simple majority "yes" vote by the 10 WCHA schools to lift the moratorium. Then the stakes would ramp up, with a vote by eight schools (75 percent required for passage) needed at the April league meetings to grant Bemidji State membership in the WCHA.
Without those two votes, the WCHA would effectively be signing the death warrant for Beaver hockey. And that would be very sad indeed.
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The University of Minnesota has asked for discussion on lifting the moratorium to be placed on the agenda, according to WCHA commissioner Bruce McLeod. After that discussion, any school can call for a vote on lifting the moratorium. The problem stems from the fact that the four-team College Hockey America league will disband after next season. Without a league, Bemidji State's successful program would be in trouble.
So if WCHA schools have a genuine interest in the health of the game and are in touch at all with the history of their own programs, they'll grant Bemidji State league membership. College hockey is a small band of brothers with only 58 schools fielding men's Division I teams. For the WCHA to turn its back on the dire predicament facing Bemidji State would be unconscionable. Granted, an 11-team WCHA (after adding Bemidji State) would be a bit awkward for scheduling. A simple solution would be for the WCHA to add a 12th team, perhaps Nebraska-Omaha.
Then you could put Alabama-Huntsville from College Hockey America into the Central Collegiate Hockey Association to replace Omaha in the 12-team league and place East Coast teams Robert Morris and Niagara from the CHA into the Atlantic Hockey League. For schools such as Alaska Anchorage, Minnesota Duluth, Minnesota State-Mankato, St. Cloud State and Wisconsin, a vote of yes to lift the moratorium should be a no-brainer. All five rose from lower levels of hockey over the years and were accepted into the WCHA.
Former North Dakota player and coach Bob Peters poured his life into building a program at Bemidji State, one that has won national championships at nearly every level, from NAIA to NCAA Division II. Bemidji State is a good fit geographically for the WCHA. With a planned 4,000-seat rink featuring 25 luxury suites on the shores of Lake Bemidji, it will offer modern facilities on par with other WCHA schools. Peters has said that if Bemidji State is denied membership in the WCHA, it probably will fold its hockey programs, both men's and women's. Without them as main tenants, it is not likely that Bemidji's rink-events center would be built.
Now is the time to step up and help a brother in dire straits. To do otherwise would be unthinkable.
Virg Foss writes a weekly column for the Grand Forks Herald, a member of Forum Communications.
