Monthly Archives: March 2022

Post #69 – 3/12/22 – NCAA Tourney Update – Quinnipiac, MN-Duluth, Wisconsin Advance, D-III Tourney Underway

In This Post…

  • D-I NCAA Tournament Update |
  • D-III NCAA Tourney Underway |
  • D-I and D-III Viewing Links |

D-I 2022 NCAA Tourney Update

The Bracket

Quinnipiac, MN-Duluth, and Wisconsin Advance

Quinnipiac scored 2 goals in the 2nd period and 2 in the 3rd, including an empty-netter for a 4-0 victory vs. Syracuse. The bobcats will now face #1 tournament seed Ohio State Saturday for a berth in the Frozen Four. Corrine Schroeder got the shutout and made 16 stops. Adzija, Mobley, and Boyd each had 2 points a piece to pace the Bobcats.

MN-Duluth forward Gabbie Hughes needed just 39 seconds to put Duluth up 1-0 on the Crimson and they never looked back en route to a 4-0 win over Harvard in Minneapolis last night. Hughes would go on to score two more goals to complete the hat-trick while 5th yer senior and Top 10 Patty Kaz finalist Elizabeth Giguere chipped in with 3 assists of her own. Anna Klein would 2 assists as well. Duluth’s Soderberg picked up the shutout making 27 saves.

Wisconsin took a 2-0 lead into the 3rd period and scored an empty net goal to secure a 3-1 win for the Badgers. Clarkson cut the lead to 1 on an extra-attacker goal with 2:01 remaining Almost half the game was played on special teams as a total of 26 minutes in penalties were called. Clarkson outshot Wisconsin 31-25. Wisconsin moves on to play the #3 overall seed Northeastern in a rematch of last years national championship game.

D-III NCAA Tourney Underway

The Division III NCAA National Championships got underway as well this week. Here’s everything you need to know.

You can watch the selection show HERE.

7 conferences give ‘Auto Bids’ to their post-season playoff champions. Those are below. 3 additional schools receive bids based on their season record and body of work. Those schools receive an ‘At-Large’ invitation to the tournament.

CONFERENCESCHOOL
Commonwealth Coast ConferenceEndicott
Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic ConferenceGustavus Adolphus
New England Hockey ConferenceElmira
New England Small College Athletic ConferenceMiddlebury
Northeast Women’s Hockey LeaguePlattsburgh State
United Collegiate Hockey ConferenceNazareth
Women’s Northern Collegiate Hockey AssociationAurora

The three institutions selected from Pool C were ColbyUniversity of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and University of Wisconsin-River Falls.

Bracket

Schedule

March 9 – First Round

Aurora University 0 @ UW-River Falls 7

UW-Eau Claire 0 @ Gust-Adolphus 3

March 12 – Quarterfinals

#8 Endicott @ #1 Middlebury, 3PM EST

#9 Colby @ #2 Plattsburgh, 3PM EST

#3 Elmira @ #6 Nazareth, 3Pm EST

#5 Gustavus @ #4 UW-River Falls, 3:05PM CST

Sifters

2 Minutes For Delay of Game… The women’s hockey spotlight is now firmly on the NCAA D-I tournament with its expanded 11-team field. Not only are three more teams added, but the tournament selection show was aired for the first time ever on national television via ESPN News last Sunday. The D-I game is evolving. Coverage of women’s NCAA hockey, D-I or D-III, has been hard to come by consistently in one spot. One hockey media outlet, USCHO.com, which stands for US College Hockey Online, does its best to cover both NCAA divisions. But even their women’s hockey coverage is sporadic.

With three NCAA tournament games played last night, over 50% of the field, one might expect a bit of coverage from the likes of a USCHO. Yet when you go to the USCHO.com homepage, there’s nothing about any of the three games. Heck, there isn’t anything on the women’s D-I homepage either. Seems like it should be US Men’s College Hockey Online, right? The only place I can find coverage or recaps from a national type media entity is from The Ice Garden, which is a blog that covers not only NCAA D-I hockey but professional leagues like the PHF.

The need for national coverage of Women’s D-I and D-III hockey only helps the sport top to bottom. There are so many great college players, coaches, rivalries, human interest stories, etc. NCAA Women’s Hockey deserves timely, quality, and consistent coverage.

Stream/Viewing Info for D-I & D-III Games today

Wisconsin vs. #3 Northeastern, 1pm EST – Watch HERE for FREE.

#5 Yale vs. #4 Colgate, 3pm EST. It’s been hard to find viewing info, until now. ESPN+ will carry the game according to its website. You can click HERE to subscribe.

MN-Duluth vs. #2 Minnesota – 2pm CST/3PM EST – Watch HERE for FREE.

Quinnipiac vs. #1 Ohio State, 5pm EST – Watch HERE for FREE.

D-III NCAA Tournament Game Viewing Options…

Endicott vs Middlebury, 3pm EST – Watch Here.

Elmira vs. Nazareth, 3pm – Watch HERE.

Colby vs. Plattsburgh, 2:45pm EST – Watch HERE.

Gustavus vs. UW-River Falls, 3PM EST / 2pm CST – Watch Here.

Enjoy the viewing!

Until Next Time…


21-22 Streaming Info

-Streams for games in the ECAC can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in the WCHA can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in Hockey East this year can be found HERE. Hockey East once again is streaming all game live and for FREE.

-Streams for CHA games with the exception of Penn St. can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams for NEWHA games can be found at each teams’ website. Subscriptions may be necessary to watch games.


NCAA Coaching Changes… Keep up with all the coaching changes across D-I and D-III HERE.

Give Someone a Stick Tap… Know someone in women’s college hockey who’s work needs some recognition? Nominate them for WCH.org’s monthly ‘Stick Tap’ HERE or Email us at: womenscollegehockey@gmail.com

Recruiting Events/League Online Directory… Find all the recruiting events on WCH.org right HERE. Want to add your event? Click HERE to fill out our WCH.org event form.


Grant Kimball is founder and contributing writer at Women’s College Hockey.org and beginning his 3rd season as an Assistant Coach with the Yale University women’s hockey program. Grant has developed an experienced perspective in the world of women’s ice hockey, having coached and recruited players from across the globe during his 25+ year amatuer and NCAA coaching career. He has coached at 6 NCAA DIII and DI programs in the NCHA (D3), the CHA, WCHA, Hockey East, ECAC, and the Ivy League (DI). Beyond coaching, Grant served as a site representative for the 2019 NCAA quarterfinal of the D-I NCAA Tournament. He also currently serves as an Officer with the American Hockey Coaches Association as Vice President of Membership and sits on the AHCA’s Women’s Hockey Executive Committee.

Post #68 – 3/10/22 – Weekly Schedule, Polls, NCAA Tourney Preview, Sifters

In This Post…

  • We’ll take a look at the upcoming weekly D-I schedule|
  • See who’s ranked in the USCHO.com, USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine, and the ‘Power 10’ national polls|
  • NCAA Tourney Preview|
  • Sifters… Little tidbits of news and info from around women’s college hockey|

D-I Weekly Schedule

Thursday March 10th, 2022

Minneapolis Regional – Harvard vs. Minnesota-Duluth 7pm EST. WATCH B1G+ (FREE)

Columbus Regional – Syracuse vs. Quinnipiac 6pm EST. WATCH – B1G+ (FREE)

Boston Regional – Clarkson vs. Wisconsin 7pm EST. Watch – SportsLive (FREE)

Friday March 11, 2022 – DAY OFF

Saturday March 12, 2022

Boston Regional Final – Clarkson/Wisco winner vs. #3 Northeastern 1pm EST. Watch – SportsLive (FREE)

Hamilton Regional Final – #5Yale vs. #4 Colgate 3pm EST. Watch – NCAA.com

Minneapolis Regional Final – Harvard/MN-Duluth winner vs #2 Minnesota 3pm EST. WATCH – B1G+ (FREE)

Columbus Regional Final – Syracuse/Quinnipiac winner vs. #1 Ohio State 5pm EST. WATCH – B1G+ (FREE)

Game results, box scores, and statistics come directly from CHN – College Hockey News, USCHO.com or the NCAA’s official stats site HERE.

Video highlight links are to individual program produced media, some of which may be found on team twitter or other social media accounts – so scroll the feed to see the game highlights.

Postgame links are any postgame video produced by individual programs and found on either team websites or social media accounts.

Don’t See a link… for video highlights or postgame? Assume there was none available at the time of our post.

D-I Top 10 Polls

Evan’s last look at his Top 10 in D-I women’s college hockey came in Pipeline Post #65. You can find it HERE.

2022 NCAA Tourney Preview

The Bracket

Seedings

-5 teams are seeded, #1 Ohio State, #2 Minnesota, #3 Northeastern, #4 Colgate, and #5 Yale

-Seeds 1-5 get an automatic bye into the regional final. There are 4 regions: Columbus – Ohio State as the host, Minneapolis – Minnesota as the host, Boston – Northeastern as the host, and Hamilton, NY – Colgate as the hosts. Seeds 6-11 play a 1st round game with the winner moving on to the regional final.

-The top 5 teams, by virtue of their pairwise rankings after all post-season playoff championships were completed, received seeds 1-5. Using the pairwise rankings as the seeding method was determined by the 2022 NCAA Women’s Ice Hockey Tournament Committee.

How They Got There

There are 4 automatic qualifiers for the 4 D-I conference playoff champions that award ‘Auto-bids’ and 7 ‘At-Large’ bids awarded that make up the 11-team NCAA Tournament field.

-#1 Ohio State, received the WCHA automatic qualifier by winning the WCHA playoff championship 3-2 in OT vs. Minnesota and ranked #1 in the pairwise.

-#2 Minnesota received an At-Large bid and ranked 2nd in the pairwise rankings.

-#3 Northeastern University, received the Hockey East automatic qualifier by winning the Hockey East Playoff championship vs. UCONN 3-1 and ranked #3 in the pairwise.

-#4 Colgate University, received the ECAC Automatic qualifier by winning the ECAC playoff championship over Yale 2-1 in overtime and ranked #4 in the pairwise.

-#5 Yale University, received an ‘At-Large’ bid and ranked 5th in the pairwise rankings. Yale lost to Colgate in the ECAC Championship game 2-1 in OT.

Syracuse University, received the College Hockey America Automatic qualifier by defeating Mercyhurst University in the CHA Championship 3-2 in overtime.

Quinnipiac University received an ‘At-Large’ bid and ranked 7th in the pairwise rankings. The Bobcats lost to Colgate 3-2 in the semifinals of the ECAC post-season tournament.

Wisconsin received an ‘At-Large’ bid and ranked 6th in the pairwise rankings. The Badgers lost to Ohio State in the semifinals of the WCHA post-season tournament.

Clarkson University received an ‘At-Large’ bid and ranked 10th in the pairwise rankings. The Green Knights lost to Quinnipiac in the first round of the ECAC post-season tournament.

Minnesota-Duluth received an ‘At-Large’ bid and is ranked 8th in the pairwise. The Bulldogs lost to Minnesota 5-1 in the WCHA post season tournament semifinals.

Harvard University received an ‘At-Large’ bid and is ranked 9th in the pairwise. The Crimson lost its first-round ECAC quarterfinal series to Princeton.

Sifters

Free Viewing… Nice to see first round NCAA games free to watch. Click the links above for info.

National Awards Season… This is the time of year when national players’ of the year, coach of the year, goaltender of the year, etc. get named. The 3 finalists for Goaltender of the Year in D-I have been announced–2 from the ECAC, St. Lawrence’s Lucy Morgan and Quinnipiac’s Corinne Schroeder. And from Hockey East, it was Northeastern’s Aerin Frankel. The winner will be announced March 17th.

USA Hockey Nationals Update… One of the last events for D-I college coaches to get some in-person evals in before the April-May quiet period takes place will be in Pittsburgh, PA as USA Hockey hosts its girls tier I national championships.

Tier I Schedule and Info can be found HERE. Tier II Schedule and Info can be found HERE. All games will be streamed live on HockeyTV.

Here is who we know to have made the field as of now… with still a few spots to doll out the next few weeks.

U14s – Qualified

Amherst Lady Knights

Cleveland Lady Barons

Detroit Little Caesars

FL Alliance

LA Lions

MN Green Giants

Philadelphia Jr Flyers

Pittsburgh Penguins Elite

Team North Dakota

4 more teams to qualify + 3 At Large Bids

Central District

Mass District

New England District

Rocky Mtn District

U16s – Qualified

Anaheim Lady Ducks

BK Selects Academy (Rochester Youth Hockey)

Detroit Belle Tire

East Coast Wizards

Gilmour Lancers

FL Alliance

MN Grey Sharks

Philadelphia Jr Flyers

Pittsburgh Penguins Elite

Team Colorado

Team North Dakota

2 more teams to qualify + 3 At Large Bids

Central District

New England District

U19’s – Qualified

Alaska All-stars

BK Selects Academy (Rochester Youth Hockey)

NAHA White – North American Hockey Academy

Detroit Little Caesars

Gilmour Lancers

FL Alliance

Philadelphia Jr Flyers

Pittsburgh Penguins Elite

Shattuck St. Mary’s (Prep)

3 more teams to qualify + 4 At Large Bids

Central District

New England District

Rocky Mtn District

Until Next Time…


21-22 Streaming Info

-Streams for games in the ECAC can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in the WCHA can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in Hockey East this year can be found HERE. Hockey East once again is streaming all game live and for FREE.

-Streams for CHA games with the exception of Penn St. can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams for NEWHA games can be found at each teams’ website. Subscriptions may be necessary to watch games.


NCAA Coaching Changes… Keep up with all the coaching changes across D-I and D-III HERE.

Give Someone a Stick Tap… Know someone in women’s college hockey who’s work needs some recognition? Nominate them for WCH.org’s monthly ‘Stick Tap’ HERE or Email us at: womenscollegehockey@gmail.com

Recruiting Events/League Online Directory… Find all the recruiting events on WCH.org right HERE. Want to add your event? Click HERE to fill out our WCH.org event form.


Grant Kimball is founder and contributing writer at Women’s College Hockey.org and beginning his 3rd season as an Assistant Coach with the Yale University women’s hockey program. Grant has developed an experienced perspective in the world of women’s ice hockey, having coached and recruited players from across the globe during his 25+ year amatuer and NCAA coaching career. He has coached at 6 NCAA DIII and DI programs in the NCHA (D3), the CHA, WCHA, Hockey East, ECAC, and the Ivy League (DI). Beyond coaching, Grant served as a site representative for the 2019 NCAA quarterfinal of the D-I NCAA Tournament. He also currently serves as an Officer with the American Hockey Coaches Association as Vice President of Membership and sits on the AHCA’s Women’s Hockey Executive Committee.

Post #67 – 3/6/22 – Pairwise & NCAA Tourney Selection Show Info

In This Post…

  • NCAA Pairwise Update as of Saturday March 5th
  • NCAA Championship Tournament Selection Show Details

Pairwise Update

Here is the latest Pairwise rankings as detailed by USCHO. Rankings are updated as of Sunday March 6th at just after 3am this morning.

There was one more game to be played this afternoon in the WCHA Final-Faceoff as Ohio State beat Minnesota in a #2 vs. #1 match-up. Ohio State erased a 2-goal deficit in the 3rd period to force overtime. It only took OSU 23 seconds into OT while on a PP to end it and win the WCHA Championship and the WCHA’s auto-bid to the NCAA tournament.

Ohio State and Minnesota are #1 and #2 respectively in the Pairwise, so not much movement should happen below them. It’s now up to the NCAA D-I tournament committee to work on sorting out the bracket & regional site team placements.

How To Watch Selection Show

The NCAA D-I National Collegiate Tournament Selection Show will air tonight, Sunday March 6, at 9pm EST. For the first time ever, it will be broadcast on television live via the ESPN News channel. Check local cable listings for where you can find ESPN News.

If you have access to the ESPN App, you can subscribe to ESPN+ and watch the selection show from there.

More on how to watch the selection show can be found HERE.

Be sure to tune in!

Until Next Time…


21-22 Streaming Info

-Streams for games in the ECAC can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in the WCHA can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in Hockey East this year can be found HERE. Hockey East once again is streaming all game live and for FREE.

-Streams for CHA games with the exception of Penn St. can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams for NEWHA games can be found at each teams’ website. Subscriptions may be necessary to watch games.


NCAA Coaching Changes… Keep up with all the coaching changes across D-I and D-III HERE.

Give Someone a Stick Tap… Know someone in women’s college hockey who’s work needs some recognition? Nominate them for WCH.org’s monthly ‘Stick Tap’ HERE or Email us at: womenscollegehockey@gmail.com

Recruiting Events/League Online Directory… Find all the recruiting events on WCH.org right HERE. Want to add your event? Click HERE to fill out our WCH.org event form.


Grant Kimball is founder and contributing writer at Women’s College Hockey.org and beginning his 3rd season as an Assistant Coach with the Yale University women’s hockey program. Grant has developed an experienced perspective in the world of women’s ice hockey, having coached and recruited players from across the globe during his 25+ year amatuer and NCAA coaching career. He has coached at 6 NCAA DIII and DI programs in the NCHA (D3), the CHA, WCHA, Hockey East, ECAC, and the Ivy League (DI). Beyond coaching, Grant served as a site representative for the 2019 NCAA quarterfinal of the D-I NCAA Tournament. He also currently serves as an Officer with the American Hockey Coaches Association as Vice President of Membership and sits on the AHCA’s Women’s Hockey Executive Committee.

Post #66 – 3/3/22 – Weekly Schedule, Polls, The Pairwise & NCAA Tourney, Conference Tourney Recap, Sifters

In This Post…

  • We’ll take a look at the upcoming weekly D-I schedule|
  • See who’s ranked in the USCHO.com, USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine, and the ‘Power 10’ national polls|
  • The Pairwise & NCAA Tourney|
  • Sifters… Little tidbits of news and info from around women’s hockey|

D-I Weekly Schedule

We are going to try a new format for displaying the weekly schedule as well as games played with links to box scores. Formatting from USCHO.com is not kind to mobile users. So to help, we will be using the links CHN – College Hockey News.


It’s ‘Final-Four’ Weekend for NEWHA, ECAC, Hockey East, and WCHA… The CHA completed its post-season playoff championship last weekend with Syracuse beating Mercyhurst in the final 3-2 in OT. The NEWHA, ECAC, Hockey East, and WCHA are all down to its ‘Final-Four’ championship weekend. The NEWHA held quarterfinal games Tuesday. Hockey East played its Semifinal games last night. The NEWHA and ECAC championship weekends have semifinals Friday and championships Saturday. The WCHA final-four championship weekend is Saturday/Sunday. All schedules are below:

Make sure to scroll down

Tuesday, March 1

NEWHA Quarterfinals #6 St. Michael’s 1 @ #3 St. Anselm 2

NEWHA Quarterfinals #5 Post 2 @ #4 Sacred Heart 5

Wednesday, March 2

Hockey East Semifinal #3 UCONN 3 @ #2 Vermont 1, HIGHLIGHTS

Hockey East Semifinal #5 Maine 1 @ #1 Northeastern 3, HIGHLIGHTS are ⬇️

Friday, March 4

NEWHA Semifinal #4 Sacred Heart vs. #1 Franklin Pierce 3PM Hosted By Franklin Pierce, Watch/Stream

NEWHA Semifinal #3 St. Anselm vs. #2 Long Island Univ. 7PM Hosted by Franklin Pierce, Watch/Stream

ECAC Semifinal #8 Princeton vs. # 2 Yale 3PM, @ Yale Univ. Ingalls Rink, ESPN+ Stream

ECAC Semifinal #4 Quinnipiac vs. #3 Colgate, @ Yale Univ. Ingalls Rink, ESPN+ Stream

Saturday, March 5

NEWHA Championship TBD, 7PM Hosted By Franklin Pierce, Watch/Stream

ECAC Championship TBD, 3PM EST, @ Yale Univ. Ingalls Rink, ESPN+ Stream in USA, Outside USA

Hockey East Championship TBD, 7PM, @ TBD Campus site of highest remaining seed, TV-NESN+

WCHA Semifinal #4 MN-Duluth vs. #1 Minnesota, 1:07PM CST, @ Univ. of MN Ridder Arena, TV/Stream INFO

WCHA Semifinal #3 Wisconsin vs. #2 Ohio State, 4:07PM CST, @ Univ. of MN Ridder Arena, TV/Stream INFO

Sunday, March 6

WCHA Championship TBD, 1Pm CST, @ Univ. of MN Ridder Arena, TV/Stream INFO

NCAA Tournament Selection Show, 9PM EST, TV-ESPN NEWS Channel, Stream Info Coming Soon


Game results, box scores, and statistics come directly from CHN – College Hockey News, USCHO.com or the NCAA’s official stats site HERE.

Video highlight links are to individual program produced media, some of which may be found on team twitter or other social media accounts – so scroll the feed to see the game highlights.

Postgame links are any postgame video produced by individual programs and found on either team websites or social media accounts.

Don’t See a link… for video highlights or postgame? Assume there was none available at the time of our post.

D-I Top 10 Polls

Evan’s last look at his Top 10 in D-I women’s college hockey came in last week’s Pipeline Post #65. You can find it HERE.

The Pairwise & NCAA Tourney

The Pairwise

In a Jan. 8th post of the Pipeline we introduced what is known as the Pairwise rankings. ‘The PWR’ or ‘The Pairwise’ as it’s known in NCAA hockey circles, is a way to rank teams that play an unbalanced schedule based on a specific mathematical formula. We use the USCHO.com iteration of the Pairwise rankings which can be found online HERE.

Why are the Pairwise Rankings important? It is what the NCAA D-I Women’s Ice Hockey Committee will use will determine the 11-team field for the NCAA Tournament. And this year, the committee is strictly going by the math and not subjectivity. The Committee will conviene Sunday March 6th and crunch the numbers to announce the 11-teams going to the NCAA Tournament.

Contrary to what many may think, the USCHO.com top 10 poll that comes out each week or any other media poll that exists, has no bearing on who makes the NCAA tournament. Those polls are for media purposes only and not used by the D-I NCAA Women’s Ice Hockey Committee.

Making The NCAA Tournament, Auto & At-Large Bids

There are two ways to make the NCAA Tournament’s 11-team field. Receive your conference’s automatic bid by winning the conference post-season playoff championship – or – have a high enough Pairwise Ranking to fall within the top 11 teams and receive an ‘At-Large’ bid.

There are 5 D-I conferences. 4 of the 11 bids come from conference post season playoff tournament championship Auto Bids. The other 7 are ‘At-Large Bids. The NEWHA does not have an automatic bid until the 22-23 season by virtue of an NCAA rule which stipulates conferences must compete with 6 teams for two full seasons before getting an automatic bid. The NCAA determined the 20-21 COVID season did not count as a full season for the NEWHA while only 2 NEWHA teams played games.

The CHA, which was a 6 team conference until it lost member Robert Morris University when the school shut-down the program in May of 2021, is allowed to retain its auto bid for a period of two years. The CHA would lose its auto bid if it were unable to get a 6th team beginning with the 23-24 season.

After the 11-team tournament field has been selected, then the fun begins in putting together 4 regional sites. To learn more about how the selection process works and how regional sites will be determined – click here for the 2022 NCAA Pre-Championship Manual.

Below is the USCHO.com Pairwise rankings as of Wednesday March 2, 2022.

Sifters…

#8 Outlasts #1 In ECAC… For the first time in the 20-year history of the ECAC Playoff Championship Tournament, the #8 seed Princeton Tigers knocked off the #1 seed Harvard Crimson. The Tigers won game one 3-2, lost game two 2-1 in overtime, but won the third and deciding game, 3-2. #8 Princeton will play #2 Yale in the first ECAC Semifinal set for 3Pm Friday. #2 seed Yale also went the distance in its first-round quarterfinal series with #7 seed St. Lawrence.

Top 10 Patty Kaz Announced… The 10 Patty Kaz finalists were announced today by USA Hockey.

The WCHA leads the way with 6 finalists while Hockey East landed 4. No one from the ECAC, CHA, or NEWHA made the cut. Northeastern leads the way with 3 players themselves,Minnesota and Wisconsin with 2 each. Ohio St., MN-Duluth, and Vermont each have 1. Northeastern’s Aerin Frankel, last year’s Patty Kaz winner, is a finalist this year.

The Patty will be awarded on the NHL Network March 27 in a special on-air television presentation. The top-3 finalists will be announced March 17th during the Women’s Frozen Four National Championship.

Possible NCAA Recruiting Rule Changes… As the NCAA often does each year, proposals for various rule changes in a variety of areas like recruiting, financial aid, eligibility etc., are announced and then voted on in April to become legislated. The following rule proposals were just announced and will be voted on in April.

  • Amend the trigger for student-athlete status to align with the approach authorized by waivers the past two academic years in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
  • An individual would remain a prospective student-athlete until the individual signs a National Letter of Intent or the school’s written offer of admission and/or financial aid or the school receives the individual’s financial deposit in response to its offer of admission and completes all high school graduation requirements or all transfer academic eligibility requirements.
  • An individual would revert to prospective student-athlete status if the individual does not attend classes at the beginning of the first full-time regular academic term after the individual completes all high school graduation requirements or all transfer academic eligibility requirements.
  • Specify a school shall not provide more than two consecutive nights of lodging to a prospective student-athlete in conjunction with an official visit.
  • Eliminate the limitation on the number of official visits a prospective student-athlete may take.
  • Specify that in sports other than basketball, contact may not be made with a prospective student-athlete during the time of day when classes are in session at their school.

WCH Spring Recruiting Event List… Coming shortly will be our WCH Spring/Summer Recruiting Event List. We’ll keep track of all showcases, camps/clinics, and recruiting events from March until the end of August across North America & beyond we’re aware of. We’ll post a link with event names, dates, and locations along with links to info if provided. For any coaches who want their event listed, please fill out our online form and we’ll be sure to list it. You can find it HERE.

Changes to Camps & Clinics for D-I Schools… In an effort to curb early recruiting tactics by college coaches in sports other than women’s basketball, the NCAA has legislated new ‘Institutional’ camp/clinic rules which took effect in January of 2022. ‘Institutional Camps/Clinics’ are now only allowed to be conducted during the months of June, July, August and December to Feb. 1. Institutional camps/clinics are not allowed outside of that time period.

Institutional camps and clinics are defined as those 1) owned/operated by a D-I coach or the institution institution itself and 2) where participants are classified as prospective student-athletes and have entered grade 9.

This new legislation does not impact Institutional Camps/Clinics where the participants are in grade 8 & below or the ability of college coaches to work for privately owned camps/clinics.

What’s Next For Women’s Hockey… It seems like the sport has this conversation after every Olympics. One would think with over 6 million viewers world-wide for the Gold Medal game, there is a way to harness a sustainable viewing audience for our sports best during the regular hockey season. Word came this week of something in the works. Yahoo Sports’ Justin Cuthbert & Co. bat around whats needed for a viable pro league:

Until Next Time…


21-22 Streaming Info

-Streams for games in the ECAC can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in the WCHA can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams in Hockey East this year can be found HERE. Hockey East once again is streaming all game live and for FREE.

-Streams for CHA games with the exception of Penn St. can be found HERE. Subscriptions will be necessary to watch games.

-Streams for NEWHA games can be found at each teams’ website. Subscriptions may be necessary to watch games.


NCAA Coaching Changes… Keep up with all the coaching changes across D-I and D-III HERE.

Give Someone a Stick Tap… Know someone in women’s college hockey who’s work needs some recognition? Nominate them for WCH.org’s monthly ‘Stick Tap’ HERE or Email us at: womenscollegehockey@gmail.com

Recruiting Events/League Online Directory… Find all the recruiting events on WCH.org right HERE. Want to add your event? Click HERE to fill out our WCH.org event form.


Grant Kimball is founder and contributing writer at Women’s College Hockey.org and beginning his 3rd season as an Assistant Coach with the Yale University women’s hockey program. Grant has developed an experienced perspective in the world of women’s ice hockey, having coached and recruited players from across the globe during his 25+ year amatuer and NCAA coaching career. He has coached at 6 NCAA DIII and DI programs in the NCHA (D3), the CHA, WCHA, Hockey East, ECAC, and the Ivy League (DI). Beyond coaching, Grant served as a site representative for the 2019 NCAA quarterfinal of the D-I NCAA Tournament. He also currently serves as an Officer with the American Hockey Coaches Association as Vice President of Membership and sits on the AHCA’s Women’s Hockey Executive Committee.