Last week, the Eastern College Athletic Conference announced that Union and Clarkson will be joining its Division I league over the next two years. This will bring the membership in that league up to 11 teams: Brown, Colgate, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Princeton, St. Lawrence, Vermont, and Yale, plus the two new teams.
Hockey fans will immediately recognize that roster as being identical to the ECAC’s men’s Division I hockey lineup, with one notable exception: RPI.
In the near future, the Institute will need to promote one of its women’s athletic teams to Division I status. I believe we should make the move that the other ECAC schools have made and select the women’s hockey team.
The biggest reason to move women’s hockey to D-I is synergy with the men’s team. From a pragmatic standpoint, it is much easier to maintain one D-I facility than two, and almost all of the infrastructure is already in place because of the men’s team.
Another consideration is the fan base—hockey is the most popular sport on campus, and women’s hockey is rapidly gaining ground among the general public as well.
Finally, there is the competition; hockey fans should have no problem getting into the game when the opponent is, say, Clarkson or Union. On the other hand, other women’s sports at these same schools are Division III; promoting our team in one of these sports would mean that those matchups would no longer take place.
In my opinion, though many of our women’s sports would do well at a higher level of competition, the hockey team would have the best chance for success. Let’s make it happen and give the fans even more to cheer about.
