Growing the NCRHA (in outlying regions)

[kevinsmithAZ]

Just stumbled upon this video of the University of Idaho's (?!) Intramural Roller Hockey. Hockey may not be great but the facility looks sick.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yn163i09BCA&feature=player_embedded

Also have seen articles written on Utah State University playing intramurals or something similar. How do we grow the league to these places that may not have otherwise heard of it (or roller hockey in general?)

[GoRangrHky]

It's a difficult proposition sometimes without actually knowing anyone at the school. In some cases, how do you get a school that is going to have to travel 10+ hours to play to even want to join?

In other cases, there's schools right under our nose that we could maybe get to play- for example, http://rollerhockey.union.rpi.edu/forum/ RPI is right down the road from Albany, 2 hours away from Glastonbury, CT, where the ECRHA just had a weekend. http://www.corsairathletics.com/intramurals/hockey.html

Some schools may have something http://wellness.und.edu/recsports/intramurals_brochure.pdf http://www.wfu.edu/campusrec/facilities.php but it's tough to tell.

In some cases, it's the small local area leagues that are in a way keeping the teams from potentially growing, but at the same time are allowing teams that might not exist otherwise to participate. The PCRHL and Western PA league are prime examples of that. Someone like Grove City College might not be able to succeed at the travel/ NCRHA level. But a school like Duquesne (who has been in and successful in the ECRHA) might just be content with staying small time- it's less work, less travel, etc.

I guess in some cases, there's spots where teams can exist just by playing at one or two rinks against a lot of local competition. This is the case in Philadelphia, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, and could be in New York. Believe me, nothing annoys us more than driving 2 1/2 hours away to another state to play two schools that drove past several rinks and our campus to get there themselves. But that model doesn't work for schools like Vermont or K-State who are hours and hours away from everyone.

I think the best idea is to get in touch with these schools, and offer for them to come down and play for a weekend. Schedule them against a variety of level of teams- let them see what the competition is like. Give some feedback to them as well as to their school. That's really the best we can do. Until we can have people go to the campus and meet with club sports directors, students, student government leaders, that's really the best I think we're capable of doing.