Comcast-Spectacor Chairman Ed Snider has declared “this will be the final year of the Spectrum.” Comcast-Spectacor, the Philadelphia-based sports and entertainment firm which owns the arena, will close the 42-year-old Spectrum at the conclusion of the upcoming 2008-09 hockey and soccer seasons.
“This has been one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make,” said Snider. “The Spectrum is my baby. It’s one of the greatest things that has ever happened to me, but after a lot of thinking and discussions, we all feel it is in our best interest to close the Spectrum at the conclusion of the upcoming 2008-09 Philadelphia Phantoms and Kixx seasons.”
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The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth's men’s ice hockey team, which has been involved with a league run by the Eastern College Athletic Conference since the program’s inception, will leave the ECAC Northeast after the 2008-09 season and join a new conference.
The Massachusetts State College Athletic Conference has announced it will sponsor a new NCAA Division III conference after the 2008-09 season, pulling teams from the New England Small Colleges Athletic Conference, the ECAC Northeast and the ECAC East.
The conference, to be known as the Little East Conference, will include five members of the MASCAC as well as UMass Dartmouth and Plymouth State. Fitchburg State, Framingham State, and Worcester State will also leave the ECAC Northeast for the new MASCAC league, Salem State will leave the ECAC East, and Westfield State will join the league after adding hockey this season and competing in the ECAC Northeast. The MASCAC sponsored men’s ice hockey for 32 years, between 1971 and 2003.
With Westfield State reinstating its program following a 20-year hiatus, the MASCAC now has five member institutions sponsoring men’s ice hockey, and per conference bylaws, ice hockey will now become a MASCAC-recognized sport.
“We are excited to announce the addition of men’s ice hockey as a MASCAC-sponsored sport,” MASCAC Commissioner Angela Baumann said in a statement released by the MASCAC office. “UMass Dartmouth and Plymouth State University will be welcomed additions to our conference. We look forward to the opportunities this new league will provide to our member institutions and men’s ice hockey student-athletes.”
According to the MASCAC release, following a mandatory two-year waiting period, the MASCAC will be sanctioned by the NCAA and receive an automatic qualifier into the NCAA Division III Championships beginning in 2011-12.
Compiled from UMass-Dartmouth press release.
