COLUMN: CMU fertile for Division I hockey
There is no debating the fact that the average Central Michigan student is disinterested in the school’s athletic programs.
Student attendance at football games is terribly low, and the basketball program is coming off a 3-15 conference performance. They have not been to the NCAA tournament in more than a decade either. As an avid sports fan, I would love to be able to share in a collective, university pride for an athletic program.
Unfortunately, for the foreseeable future, that will not happen.
Central Michigan is by definition a large-scale university, with around 19,634 students on-campus, more than enough to support a successful sports program. With a dismal interest level in our basketball and football programs, we should ask ourselves, what kind of program will ignite the CMU community?
This after all is Michigan, and something that would immediately jolt the student body and bring an unprecedented sense of spirit to the campus is a Division I hockey program.
The state of Michigan is disproportionately spoiled with youth, college, professional and NHL hockey. Michigan State, Michigan and Western Michigan all have established Division I hockey programs that award their hockey-crazed students the opportunity to cheer on and take pride in their universities.
Ferris State, whose enrollment is a few thousand below CMU, has the fifth-ranked team in the country.
Northern Michigan, whose enrollment is significantly lower than CMU, has a Division I program that went to the NCAA tournament in 2010.
It is completely logical to envision a CMU hockey program that could immediately succeed. The dwindling football attendance and an irrelevant basketball team leave the university with a void that students yearn to have filled.
This is a hockey mad state, just as Texas is for football and Georgia is for baseball. The average CMU student has hockey in their DNA.
Our generation has been cheering for the Red Wings before we knew what hockey was.
If CMU provided students with a hockey program, there would not be an empty seat in, let’s call it, “Chip Arena,” for at least the inaugural season.
Our state is a hockey mecca, flooded with talent that flocks from all parts of the country to play youth hockey, and pursue collegiate and professional careers.
CMU has the most sought after talent sitting in its backyard, and could all but guarantee prospective coaches and recruits a chance to be a part of something that the campus would meet with more anticipation than any other event in recent memory.
There are 59 Division I hockey programs, and Central Michigan is the perfect school to make a dedicated push to become the 60th.
