A New Hockey Destination

I spoke about the ECHL's Tahoe expansion team the other day, and expansion is always good to see at any level of hockey. Specifically, though, when hockey expands at the women's college level in either Canada or the US, it's a good day because it gives more girls a chance to play the game at a higher level than in previous years. That's what the image to the left is all about as the University of Delaware officially announced today that it will be adding varsity women's ice hockey in 2025-26 as part of the College Hockey America conference! Having another univeristy playing at the Division-1 level means more competition and a deeper talent pool moving forward, so this is a great day for hockey in the state of Delaware, for the NCAA, and for women's hockey overall!

The University of Delaware officially becomes the 45th college or university in the US to boast a Division-1 women's ice hockey team, and the Blue Hens certainly will be aiming to make an impact in the CHA against teams like Penn State, Mercyhurst, Robert Morris, Syracuse, Lindenwood, and RIT. While a seven-team conference will mean that bye weeks will come into play for teams in the CHA, none of the teams will be complaining with a deeper conference that includes Delaware in a couple of seasons' time.

"Not only does the University of Delaware nicely fall within our geographic footprint, this institution aligns with the academic and athletic commission and the values of our member institutions that make up College Hockey America,” Michelle Morgan, CHA commissioner, said at today's press conference. "Because of this, the College Hockey board of directors unanimously voted to extend an invitation to Delaware becoming the seventh member of our league."

For those wondering about the institution, the University of Delaware is located in Newark, Delaware where it sits about an hour northeast of Baltimore and about 45 minutes southwest of Philadelphia. It's the largest university in the state of Delaware, and it offers nearly 150 bachelor's programs across a wide range of disciplines. US News ranks it as the 76th-best university of the 439 national universities in the US, and it features 22 athletic teams prior to the additions of both football and women's hockey.

That last piece of the statement above is significant because the University of Delaware made the decision to have its football program join the Football Bowl Subdivision - the highest division in US College football - so it needed to add another women's team in order to match the additional scholarships coming to football and stay Title IX compliant. Don't think that the university is doing this as a charity move, though, as the University of Delaware has been a nationally-ranked ACHA team for the last decade!

The team will play out of the Fred Rust Arena on the university campus which seats 2500 fans as an Olympic-sized rink, but Gold Arena is also on campus grounds and it is NHL-sized in terms of seating and rink size. Athletic Director Chrissi Rawak doesn't seem concerned with the few changes needed to Fred Rust Arena to house the new women's team.

"We're in a really good place, there's certainly going to be a few things like a women's locker room that we're going to need to add, coaches offices, but it is incredibly - it's insignificant, honestly - I mean money's money and I'm not denying that," Rawak said to Delaware Public Media.

You may be wondering why Delaware focused on an expensive sport like hockey when it came to adding another varsity women's team, but it seems they did their homework. The school worked with the NHL in determining the feasibility of sponsoring a Division-1 hockey program, and the results they found were quite encouraging.

"As you can imagine, the results were incredibly positive," Rawak said at today's press conference. "The geographic location is ideal. The interest in hockey in the Mid-Atlantic region continues to grow, with almost 90,000 girls registered as USA Hockey participants in 2021 and 2022, which was a 25% increase from the year before, and over 26,000 are in Delaware or neighboring states."

No matter what anyone says, the addition of the University of Delaware Blue Hens to the CHA Conference opens up 25 more spots in Division-1 women's hockey for 25 girls to play hockey with the promise of scholarships to a prestigious university in the US. You're likely going to see a handful of Canadians playing there at times, so this gives more chances for girls on both sides of the border to play high-level hockey. The Blue Hens will begin the search for a head coach for the team immediately in order to get things organized, and the recruiting process will begin one year from the first NCAA in Blue Hens history.

I wasn't aware of this fact, but the Delaware Blue Hens will be the closest Division-1 women's hockey team to the city of Philadelphia, and that has led them to partner with the Philadelphia Flyers as the first NCAA women's team to work with an NHL franchise. More details on this partnership will be announced at the February 8 NHL game between the Flyers and Winnipeg Jets which comes one day after National Girls and Women in Sports Day! How cool is that?

Congratulations to the University of Delaware for making Division-1 women's hockey a reality at the institution in 2025-26. There's still a pile of work to do before the first puck is dropped in October 2025, but getting membership into Division-1 hockey and gaining a valuable partnership with the Philadelphia Flyers are two fantastic steps that will likely be a memorable journey!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!