http://www.centralhockeyleague.com/news ... e_id=11233" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;ECHL Accepts Seven New Members
League expands to 28 teams for 2014-15 season
CHICAGO – The ECHL announced on Tuesday that the League’s Board of Governors has approved the Membership applications of the Allen Americans, Brampton Beast, Missouri Mavericks, Quad City Mallards, Rapid City Rush, Tulsa Oilers and Wichita Thunder for admission to the ECHL.
The seven expansion teams will begin play in the ECHL this season, giving the League 28 teams in 20 states and one Canadian province for its 27th season of operation, which begins on Friday, Oct. 17 and runs through Saturday, April 11.
The applicants were approved at a special meeting of the ECHL Board of Governors in Chicago on Tuesday.
“The ECHL is very pleased to welcome these new Members to the League,” said ECHL Commissioner Brian McKenna. “These additions strengthen our base in the center of the country and give the ECHL, for the first time, a true national presence. It expands our ability to act as a development league and more closely aligns our number of teams with both the American Hockey League and the National Hockey League.
“There will be logistical challenges in the short term, however, in the long term, it is certainly in the best interest of the ECHL, the new Members and minor-league hockey in general,” McKenna added.
Updates to the 2014-15 ECHL playing schedule, divisional alignment and the format for the 2015 Kelly Cup Playoffs will be released at a later date.
http://www.sbnation.com/2014/10/7/69403 ... 4-schedule" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;It's now official: the Central Hockey League is no more, and the ECHL is taking in all of its remaining teams.
The Allen Americans, Brampton Beast, Missouri Mavericks, Quad City Mallards, Rapid City Rush, Tulsa Oilers and Wichita Thunder have all officially been admitted to the ECHL, leaving the CHL in ruins and growing the ECHL, widely regarded as North American pro hockey's top third-tier league, to 28 total teams.
The teams will join the ECHL as of the 2014-15 season, which begins in just 10 days on October 17. A new schedule from the league is expected this week.
These rumors have been swirling all offseason, and it's likely just the first step in a massive realignment of minor professional hockey in North America. There's word that the American Hockey League -- one step below the NHL -- is set to add a division on the Western half of the continent in the near future, which would presumably leave some old AHL mainstay franchises behind in lower-tier leagues and promote some western ECHL-level franchises up a level.
I'm not so much surprised that this happened, but it's how quickly it happened and that they are rewriting the schedules days before the opening of the 2014-15 ECHL season.
