Garden To Host Hockey East Play

The Hockey East Conference college hockey tournament will join the ECAC tourney in the Boston Garden beginning next year.

No, the off-shoot Hockey East teams are not rejoining their old conference. Rather, the seven-team super-league will stage its annual post-season play-down in the Garden next year after two years at the Providence Civic Center.

Hockey East also announced a change in its play-off format for the 1987 tourney: the league's last place team during the regular season will not get a tourney bid, with the regular season champion and runner-up receiving byes to the semi-final round.

Harvard plays in the ECAC while other Boston-area schools including Boston College, Boston University, and Northeastern are in Hockey East.

The ECAC, which has used the Garden as a tourney site for the past two decades, will continue to hold its two-day tourney on Friday and Saturday (March 13 and 14 in 1987) while Hockey East will use the building's notoriously small ice surface the following two nights.

"Boston has traditionally showcased the best in hockey," Hockey East Commissioner Lou Lamoriello told the Boston Globe. "We are delighted to carry on this tradition by holding the 1987 Hockey East Championship at the Boston Garden."