Eastern Teams Fail to Draw Crowds

DETROIT, Mich.--Chances are, the Harvard men's hockey team won't be invited back to the Great Lakes Invitational anytime soon.

Not because the team lost both of its contests this year, however. The reasoning has less to do with hockey and more with business.

"We have found that the eastern teams really haven't drawn [fans] well," Director of Tournament Rick Yeo explained.

"For the last 13 years, the Detroit holiday tournament has been hosted jointly by Michigan State, Michigan Tech and the University of Michigan.

Each year, the host teams invite a Division I hockey team to play in the tournament with them. The tournament officials, selecting three years in advance, try to invite a team that will be both competitive, and, just as importantly, able to draw fans.

The Michigan teams have discovered that eastern squads can only fulfill one of those requirements.

The tournament has had no trouble finding quality opponents from the eastern ranks, but it has had trouble filling seats when they play.

Harvard was invited in 1989 after the team won the NCAA championship that year.

"Harvard isn't a flash in the pan. We want a team with history," Yeo said.

While Harvard may have brought history to the Motor City, it did not bring fans. Attendance, like last year when Maine competed, was not close to years past when western clubs were invited. (About 17000 fans showed up each night for the games).

"Maine was one of the top teams in the country, and we still didn't draw very well [last year]," Yeo said.

The attendance numbers decide the financial fate of the tournament, so the tournament directors have decided to heed them. Organizers have kept their recent invitations confined to western squads, hosting Northern Michigan next year and Notre Dame the following year.

It is harder to attract western teams, according to Yeo, because of the formation of two more holiday tournaments by western hockey schools.

Minnesota and Wisconsin now hold their own hockey festivals over the winter break. As a result, the pool of teams available for invitations to the GLI is smaller.

Still. when it is possible, Yeo said the tournament will go west--rather than east--in search of opponents.