A recent Instagram post saying it was time for the NCAA to put the Women’s Frozen Four in NHL arenas received more than 2,000 likes and was shared by a number of DI coaches. Citing a large crowd for the Women’s Beanpot and the fact that the men’s Frozen Four is played in NHL arenas, it said changes need to be made.
If the women’s tournament is going to move to a larger venue, the move needs to be done in a way that ensures it is successful. The NCAA needs to spend more time and money on signage, advertising and promotion and make the Women’s Frozen Four a destination event, with surrounding programming that draws fans regardless of whether their team is playing or not.
There are plenty of things the NCAA can, should and said they would be doing to make the Women’s Frozen Four the marquee event it would need to be to sell enough tickets to fill a large venue.
It has been more than three years since the Kaplan External Gender Equity Review Report detailed the many disparities in how the NCAA supports and promotes men’s and women’s sports. I wrote about some of the findings back in 2021. The full report can be found here.
Several things have improved in women’s ice hockey since the Kaplan report and most happened within a few months of the report’s publishing, including expanding the tournament and rosters, putting the selection show on TV and removing the flight limitations from tournament selection criteria.
However, the report also listed some specific spending disparities relating to promotion of the Men’s and Women’s Frozen Four as well as staffing disparities that I think are super relevant when talking about moving the Women’s Frozen Four to a larger venue.
In ice hockey, some of the specific disparities included:
- “spending $65,000 more on signage for the men than the women”
- “spending about $193,000 each year on promotional expenses related to the men’s tournament, compared to only $11,000 a year for the women’s”
- “In Division I ice hockey, for example, there are 11 NCAA staff members who contribute to the men’s tournament, including three Championships staff, a media coordinator, and seven External Operations staff members. The women’s tournament, however, has only two Championships staff members assisting with it.”
Since the report is four years old, I reached out to the NCAA and asked, specifically, if there had been any changes to the above numbers (The bulleted list above is copied directly from my email).
My email said:
“I’m hoping to find out if there has been any movement or change in regards to some of the gaps found between men’s and women’s hockey. I’m aware of changes to the number of teams in the tournament, the roster size and the removal of limiting travel costs, among other changes. Could you let me know if there have been changes…?”
This is the reply I received from the NCAA:
“Since the Kaplan Report that you referenced, the National Collegiate Women’s Hockey Championship increased squad sizes from 24 to 27 to match Division I men’s ice hockey squad size, beginning with the 2022 championship. There have also been subsequent budget increases made in the areas of team travel, per diem, awards/mementos and officials’ fees.
The bracket size was also increased from 8 to 11 teams, beginning with the 2022 championship.
The women’s ice hockey championship budget has also been increased for game presentation and in-venue enhancements, videoboard content enhancements, and signage enhancements at both preliminary and Women’s Frozen Four sites.
Staffing for the women’s ice championships has been increased to include seven staff members since the 2021 Kaplan Report was published, with additional staff members available on an as needed basis.”
Instead of answering my specific questions about spending, they rehashed items I not only hadn’t asked about, but had expressed being familiar with. It’s great to hear that the staff has increased, but overall, the response is disheartening and doesn’t leave me feeling like a Women’s Frozen Four in a larger venue would have any chance to be successful.
It should be noted that the NCAA requests and assesses bids for hosting the Women’s Frozen Four in two-year cycles. The host is not assigned – teams that are interested in hosting submit an application. The Men’s Frozen Four that are hosted at NHL Arenas and in cities that aren’t home to an NCAA DI program are still “hosted” by a member institution. That school put together a proposal on why that site is a good choice and how they will ensure a smooth and successful tournament, even as a “remote” host and that school provides all tournament-week, on-site staffing. The University of Vermont is the host school for the 2025 Men’s FF in St. Louis. The University of North Dakota is the host school for the 2026 Men’s FF in Las Vegas.
I’ve been to every Women’s Frozen Four since 2015. There is rarely, if ever, any signage within the host city or campus advertising the event. Yes, the arenas themselves have signage, but since arenas require space to have been constructed, signage on the building itself doesn’t do much to actually advertise the event to a greater community. In recent years, the hotels where teams stay often have had logos on the entrance doors. That’s it.
The 2024 Women’s FF was at the University of New Hampshire in Durham. That’s 11 miles from Portsmouth, where a lot of attendees stayed as well as socialized. Walking around Portsmouth or going into restaurants with friends decked out in jerseys, we garnered a lot of attention, but no one we talked to was aware the event was happening. They were bemused by the sudden influx of people wearing Clarkson, Colgate, Ohio State and Wisconsin gear, but had no idea why we were there.
One has to look no further than the NCAA homepages for the Men’s Frozen Four and Women’s Frozen Four to see the disparity in how the event is presented.
Not only are there links upon links for various add-ons, experiences and information for the men’s tournament, but a pop up invites you to sign up for a mailing list for NCAA men’s hockey and offers ticket packages priced at $800 and $1000.
The Women’s Frozen Four page directs you to a University of Minnesota site to buy tickets or back to the Women’s Ice Hockey homepage.
For those unfamiliar, the Men’s FF is attended by fans from across the country, regardless of whether their team advances that far. Attendees play a version of bingo to track jerseys from different college teams they spot over the course of the weekend. They buy their tickets as soon as they go on sale, meet up with friends and use the Men’s Frozen Four as a celebration of a love of hockey. It’s a destination event.
The Women’s FF could not be further from this. The games don’t sell out. The crowd is usually noticeably thinner for the Championship when two team’s fans have gone home. The best thing that’s happened to the Women’s FF experience was USA Hockey moving the presentation of the Patty Kazmaier Award from a private, paid brunch on the Saturday between the semifinals and finals to a free, public event starting at the 2023 Tournament. The day usually includes youth clinics and an autograph signing, but is still a far cry from a full Fan Fest-style event.
Beyond advocating for the Women’s FF to be played in NHL stadiums, the social media post also derided the future sites of the event that have been awarded by the NCAA as too remote and difficult to get to. The Women’s FF will be hosted by Penn State at Pegula Arena in State College, PA in 2026 and by the University of Minnesota Duluth at Amsoil Arena in Duluth, MN in 2027.
I understand the poster’s point and I don’t think they’re meaning to pick on either city in particular. And I have to agree on Penn State. They hosted the 2022 Women’s FF and I can’t deny that it was not easy to get to and thanks to a bunch of youth sports events happening in the area at the same time and University Park/State College being quite small, hotel rooms were tough to come by. The event itself was well run and the arena is gorgeous, but I can’t in good conscience contend that overall it’s a good host location.
What I will say is that the Women’s Frozen Four has been held at a number of arguably more accessible places, from big cities like Minneapolis and the St. Louis suburbs to places like Quinnipiac and New Hampshire that are a short bus, train or car ride away from either Boston or New York. Before last season, none of those sites had drawn more than 3,600 fans.
The best attended Women’s championship game was held in Duluth in 2003, when 5,167 people attended. In fact, three of the six highest attended women’s title games were in Duluth. The attendance in 2023 was 3,940, the highest total of any championship game since the last time they hosted in 2008.
The 2024 title game at UNH had 4,378 fans – the highest attendance since 2006. It gives me hope that things are improving, but at the moment it’s a lone data point and it would be a hard sell to the NCAA to move to bigger venues when crowds have not sold out the arenas currently being used.
I want women’s hockey to grow. I especially want women’s college hockey to grow. If a move to bigger venues were to happen, it would need to be done correctly so that the players and the sport aren’t set up to fail.
North Americans women’s hockey fans are great and they’ve proven themselves through Rivalry Series and PHWL crowds time and again the past few years, but it shouldn’t be on the fans to ensure the sport gets propped up and it’s not fair to put the onus on them.
The leap from campus sites to an NHL arena might not feel like such a lofty goal if the NCAA did a better job of promoting and marketing the Women’s Frozen Four.
