American Collegiate Hockey Association

The American Collegiate Hockey Association (ACHA) is a chartered non-profit corporation that is the national governing body of varsity and club level college ice hockey in the United States. The organization provides structure, regulations, promotes the quality of play, sponsors National Awards and National Tournaments.

The ACHA currently has three men's and two women's divisions and includes approximately 450 teams from across the United States. Teams offer few athletic scholarships and typically receive far less university funding.

The ACHA offers an opportunity for college hockey programs that struggle with large budgets and Title IX issues, as an alternative to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) financial structure. Sometimes, NCAA and ACHA teams will compete against one another.

Policies and regulation
The ACHA's primary mission is to support the growth of two-year and four-year collegiate hockey programs nationwide. The ACHA identifies standards that serve to unite and regulate teams at the collegiate level. The ACHA emphasizes academic performance, institutional sanction, eligibility criteria, and standards of play and opportunities for national competition, and the ACHA promotes all aspects of collegiate hockey stressing the personal development of individual athletes as well as national recognition for member organizations. In order to do this, the ACHA has developed organizational by-laws and a Policies and Procedures Manual to provide the policy foundation for the organization as it works to fulfill its purpose. These documents are reviewed yearly at the ACHA's annual meeting.

The ACHA's policies cover team and player eligibility, rules of play, ranking procedures, national tournament procedures, and other administrative issues, although the ACHA parallels the NCAA Division III with most eligibility requirements, recruitment processes, gameplay rules, etc. The league holds its annual meeting in conjunction with the annual convention of the American Hockey Coaches Association, in the month of April in Naples, Florida.

ACHA History
The ACHA was established on April 20, 1991. Fifteen charter members met during the Chicago Showcase in Skokie, Illinois at the North Shore Hilton. These member teams had been playing college hockey for many years but wished to legitimize its play by standardizing some of its procedures.

The members that created the organization were: Tom Keegan (ACHA), Al Murdoch (Iowa State), Joe Battista (Penn State), Jim Gilmore (Ohio), Ernie Ferrari (Stanford), Howard Jenks (California-Berkeley), Jeff Aikens (North Dakota State), Don Spencer (West Virginia), Jim Barry (Navy), Scott Fuller (Navy), Leo Golembiewski (Arizona), Ron Starr (DePaul), Cary Adams (PCHA), Jim Warden (PCHA), and Jack White (UCLA).

The inaugural year of the ACHA was the 1991–1992 season. The goal of the organization was to create an impartial governing body to monitor national tournaments, player eligibility, and general oversight. Over the years the ACHA quickly grew to over 150 teams in three men's divisions.

A Women's Division was added in 2000 with a second Women's division being added for the 2006–2007 season.

By the 2001–2002 season, marking their 10th anniversary, the ACHA had a total of 179 teams registered with 33 teams in Division 1, 100 teams in Division 2, 18 teams in Division 3, and 20 teams in the Women's Division.

By the 2002–2003 season that number raised to over 250 teams, with Division 3 adding over 80 teams alone.

By the 2003–2004 season the number raised to 278 teams: 40 teams in D-1, 124 teams in D-2, 87 teams in D-3, and 27 teams in the Women's Division.

By the summer of 2007 ACHA membership had reached 360 teams (M1-54, M2-190, M3-139, W1-32, W2-8), that cover 48 of the 50 states.

During the summer of 2009 the University of Alaska Fairbanks established a Women's Division 2 team becoming the 49th state in the ACHA. Hawaii is currently the only state without an ACHA team.

Every year since 2003, the Men's Division 1 Showcase has been an event that features some of the top teams in the ACHA.

ACHA partners with Fasthockey.com to broadcast many of the league's games.

In 2017, the ACHA adopted a new hosting format for holding the annual National Championship Tournament for all Men's & Women's Divisions. Then ACHA Executive Director Michael Walley championed an idea to hold all of the ACHA's National Championship Tournaments in 1 major U.S. city, in partnership with that city's National Hockey League team. The inaugural year saw the 2017 ACHA National Championship Tournament Festival held in Columbus, Ohio, in partnership with the NHL's Columbus Blue Jackets. Then ACHA Executive Director Michael Walley assumed the role of Tournament Director for the inaugural tournament. In July 2017, after undergoing a nationwide search, Russ Slagle was selected by the ACHA's Board of Directors and appointed to fill the vacant staff position of ACHA National Tournament Director.

Membership


The ACHA includes both Men's and Women's Divisions. The Men's side is made up of three Divisions: 1, 2, and 3. Division 3 was the last to be established in 1999. Each division has its own distinguishing set of guidelines which are explained below. The Women's side has two divisions. Division 1 began in 2000 and Division 2 is the most recent addition to the ACHA with its inception in 2006.

Despite most teams non-varsity status, the caliber of ACHA play can be quite high, especially in Division 1. Many large universities that do not sponsor hockey at the NCAA varsity level have become powerhouses, such as Ohio University, Adrian College, and Lindewood University. Additionally, several universities that do sponsor NCAA varsity hockey teams also field an ACHA-affiliated teams. Of all non-varsity sports activities, the ACHA-affiliated hockey teams generally garner the most attention at their universities, such as Missouri State where it is the third largest spectator sport. The same can be said for the Arizona and University of Georgia who draws the third largest fan base behind football and basketball.

All ACHA teams are members of USA Hockey and the American Hockey Coaches Association (AHCA).

Men's Divisions
ACHA Men's Division 1 comprises 57 teams. Some of these teams also compete against NCAA Hockey D1 and D3 Schools throughout the pre-season in informal exhibition games. There are seven conferences along with Independent teams that compete annually for the Murdoch Cup, which is awarded to the Men's ACHA Division 1 National Champion. Twenty teams compete in the National Tournament. These top-twenty teams are ranked/selected by way of computer rankings, and as determined by auto-berths from the seven regular-season Conference champions. At Nationals, teams ranked 1–12 all receive first-round byes, with teams ranked 13–20 matching up 20 vs 13 (etc.), for the rights to play in the second-round in pre-determined bracket slots. Since 2012, two teams (Penn State and Arizona State) have moved from ACHA to NCAA Division I.

Conferences ACHA Men's Division 2 is currently the largest division in the ACHA, it includes approximately 200 teams in 12 conferences and Independents. These teams are divided into four Regions (Central, Northeast, Southeast and West). A total of 16 teams qualify for the National Tournament, four from each region. Each month of the season a ranking of the top 15 teams in region is released. After the final ranking in February the top two seeds from each region earn an automatic berth into Nationals. Seeds 3–10 compete in their respective single-elimination Regional Tournaments, with the two teams who win both of their games also earning a Nationals berth. The National Tournament is a pool play format with the winners of each pool advancing to the semifinals. The semifinal match-ups are the winner of Pool A vs. Pool C and Pool B vs. Pool D.
 * Central States Collegiate Hockey League (CSCHL)
 * College Hockey Mid-America (CHMA)
 * Eastern Collegiate Hockey Association (ECHA)
 * Eastern States Collegiate Hockey League (ESCHL)
 * Great Lakes Collegiate Hockey League (GLCHL)
 * Northeast Collegiate Hockey League (NECHL)
 * Western Collegiate Hockey League (WCHL)

Conferences ACHA Men's Division 3 consists of approximately 140 teams in ten conferences and Independents. These teams are also divided into four Regions (Atlantic, North, Pacific and South). A total of 16 teams qualify for the National Tournament in the same manner as Division 2. The National Tournament has also been conducted in the same manner as Division 2 since 2010. Before that it was single elimination and every team played four games. The one exception is the semifinals match-ups. The winner of Pool A plays the winner of Pool B and the winner of Pool C plays the winner of Pool D.
 * Atlantic Coast Collegiate Hockey League (ACCHL)
 * Colonial States College Hockey Conference (CSCHC) (The Colonial)
 * Mid-American Collegiate Hockey Association (MACHA)
 * Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Hockey Association (MACH)
 * Mountain West Collegiate Hockey League (MWCHL)
 * Northeast Collegiate Hockey Association (NECHA)
 * Northern Collegiate Hockey League (NCHL)
 * Pacific 8 Intercollegiate Hockey Conference (PAC-8)
 * Pacific Collegiate Hockey Association (PCHA)
 * Super East Collegiate Hockey League (SECHL)
 * Texas Collegiate Hockey Conference (TCHC)
 * Tri-State Collegiate Hockey League (TSCHL)
 * Upstate New York Club Hockey League (UNYCHL)
 * Western Collegiate Club Hockey Association (WCCHA)
 * West Coast Hockey Conference (WCHC)

Conferences
 * Blue Ridge Hockey Conference (BRHC)
 * College Hockey East (CHE)
 * Delaware Valley Collegiate Hockey Conference (DVCHC)
 * Empire Collegiate Hockey Conference (ECHC)
 * Indiana Collegiate Hockey Conference (ICHC)
 * Metropolitan Collegiate Hockey Conference (MCHC) (Contains Non-ACHA members)
 * Michigan Collegiate Hockey Conference (MCHC)
 * Mid-American Collegiate Hockey Association (MACHA)
 * Northeast Collegiate Hockey Association (NECHA)
 * South Eastern Collegiate Hockey Conference (SECHC)
 * Southern Collegiate Hockey Conference (SCHC)

Women's Divisions
ACHA Women's Division 1 includes 23 teams for the 2016–17 season, with all but independents Liberty and McKendree playing in one of the three WD1 conferences. Eight teams qualify for the national tournament each season: automatic bids are awarded to the playoff champions of the Central Collegiate Women's Hockey Association and the Western Women's Collegiate Hockey League, with the remainder of the field determined by taking the highest-placing teams from the last of a series of weekly rankings (the rankings are calculated through a computer component and the consolidated opinion of the WD1 competition committee, with each weighted 50 percent). At nationals, the eight teams are paired off by ranking (1 vs. 8, 2 vs. 7, etc.) for a best-of-three first round, with the winners of those series advancing to the semifinals.

Conferences
 * Central Collegiate Women's Hockey Association (CCWHA)
 * Eastern Collegiate Women's Hockey League (ECWHL)
 * Western Women's Collegiate Hockey League (WWCHL)

ACHA Women's Division 2 includes 41 teams for the 2016–17 season, with 27 standing as a member of one of four conferences. All teams are sorted into either the East Region (22 teams) or the West Region (19 teams). At the end of the year, the top six teams from each region in the final edition of a quarterly ranking (calculated similarly to the WD1 rankings, with an exception being that each region has its own competition committee) are invited to the ACHA National Tournament. The WD2 tournament differs from WD1 in that teams are divided into pools and play a round robin to determine the semifinalists.

East Region Conferences
 * College Hockey East (CHE)
 * Delaware Valley Collegiate Hockey Conference (DVCHC)
 * Independent Women's Collegiate Hockey League (IWCHL)

West Region Conference
 * Central Collegiate Women's Hockey Association (CCWHA)
 * Note: The CCWHA includes both a Division 1 and a Division 2 conference, with separate groups of teams as members

International competition
Players are selected from only ACHA Men's D1 to represent USA Hockey in the Winter World University Games, an IIHF and FISU event. ACHA Men's D2 and D3 division created the Select Teams to offer opportunities for the other Men division's to experience International hockey and they are ACHA events. The Division 2 & Division 3 Selects Teams alternate going over to Europe each year during the Holiday Break to play European teams. The players are chosen from a round robin tournament in the spring usually in Pennsylvania. The tournament pits each conference's elite players against each other.

Logos
The original ACHA logo was created by Dave Kammerdeiner of the West Virginia University Art Department under the direction of Don Spencer for a cost of $50.

In August 2003, the ACHA held an official contest to design a new logo, with the winning school receiving free registration for the 2003–2004 season. The University of Washington's Husky Hockey team won the contest, with former graphic-design intern Tom Eykemans designing the new version of the logo (as shown above).

Zoë M. Harris Award winners
The Zoë M. Harris Award is given to the player of the year in each ACHA women's division.