A Boston Frozen Four In 2015?

The NCAA men's ice hockey committee is holding meetings this week as part of the NCAA's spring meetings in Indianapolis. One of the topics on the agenda is the selection of the next cycle of Frozen Four locations for 2015-2018. The final decisions won't be made until the fall as the committee is changing up the bid process, but that could be to the advantage of the city of Boston.

CHN's Adam Wodon explains:

The final decisions will not be made until November of this year, meaning that the 2015 host city will have just about 16 months to prepare. Given that, it's likely the committee will select a city that has experience with the event, such as Boston, which last hosted in 2004.

The delay in accepting new bids was caused by a change in the way the NCAA handles the process, which was finalized over the last few months.

With the Frozen Four "back east" in back-to-back-to-back years -- Philadelphia will host in 2014 -- I figured that Boston's next shot at hosting the event would be 2016 at the earliest. Now this change to the bidding process has opened up an opportunity for the Hub to keep the event in the East for the fourth consecutive year (and fifth time in seven years with the 2009 Frozen Four that does not need to be mentioned in this space).

A loophole! We can use this.

I've made it pretty clear how I feel about the Frozen Four's return to the center of the college hockey universe (Connecticut tho) and it's borderline criminal that it'll be a minimum of 11 years between visits. College hockey would also be wise to capitalize on the recent run of success the Bruins have been on over the past few years. Still, sounds like the NCAA is taking steps to right this egregious error and possibly even sooner than we expected.

College Hockey News also lists Nashville, Denver, Washington D.C. and San Jose as possible locations for the next cycle, which ... OK as a destination, one-off ... ABSOLUTELY! ... yeah, no ... see answer for Nashville, respectively. If those are the only options, I'd prefer a rotation of Boston (2015), San Jose (2016), Denver (2017) and Nashville (2018). Throw the west a bone, I guess.

With any luck, odd-numbered years (2015) will become the new even-numbered years (2008, 2010, 2012, 2014) will become the new odd-numbered years (1949, 2001) for the Eagles in time for the next Frozen Four in the Hub.