CHN Staff Report
The Big Ten has formally decided to change its postseason playoff format so that it spans two weeks instead of three. The conference made the official announcement today. The change is effective immediately.
College Hockey News reported recently that this change was likely, and in March, had implored the Big Ten to do so.
Instead of a best-of-3 quarterfinal series, the 2-7 seeds will play single-game quarterfinals on the Wednesday after the end of the regular season. That will be followed by a single-game semifinal the following Saturday, and the championship game a week later.
The change helps alleviate situations where a high seed is upset in the quarterfinals, then has to wait almost three weeks for its NCAA Tournament game. As it is, with the top four teams likely to all make the NCAAs, even without upsets, two teams have to sit approximately 10 days between games.
To account for having a Wednesday playoff game, the regular season will end the Friday prior, rather than the typical Saturday.
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