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Q&A with NAHL Commissioner Mark Frankenfeld

North American Hockey League (NAHL) Commissioner Mark Frankenfeld visited Minot this past Saturday to check out Maysa Arena and the top two teams in the Central Division.

Prior to the Aberdeen Wings topping the Minot Minotauros 4-3 in overtime to claim a second straight regular season divisional title, Frankenfeld sat down with Minot Daily News sports editor Alex Eisen for a conversation about the Central Division, the NAHL and the future of the league.

Below is a transcript of the 10-minute question and answer session. Parts of the conversation were shorted due to the length of the interview or edited out for clarity reasons.

Alex Eisen (AE): To start off, what brings you to Minot?

Mark Frankenfeld (MF): Well, I’m coming to visit an NAHL city. I try to get out and cycle through every city about once every 3-4 years. It’s a nice opportunity to come up here and see the new building — I haven’t seen that. Just see and be seen, and support where I can.

AE: What are your first impressions of Maysa Arena?

MF: It’s awesome. It’s not only a nice facility, it fits the North American Hockey League really well. When you look across any junior league, 2,000 to 3,000 (seating capacity) that is the number that works really well. This is about 2,300 seats with the nice chair/bar rail across the top. A couple private rooms and party rooms, it’s a perfect facility for almost any team in the North American Hockey League.

AE: Where does the Central Division stack up against the rest of the league?

MF: That’s always the question. Typically, the Central Division does a pretty good job comparatively. They heavily recruit out of the Minnesota, Dakotas areas. A lot of great hockey players in that area. So, they typically stack up pretty well.

The one thing I think is really interesting about the Central Division, compared to the other divisions, is that the playoffs are always tight. Right now it looks like the top four are kind of decided even though Bismarck (Bobcats) haven’t clinched yet. But, it’s going to be a battle for home ice. (…)

The parody and competition down the stretch really separates them from some of the other divisions.

Then you go into which division is better… You get a little bit of a read at the NAHL Top Prospects Tournament where you have divisional teams, but that is not always a true read because if there is committed players they won’t go. (…)

At the end of the day, I look back at last year’s Robertson Cup and everything that went down. It was some of the most exciting (hockey games). You didn’t want to blink in that Fairbanks (versus Minotauros elimination Game 3) because it was absolutely phenomenal. One of the best game you could ever see in the Robertson Cup.

AE: What do you see as the future of the league moving forward?

MF: Great question. What we are really focusing on right now — we have reached a level that we feel is comfortable and sustainable, as everybody seems to be in a good spot — so, what I see right now is a little bit of growth in the south. I see a little bit of growth in the northeast.

The reason is you get eight teams on the ground where they can reach each other by the bus. The south can’t get to Minot. Jamestown (N.Y.) and Johnstown (Pa.) can’t get to Minneapolis that easily. But the mid-central there are 10 teams on the ground that can cross. Then, throw the two Alaska teams, Fairbanks and Kenai (River), in the Midwest.

So, you are seeing us trying to grow a little bit. We just added the New Mexico Ice Wolves and the Maine Nordiques. (…)

We will continue to work on building our brand. Raise our minimum standards to get a better product for the players.

Right now, it’s really about pushing the number up on commitments to the NCAA and getting to the NHL.

Our owners have a lot of fun in taking a risk and hopefully being successful financially. Success at our level financially is breaking even or coming close to breaking even. There is probably not a lot of guys in junior hockey that make a heck of a lot of money. So, we rely on the local community support, local corporate support and things along those lines.

Junior hockey is really the purest form of the sport. You got these young guys who want to live their dreams and be the personal hero of their story on this team. They want to do whatever they can for the community and fans. So, you get that here and get that in all the other markets, you put it together and something exciting is going to combust out of that.

AE: Is there a max number of teams that you would like to see in the league?

MF: When you are looking at the number of teams, you are kind of playing with your player pool. There are players that go to Canada. There are players that go east or west. So, who knows exactly what your player pool is. But, what you got to do is basic work on the number of players out there and the number of teams you have.

You can’t just add six teams. So, we felt comfortable with our additions this year. We have got a lot more players coming from the northeast since the Eastern Division has been established. We looked at that growth over the next few years at the junior league level of 15-16 age category. With that data, we felt it was time to bump it up a couple (teams).

If I’m looking at a long-term, 6-8-10 years, and get to 28-32 teams that’s probably the max. The only reason I would ever think we would get past the two more I previously mentioned in the northeast and the south would be if we created a real West Coast Division that Alaska would play in.

That way you would end up with 32 (teams). Something like 10-8-8-6 (teams per division), I don’t know if that adds up, hold on… 10 plus eight equals 18 plus eight and six, yup that equals 32. I’m a math genius too [laughs].

But, that would be like…

AE: Pushing the limit?

MF: Yeah. The other thing too is we have been doing this for a while and we know all the markets. There is not a lot of surprises. It’s been fun being in the Northeast because we aren’t as familiar in that territory. We are more familiar today than we were six years ago when we started, but there are buildings and markets out there that we are learning.

Places that can participate and create a sustainable model that is in a good geographical footprint to support the west side of the east, the east side of the east, the north side of the east and the south side of the east. Places that could be good connective tissue.

But, overall, this is probably a 24-32 (team) league based on geographical footprints, sustaining the divisions and making sure we have the ability to keep the college commits up to where they are and increase them.

Alex Eisen covers Minot State athletics, the Minot Minotauros and high school sports. Follow him on Twitter @AEisen13.

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