In the next month and a half, everything should figure itself out regarding which officials will be working in which leagues next season. But for now, here’s a bit of info I’ve gathered:

• WCHA commish Bruce McLeod proposed a consortium of refs for the WCHA, Big Ten and NCHC — a system where all three leagues would share the same officials. The NCHC wasn’t interested, so it didn’t go much further.
• McLeod told the Bemidji Pioneer that the WCHA will be losing a number of its referees. I asked WCHA director of officials Greg Shepherd about this. He confirmed he’s expecting to lose a bunch of officials, but said he can’t definitively say which guys just yet. “They (Big 10 and NCHC) are taking my top officials, so they must not have been that bad,” he said.
• I heard that Derek Shepherd and Brad Shepherd will probably be working in one of the new leagues, but Greg was unable to confirm that at the time. He said it will probably be another month to a month and a half before everything works itself out.
• It’s possible that refs may work some games outside of their regular league, too (example, a Big Ten official occasionally working WCHA games). In the NCAA tournament, officials cannot work games involving teams in their league. But if you ref fewer than 14 games in a league, you are not considered affiliated with that league. Example: If a Big Ten ref works 10 WCHA games during the season, he can still work an NCAA tournament game involving a WCHA team.
• With the NCHC and the Big Ten taking some of the WCHA’s officials, the WCHA has looked to some CCHA refs and USHL refs to fill the voids. A lot of CCHA guys also will end up in the Big Ten (the Big Ten’s director of officials is the former director of officials in the CCHA).
• In case you didn’t see this a week or two ago, the NCHC announced its officiating system here.

UPDATE: Gopher Puck Live is reporting that both of the Shepherd’s will work in the NCHC, along with Todd Anderson and C.J. Beaurline, while Marco Hunt is going to the Big 10.

COMMENT: Not surprised that the NCHC was interested in Derek Shepherd and C.J. Beaurline, but don’t understand the addition of Todd Anderson. Let’s hope Don Adam tells him to stop yelling at players, escalating situations and causing games to last way longer than they should.

The WCHA held meetings in Bemidji on Sunday and Monday to hammer out a bunch of things.

Jack Hittinger of the Bemidji Pioneer has the details in this story here. It sounds like a TV package is unlikely for the league, but they are going to try to get some sort of Internet streaming package going.

As has been previously covered in this space, I think that would be a wonderful idea to have sort of a NHL GameCenter-type of thing that fans can access webcasts to all league games.

Of course, this presents a lot of challenges as far as the profits and the webcast quality, but, it would be a wonderful thing for the fans.

The Big Sky Conference has something like that with free webcasts on Big Sky TV.

Also of note, commish Bruce McLeod says in that story that a lot of WCHA officials have defected to the Big Ten and the NCHC. He also told Hittinger that there’s been no official decision on whether he will step down after this season.

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The CHL made a bizarre decision to start phasing in a European goalie ban in the WHL, OHL and QMJHL.

Apparently, they feel that there aren’t enough outstanding Canadian-born hockey goalies and the problem is that European goalies are developing in their leagues and taking away opportunities from Canadians.

Read more here.

Will it impact the NCAA game?

It’s hard to say, but if Canada isn’t producing enough top quality goalies, the CHL may come harder after American goalies to fill the void.

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The Stanley Cup Finals start on Wednesday and UND’s Jonathan Toews will attempt to win his second Cup.

If he’s able to do so, he will join rare company.

Since 1913, only one person has ever captained two Stanley Cup teams at age 25. The person is Wayne Gretzky.

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UND recruit Trevor Olson is taking summer classes in Grand Forks and will be around town this summer. Right now, the plan is still for him to play for Sioux City this upcoming season and come to UND in the fall of 2014.

UND announced its Hall of Fame class this year. Two former hockey players will be honored. Greg Johnson, the all-time scoring leader, will be inducted to the Hall of Fame, while Scott Sandelin will receive the Tom Clifford Award.

Johnson played 15 years in the NHL, serving as the captain of the Nashville Predators for the last four. Sandelin played in the NHL for the Canadiens, Flyers and North Stars and is currently the head coach at Duluth.

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The search is on to find an NCHC commissioner to replace Jim Scherr, who left the league to take a position with the European Games.

One candidate is believed to be Miami associate athletic director Josh Fenton. He’s in charge of business and finance there and has a background in hockey ops and with the NCAA Rules Committee.

If that’s a direction they look, it probably wouldn’t take too long for him to get up to speed on things within the league.

If I hear names of other potential candidates, I will pass them along.

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The schedule for the UND women’s hockey team has been posted here.

One thing I noticed right off the bat is that the team will have just two home games and one home series in a three-month span between Oct. 19 and Jan. 17. That will test the team early.

A rematch of the UND-Minnesota epic, triple overtime game in the NCAA quarterfinals will come to Ralph Engelstad Arena on Jan. 31 and Feb. 1. The men’s team is not playing that weekend, which could lead to a record crowd (if the team is playing well).

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New-WCHA presidents are meeting in Bemidji tomorrow and Monday to discuss the future. Jack Hittinger has a story in the Pioneer.

It will be interesting to see if Bruce McLeod makes any announcements to the presidents about his future. He told a large group of people in Florida that this upcoming year was “probably” his last, and I know people are moving forward under the assumption that he will retire after this year. But no definite announcement has been made yet.

The WCHA’s HQs will once again be on the campus of the University of Denver this season, but it’s hard to believe that will be the longterm home. If McLeod does retire after this year, you have to think the league’s board will find workspace elsewhere for the new commissioner.

McLeod told the Pioneer that there will be a formal presentation about the league’s “media package” and internet streaming rights.

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MSU-Mankato got a nice late pickup in the recruiting game with the commitment of Zach Stepan, who de-committed from Ohio State when coach Mark Osiecki was fired.

In this Mankato Free Press story, Stepan says that internet rumors that Ohio State put restrictions on his release from his letter of intent are wrong.