Small School / Large School Breakdown

The New England Prep School Ice Hockey Association (NEPSIHA) Boys Hockey Playoffs each season are broken down into 3 categories; Elite 8 which are the top 8 teams in prep hockey and then the Large School Tournament and the Small School Tournament. This was enacted to allow for more teams to make the playoffs and eliminate the division 1 and division 2 breakdowns so all games count the same. It has been a successful and well received change and this season the NEPSIHA Girls Hockey is adopting the same concept.

With that being said the determination of Large School and Small School is based entirely on the population of male students at the school. There are 54 NEPSIHA teams so the largest 27 schools in male enrollment are Large School and the lowest 27 schools are Small School. One common misconception is that the Large School Programs, because of their size, are better than the Small School but history doesn’t bare that out, in fact the previous two champions were KUA which is one of the smaller schools in NEPSIHA.

Below is a breakdown of what schools this year are Large School and Small School qualifiers.

Large School Small School

Photo Credit: Dan Hickling/Hickling Images