Northern is in

The WCHA on Friday announced that it will formally approve Northern Michigan's application for membership to the league next week. Representatives of the teams left over in the WCHA after the departure of teams from the Big Ten and the new National Collegiate Hockey Conference met in St. Paul on Friday and apparently OKed the deal.

The WCHA's release reads:

The CEOs (chief executive officers) of the five member teams that will make-up the men's Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) as of the 2013-14 season are supportive of Northern Michigan University's entrance into the conference. WCHA men's membership in 2013-14 will include University of Alaska Anchorage, Bemidji State University, Michigan Technological University, Minnesota State University, Mankato, and St. Cloud State University.

Formal approval of Northern Michigan's application for membership in the WCHA will occur next week.

Northern Michigan was a WCHA member from 1984 to 1997 before going to the CCHA.

In other college hockey happenings on Friday, Minnesota State-Moorhead held a press conference expressing its intent to add Division I hockey. The school has set a goal of raising $37 million for an endowment to fund the program. University president Edna Szymanski said that 40 percent of the goal has been committed. The school hopes to make a final decision within the next three months.