The football team will now be playing the likes of Michigan and Michigan State. Basketball fans can now look forward to the spectacle of the one and only Bobby Knight, with his mouth, arms and chairs a-flying.

But Penn State's move to the Big 10 Conference will have no effect on the ice hockey club.

First, there is no Big 10 in ice hockey. Michigan, Michigan State and Ohio State are members of the Central Collegiate Hockey Association (CCHA) and Minnesota and Wisconsin are part of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) of the NCAA's Division I.

Second, the Icers are a club team, and Illinois is the only other Big 10 school with a club program.

These two factors combined effectively put Penn State out in the cold. The NCAA only allows Division I teams 38 regular-season games. Of those, 32 are league games. The six remaining games are usually spent playing Division I teams from outside the CCHA and WCHA -- the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) and Hockey East, as well as the various Division I independents, Division III members and even teams from the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA).

With all this competition for scheduling, the Division I schools simply don't have room for a club team.

"As long as they're a club team, I probably wouldn't want to play them," Michigan State coach Ron Mason said. "If they were at varsity status, I'd be happy to. I don't think it's in our best interest to play club teams."

Coach Joe Battista would love to play the Division I members of the Big 10, but he knows that it isn't likely to happen -- and even if it were, the Icers would most likely be out of their league.

Division I teams are allowed 20 scholarships in hockey, and Penn State, which doesn't offer any hockey scholarships, simply cannot compete with that.

Minnesota coach Doug Woog said his team has had at least a 34-win season in each of the last 10 years. The Golden Gophers made the NCAA's Final Four four times in four years and won two WCHA championships.

But this doesn't intimidate the Icers.

"It (becoming a varsity team) would be great," freshman forward Ben Bouma said, "but I don't think it will happen while I'm here. Right now, we are a middle-of-the-road Division III team, but it would not take much to get to their (the WCHA and CCHA's) level.

"Those teams that play in that league have heavy recruiting, and they offer scholarships and such, and here, we don't," freshman forward Chris Cervellero said. "Maybe in a couple of years, if we got some scholarships and we became a varsity sport, th then we might do well . . . we'd fare well in Division III, but in Division I, against Michigan and Minnesota and all those guys, we wouldn't hold our own at all."

The only way Penn State will see any competition with the CCHA or WCHA will be as a Division I team, but L. Budd Thalman, associate athletic director for communications, doesn't see any plans in the near future.

Athletic Director Jim Tarman said a move to varsity status would have to be included in the athletic department's budget, scheduling would have to be done for the team and -- most important of all -- the athletic department must want to make the move. Right now, with the athletic department busy handling the move of currently existing varsity teams to the Big 10, any talk of an Icers' move to varsity status would be premature.

"It's unlikely we'll be adding any new varsity teams, because of financial reasons," Tarman said.

For now, the Icers will have to just hope for the best.

"Sure, we would like to see it (a move to varsity)," Battista said, "but it's in the hands of the athletic department. I hope that they would recognize the interest the sport has taken at Penn State, and I will continue to encourage them to consider the possibility."