a fifth was briefly a CCHA member. The new CCHA, which recognizes the original CCHA as part of its history, started play in 2021–22. Women's ice hockey Women's ice hockey was almost completely unaffected by the numerous realignments involving the men's teams. Although the Big Ten then (as now) had six full members with varsity men's hockey (Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Ohio State, Penn State, Wisconsin), only four of those schools sponsor varsity women's hockey (the two Michigan schools have never sponsored the sport). As of 2022–23, no other Big Ten school has added the sport, leaving the conference two short of the number of teams needed to officially sponsor women's ice hockey and receive an automatic bid to the NCAA women's hockey championship. In addition, the original CCHA never sponsored women's hockey in its history, and in fact had only one member school with a varsity women's team (Ohio State, a departing member whose women's team was and still is in the WCHA). The only change to the women's conference setup was in College Hockey America, which only sponsors women's hockey. CHA lost Niagara (which dropped the sport completely) and added Penn State, Lindenwood and RIT. Softball The realignment cycle had a significant effect on softball, leading to the demise of the single-sport Pacific Coast Softball Conference (PCSC) after the 2013 season. The conference, founded in 2002 with six members, had doubled in size to 12 in 2008. However, it lost all of its membership in two waves, each corresponding with the expansion of an all-sports conference which allowed that league to sponsor softball. The first wave was due to Big Sky expansion. At the start of the realignment cycle, five Big Sky members sponsored softball—one fewer than the six required to qualify for an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. All five (Idaho State, Northern Colorado, Portland State, Sacramento State, and Weber State) had their softball programs in the PCSC. When North Dakota and Southern Utah, both of which sponsor softball, accepted invitations to join the Big Sky, that conference announced that it would begin softball competition in the 2013 season (2012–13 academic year). This led the five Big Sky members to withdraw from the PCSC after the 2012 season. The PCSC lost a sixth member when Seattle joined the WAC for all sports. In the meantime, the BYU softball program entered a state of flux. Since it