1996 ECAC Tournament

The 1996 ECAC Tournament took place between March 5, 1996 and March 16, 1996 for the Men's Division I league and between March X, 1996 and March XX, 1996 for the Women's Division I league.

Conference Standings
Note: GP = Games Played; W = Wins; L = Losses; T = Ties; PTS = Points; GF = Goals For; GA = Goals Against

Tournament
The regular season champions were the Vermont Catamounts. Vermont was awarded an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament through their regular season championship.

The seeds for the men's tournament were:


 * 1. Vermont
 * 2. Clarkson
 * 3. St. Lawrence
 * 4. Cornell
 * 5. Colgate
 * 6. Harvard
 * 7. Brown
 * 8. Rensselaer
 * 9. Dartmouth
 * 10. Princeton

Union and Yale did not qualify for the tournament.

Preliminary Round
The preliminary round was played on March 5 among the 7-10 seeds at the site of the higher seed. The winner of each game advanced to the Quarterfinal Round.

Quarterfinal Round
The Quarterfinal Round was held March 7-9 at the site of the higher seeds. The first team to accrue 3 points advanced to the Final Four.

ECAC Final Four
The ECAC Championships took place March 15-16 at 1980 Olympic Arena in Lake Placid, New York. The games were single-elimination.

On March 15th, the remaining four teams took part in the semifinal round.

The semifinal losers, Vermont and Clarkson, played in the consolation game on March 16th.

Rivals Cornell and Harvard met in the ECAC Championship game. The Big Red of Cornell won their record eighth ECAC championship. Cornell goaltender Jason Elliott was named the tournament's Most Oustanding Player. Cornell was awarded the ECAC's second automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Clarkson, Cornell, and Vermont would go on to represent the ECAC in the NCAA Tournament.