With about 40 candidates reporting to Coach E. L. Bigelow 21 at the initial meeting at the Varsity Club yesterday, the University hockey season was officially launched. Conditioning work for all men except those who have been playing football will start at once and continue throughout the week. It is planned to get the squad on the ice in the Arena at the first of next week.

Coach Bigelow welcomed the candidates, and spoke briefly on the season's plans. He emphasized the fact that members of the squad this year must be more than ever before, able to play offense and defense alike, since the changes in the intercollegiate rules have curtailed the number of players of any team who may play in one game to twelve, one of whom must be a goaltender. This new clause was aimed at the policy of wholesale substitution so much in vogue among eastern colleges Coach Bigelow declared that the rule might be waived at the Harvard-Yale games, since neither university approved of its adoption.

Howard Expected Back

Captain W. P. Ellison '27 led the list of letter men who reported at yesterday's meeting. Among these was Willard Howard '27, a letter man two years ago who did not play last year because of an injury sustained in baseball. The members of last year's undefeated Freshman sextet and several stars who were ineligible last season swell the total of first-class material from which Coach Bigelow will mould the team to face a hard schedule.

The season will open on December 10 with M. I. T. facing the Crimson six at the Arena. The remainder of the list of engagements has not been decided, but there are tentative dates with several Canadian universities, including McGill, Toronto, and the University of Western Ontario. Last year a fast McGill team defeated the University 5 to 4 in six overtime periods in New York.

Two games will probably he played with Dartmouth, with the location of these doubtful. The complete schedule will be announced soon.