CONCORD — The New Hampshire Athletic Association held its annual media day on Thursday morning with the new school year rapidly approaching. While the NHIAA didn’t roll out any new initiatives for the upcoming year, discussions were centered on reclassification and locations for state championships.

Here are three takeaways from the meeting:

The ice remains nice: The expiration of the Manchester Monarchs franchise on May 15 left New Hampshire without a professional hockey team and SNHU Arena without a main tenant.

Without the Monarchs, the arena has no reason to make ice. But on Thursday, NHIAA executive director Jeff Collins reassured media members that it still plans to play its hockey championships in Manchester this winter.

“To me, that’s an outstanding venue, and we’ll continue to play there as long as they’ll have us,” he said. “But I think, essentially, Manchester is a great spot, and we’ll continue to go there as long as there’s ice. And we’ve had some discussions with them this year knowing that the Monarchs are pulled out of there. We plan to be back there if they have ice for championships this year.”

The University of New Hampshire continues to be a reliable host for many of the NHIAA’s championships. This upcoming year, the school will host three football finals on Nov. 24. The Division IV game will be played at Laconia High School on Nov. 16.

Boys and girls soccer at the Division I and II level will be played at Southern New Hampshire University.

Classification begins: When the NHIAA hosts its annual meeting on Sept. 16, the process of reclassification will begin for the 2020-21 year. Schools all across New Hampshire must submit their grades 9-12 enrollment numbers as of Oct. 1. From there, the NHIAA classification committee will meet in November and start to look at figures from all schools to place them into divisions. A school is allowed to petition up as many divisions as it wishes but may only request to move down a single division.

Currently there are four divisions in New Hampshire, which the NHIAA plans to keep in place. For a school to qualify for Division I status, it must have 900 or more students. Pinkerton Academy’s enrollment of 3,449 students is the most in the state.

Division IV, whose members have no more than 285 students, has 24 schools participating and leads all divisions in membership.

■ Life of an Athlete: The NHIAA enters the eighth year of its Life of an Athlete program, which teaches student-athletes the importance of looking out for athletes on and off the field. The program’s main goals are to address behaviors of concern in a positive way and educate students to make healthy decisions. Life of an Athlete also acknowledges the importance of engaging coaches as a key part of the program, and how they can impact their players’ decisions.

It’s the biggest initiative every year for the association, which hosts monthly meetings at its Concord office with students who help lead Life of an Athlete programs across the state. In March 2020, the NHIAA will host the New Hampshire Student Leadership Conference at the Omni Mount Washington Resort.

Pete Nakos can be reached at pnakos@vnews.com or 603-727-3306.