WORCESTER — Unlike the Sistine Chapel, the Radisson Plaza Hotel and Suites in Kalamazoo, Michigan, is a smoke-free zone.

Which means that Cliff Rucker will find out on Friday if his application to have Worcester join the ECHL in 2017-18 has been accepted in a more conventional way than the white puffs that tell the world there is a new pope.

He will find out when the league board of governors open a meeting room door and invite him in.

“You go in, you make your presentation, you take questions, you wait outside, they vote,” is how Rucker understands the process. “If you’re approved, you come back in and you finish the meeting as a voting member, if you’re not approved, it’s a long ride home from Kalamazoo.”

Lately, Rucker has been in the city constantly and has meetings scheduled through 3 p.m. Wednesday. He will fly to Kalamazoo that night and meet informally with the executive Board of Governors on Thursday, then make his final pitch the next day.

While the ECHL has been cooperative, informative and supportive of his bid to land an expansion franchise, Rucker said, he heads to Michigan with no guarantee he will come home with a franchise.

“Nobody has told me, ‘Hey Cliff — don’t worry.' "

So, he is a little worried.

“I’m not fundamentally a nervous guy, but yes, I’m getting a bit nervous about the whole thing and have to take a lot of deep breaths,” Rucker said. “I’m nervous for two reasons — historically, as an entrepreneur I haven’t been accountable to too many people and if I’ve succeeded or failed, I’ve done so for myself.

“I would feel if I didn’t get this, I’ve failed the city of Worcester and that would be devastating to me. I think that’s what making me nervous. There is more at stake than just my money and, historically, that’s the only thing that’s ever been at stake for me.”

The ECHL currently has 28 teams and has capped its membership at 30 to coincide with the makeup of both the National Hockey League and American Hockey League. Rucker is not aware of any other applications to join the ECHL that might be voted on Friday but said that does not mean there are not any others.

“It’s blind, like a job interview,” he said. “You don’t know who else is applying.”

While Rucker has interviewed potential employees, he will make the trip to Kalamzoo on his own.

“I’ve been pretty much an army of one for quite some time now,” he said.

Rucker needs a three-quarters vote, 21 of the 28 franchises, to become an ECHL member. He’d really like the vote to be unanimous, but that would take some quick politicking since he has only seen one ECHL game in person and met one management group, the people who own the Orlando Solar Bears.

Since the news first broke that Rucker was interested in placing an ECHL team at the DCU Center he has been busy making contacts in the city, negotiating a lease with the arena and drumming up support in the business community.

Rucker has five children. He and his wife spent Sunday walking around downtown and liked what they saw.

“My family is off the charts excited about this,” Rucker said. “We’re scouting for living accommodations in Worcester. My wife is supportive and excited and my kids are fired up. They’re all into it.”

Rucker will know one way or another on Friday, but once the decision is made he is planning on a news blackout as much as is possible.

“I’m on the agenda,” he said, “and it will probably be a six-hour meeting, and I don’t know where I fall on the agenda. If I’m approved, the ECHL will not issue a press release at my request, and I will not comment.”

If Worcester is in, Rucker will hold a press conference here to announce it on Monday. Scheduling that press conference will mean that his hopes of owning a professional hockey team did not go up in smoke.

—Contact Bill Ballou at william.ballou@telegram.com. Follow him on Twitter @BillBallouTG.