PSU captain Colin Tracy and his teammates will look to slow down Cortland in first round NCAA action on Saturday (Photo by PSU Athletics)
After winning their fifth MASCAC championship in a row, Plymouth State now seeks an elusive first win in the NCAA tournament hosting a red-hot Cortland squad that recently upset Geneseo and Plattsburgh on their way to their first ever SUNYAC title. The Panthers will host the first-round game against the Red Dragons in what should be a terrific battle between two highly skilled teams.
“Yeah, we will be ready for sure, said PSU head coach Craig Russell. “It will be a good test because they are playing really well right now, but this is what we have been waiting for. I like our group a lot and think we have a lot of depth in key areas for this time of the year. Now we just have to go out and prove it.”
The Panthers who are playing in their seventh NCAA tournament are led by MASCAC Player of the Year, Will Redick (26G – 29A – 55 Pts; +34) and Connor Tait (16G – 19A – 35Pts; +27) who are a dynamic duo on the ice and especially productive on the power play. A deep group of forwards (nine with more than 20 points) and defensemen contribute to strong 200-foot game in front of the MASCAC Defensive Player of the Year, goaltender Kalle Andersson (23GP – 1.75GAA – .934SP – 2SO) who already has twenty wins on the season.
Cortland enters their first NCAA tournament having defeated two nationally ranked teams on the road to win their first-ever SUNYAC title from the No. 4 seed in the tournament. The Red Dragons are led upfront by Nate Berke (15G – 20A – 35 Pts; +16), Colby Seitz (12G – 17A – 29 Pts; +17) and Domenic Settimo (8G – 20A -28 Pts; +14) along with “Mr. Overtime”, Anthony Bernardo (10G – 9A – 19 Pts; +10) who scored the decisive goals in beating Geneseo and Plattsburgh. Cortland is big, fast and physical and has relied on terrific goaltending from senior jack Riedell (14GP – 2.07 GAA – .938 SP – 1SO) who has been stellar in Cortland’s recent run of success.
“Yeah, I think we may struggle with their combination of size and speed a little bit in the early stages,” noted Russell. “We haven’t played against a fast team in a while. I know we are fast too, but we will just have to make decisions quicker. If we play simply and within our structure, we will be fine.”
Plymouth State and Cortland have not played each other since the 2008-09 season but both come into Saturday looking for a win and chance to advance and face Utica in the NCAA quarterfinal round.
Plymouth State hosts the game at Hanaway Rink in Plymouth, NH at 7 PM on Saturday, March 9.
Elmira’s Nicholas Domitrovic hopes to be celebrating a national tournament victory when they host Endicott on Saturday night in first round action (Photo by Elmira Athletics)
After losing in the semifinals of the NEHC tournament, Elmira benefited from their strong regular season and competitive schedule to earn one of the four at-large bids to the national tournament. Their reward was being able to host a first round game against the two-time defending champions from the CCC, Endicott. Despite having not played in a span that will be almost two full weeks, the Soaring Eagles are eager for the challenge against a team that gained invaluable experience on the way to last year’s Frozen Four.
“We started out great, had a bit of a lull and really struggled coming out of the semester break,” noted head coach Aaron Saul. “We had some big wins and play in a very tough conference, so we are pleased to be here and have the opportunity to play in front of our fans who really want some more hockey this season. I think we are rested and ready to go against a team that obviously knows what it takes to move on in this tournament with their success last year in hosting the Frozen Four.”
Elmira (19-7-1) finished with a 9-2-1 record on home ice with their only two losses coming to Hobart and Skidmore late in the season. Upfront the Soaring Eagles have a deep group of forwards led by Shawn Kennedy (13G – 23A – 36 Pts; +17), Nicholas Domitrovic (17G – 18A – 35 Pts; +24) and Janis Vizbelis (16G – 16A – 32 Pts; +15) who can be explosive in all situations but flourish in 5-on-5 hockey. The team has depth and balance and sophomore Kyle Curtin (22GP – 2.42GAA – .930SP – 2SO) has emerged as the man in the crease whom the Soaring Eagles have great confidence.
“I like our four lines and their ability to create pressure and chances,” said Saul. “Kyle probably got more starts than we had planned due to some injuries among our other two goalies, but he has taken control of the crease and gives us a chance to win every game.”
Endicott earned their NCAA bid by winning the CCC with a 2-1 win over Salve Regina on Saturday. The Gulls are led by the CCC Player of the Year, Andrew Kurapov (11G – 20A – 31 Pts; +13) who netted the game-winning goal against the Seahawks in the championship game. Senior Jackson Sterrett (15G – 12A – 27 Pts; +7) adds size and clutch scoring for the Gulls who pressure the puck everywhere and take advantage of the stellar goaltending tandem of Ryan Wilson (12GP – 1.88GAA – .935SP) and Atticus Kelly (15GP – 1.86GAA – .942SP) in returning to the NCAA tournament with hopes of advancing to the title game this year.
“Endicott has been her before,” said Saul. “We are very pleased that they are the team to travel, and we get a home game in front of our great fans. It should be a great game and exciting with everything on the line in a win-or-go-home scenario.”
This is the 19th appearance for Elmira in the NCAA tournament and their first since the 2021-22 season while Endicott is making their fourth appearance having reached last season’s Frozen Four where they lost in the semifinals to eventual champion, Hobart.
The Soaring Eagles and Gulls will be playing their first-round game at the Murray Athletic Center (Ice Arena) on Saturday, March 9 at 7 PM.
Veteran college hockey writer Neil Koepke joins hosts Jim Connelly and Ed Trefzger to talk about Michigan State and the Big Ten, including a look at this year’s Spartans and a capsule analsyis of the rest of this college hockey conference.
This episode is sponsored by the NCAA Division I Men’s Frozen Four, April 11 and 13 in St. Paul, Minnesota. Visit ncaa.com/mfrozenfour
Nils Wallstrom has been sharp in net this season for AIC (photo: AIC Athletics).
For the past several weeks, it’s been a “next man up” mentality for American International, which has seen a crippling rash of injuries over the final month of the regular season.
Key players including Alfred Lindberg (22 points), Brian Kramer (20 points), Alexander Malinowski (20 points), and John Lundy (19 points) all suffered what are likely to be season-ending injuries in a two-week span in late January and early February. That’s four of the Yellow Jackets’ top seven scorers. Other players are out indefinitely, and more are working through injuries.
“It’s been a challenge, losing so many players”, said AIC coach Eric Lang. “We carry a large roster, and if we didn’t, there were a couple of games that I’m not sure we would have been able to put a team on the ice. If we had 27 or 28 guys (on the roster), that would have been challenging.”
The Yellow Jackets went through a 1-5 stretch after the rash of injuries, but have righted the ship in recent weeks, ending the regular season on a 2-0-3 run, good enough for fifth place and a first-round playoff bye.
“At one point, we were going with 10 or 11 players who had zero points,” said Lang. “Against Army, I think that they had over 100 (combined) points more than our team did, so we had to accelerate our development.”
AIC has used 34 players in the lineup to date, but one constant has been freshman netminder Nils Wallstrom (2.42 GAA, .912 save percentage) supplemented by senior Alexandros Aslanidis (3.77 GAA, .868 save percentage).
Losing so much skill and experience has changed Lang’s approach.
“We’ve had to reinvent ourselves, defending and on our forecheck,” he said. “In the past, we felt like we could beat you 5-4. But that’s changed due to the amount of scoring we’re missing.”
But it’s been paying off over the final weekends of the season and heading into a showdown with Air Force.
“I’ve consistently told our guys how proud I am of our resiliency,” said Lang. “It’s been next man up, go for 45 seconds, and then the next guy in. There’s been a learning curve, but we’ve started to believe that we can take care of the puck, limit odd-man rushes, and be physical to hang around and pull out a good result.”
“We’re ready to take this reinvented version of AIC hockey into the playoffs.”
Looking ahead to the quarterfinals
This weekend will see the playoff field winnowed down to four as the three survivors from the first round join the top five seeds, which had byes last weekend.
These are best of three series.
No. 11 Robert Morris at No. 1 Rochester Institute of Technology
The Colonials pulled off the only upset of the first round with a 4-3 overtime win at Bentley. The Falcons erased a 3-1 RMU lead with a pair of third-period goals, but Cameron Garvey converted a Bentley turnover with 10 seconds left in overtime. Three of Garvey’s 11 goals have come against Bentley.
RIT captured its sixth AHA regular season crown this year and is seeking its fourth postseason title, the last coming in 2016. That was also the last time the schools met in the postseason, in the 2016 championship game won by the Tigers, 7-4.
RIT swept all four meetings between the schools this season.
No. 8 Canisius at No. 2 Holy Cross
Canisius advanced with a 5-2 win over Mercyhurst in the first round, while Holy Cross enjoyed a bye.
This series will be a rematch of last season’s Atlantic Hockey championship game when Canisius prevailed on home ice, 3-0.
This time, Holy Cross looks to have the advantage as the series’ No. 2 overall seed and host.
However, Canisius was the better team in head-to-head play this season, taking four of six points from the Crusaders.
No. 7 Niagara at No. 3 Sacred Heart
Niagara defeated Army West Point, 4-1 to advance in the first round.
Sacred Heart, which earned a first-round bye, comes into the series on a
0-3-1 skid, while Niagara is 3-1 in its last four games.
This is a rematch of a quarterfinal series from last season when Niagara pulled off a 2-1 upset series win. That was the first-ever postseason meeting between the schools.
The teams split their only meetings in the regular season back in October.
No. 5 American International at No. 4 Air Force
Both teams had a first-round bye and had an extra week to prepare for this series, which features two of the winningest programs in conference history. They’ve combined to win 10 playoff titles, including five of the last six.
They last met in the postseason in 2022 in the Atlantic Hockey championship game in Utica, NY. AIC prevailed in that one, 7-0.
The teams split their lone conference series this season.
Awards season
It’s almost that time of the year when the league hands out awards and announces its all-league and all-rookie teams. We’ll be handing out our kudos as well over our final three columns of the season.
Let’s start with the rookies. Here are our picks:
F: Matteo Giampa, Canisius
F: Tanner Klimpke, Robert Morris
F: Matthew Wilde, RIT
D: Mac Gadowsky, Army West Point
D: Trent Sambrook, Mercyhurst
G: Nils Wallstrom, AIC
Check back next time for our picks for all-conference teams.
Steve Wiedler signed a four-year contract extension with Vermont and had the interim tag removed from his title last month (photo: Vermont Athletics).
To compare the sports world to the regular world is always fraught, but one thing is similar — everybody wants job security, whether you work in a factory or coach a Division I men’s college hockey team.
Vermont’s Steve Wiedler entered the season with an uncertain future, being named interim coach of the Catamounts just weeks before the season began, following the dismissal of three-year coach Todd Woodcroft. Wiedler now has the security he was searching for, as the university dropped the interim tag in late February and signed Wiedler to a four-year contract extension.
“It felt like every game was Game 7,” Wiedler said in an interview with USCHO.com. “But inside that, there were things that I learned.”
Although he had plenty of coaching experience (four seasons as an assistant at American International (Atlantic Hockey), one as AIC associate head coach, and two years as an assistant with the Catamounts), Wiedler was forced to learn on the go as a head coach. He leaned heavily on the mentorship of those with whom he previously worked closely.
“The guys in my past that I’ve worked for had definitely helped set me up for success,” Wiedler said. “(They) taught me a lot of things and provided some good pressure to develop, but also taught me a whole bunch of different things in terms of what it means to be a coach and a leader.”
Not only was Wiedler thrust into the head coaching position with little time to prepare, he was also tasked with turning around a Catamounts program that finished dead last in Hockey East the previous season. So far, Vermont has posted a 13-16-3 overall record (7-12-3 Hockey East) and enters the final weekend fighting for home-ice advantage in the first round of the upcoming conference tourney.
The Catamounts are in the midst of their winningest season since 2018-19 when they went 12-19-3.
Adding to Wiedler’s task this season was the weight of the interim tag. Wiedler said he confronted the stress of uncertainty head on.
“If I would have hid from the stress, that would’ve been a bad thing,” he said. “If I would have faked my way through that stress, I think it would have been unhealthy, masking things. It was stressful.”
UVM will be at Connecticut on Friday and Boston University Saturday. The Hockey East tournament — single elimination and every team qualifies — starts March 13. Last year, the Catamounts pulled off a first-round upset at Maine.
Wiedler said he and his assistant coaches have worked to instill a value system that centers around player responsibility and pride in the program, all the way down to the “VCat” logo.
“It’s their program, not mine,” Wiedler said. “It’s the players’ program and they have to have accountability to each other. They really are the guardians of the culture. I’ll set the standard, we’ll set the standard as the coaching staff. But it’s got to be player driven.”
In their first games after Wiedler was extended, the Catamounts had a rough go at Boston College — the No. 1 team in both the Hockey East standings and the USCHO.com D-I men’s poll — losing 7-1 and 4-2. But the season has been full of highlights, including wins over then No. 9 Maine, then-No. 17 New Hampshire and a pair of wins over UMass, when they were ranked 14th and 10th.
“There are nine million nuanced things to being a hockey coach,” Wiedler said. “To make decisions when you don’t have the security of your future and to come out on the other side of it, I think it reaffirms that doing things the right way is usually the way to go.”
Ty Gallagher has been a steady force on the BU back end this season (photo: Kyle Prudhomme).
Welcome back to Bracketology.
If you’re ever heard the term of going down a rabbit’s hole, that’s what I am facing this week. I began putting my brackets together and thought I had a perfect bracket together that would maximize attendance and keep top seeds local.
And then I hit a roadblock.
I won’t even get into that roadblock, but I can tell you I was so deep in the rabbit’s hole, I had to find my way out and start over.
This week, UMass has moved to 12th in the PairWise, which moved the Minutemen to a No. 3 seed and avoids conflicts with Hockey East’s two No. 1 seeds – Boston College and Boston University.
But to say this week is easy is hyperbole. That said, let’s get to it.
I’ve decided to take an old-school approach and, instead of seeding the bracket from 1 through 16 first, I’m going to place the top seeds as close to home as possible and then add in the host teams.
Thus, we have:
Providence Regional
1. Boston College
2.
3.
4.
Springfield, Mass. Regional
1. Boston University
2.
3. Massachusetts (regional host)
4.
Sioux Falls, S.D. Regional
1. North Dakota
2.
3.
4.
Maryland Heights, Mo. Regional
1. Denver
2.
3.
4.
UMass has to go to Springfield, but as the 12th overall seed, they don’t belong in the same bracket as 2nd overall Boston University, so the “bracket integrity” we often reference is already gone.
Let’s plug in the second, third and fourth seeds as appropriately as we can, maintaining the 1 vs. 16, 2 vs. 15, etc., as much as possible.
Providence Regional
1. Boston College
2. Quinnipiac
3. Maine
4. Bemidji State (or CCHA champion)
Springfield, Mass. Regional
1. Boston University
2. Minnesota
3. Massachusetts (regional host)
4. RIT (or AHA champion)
Sioux Falls, S.D. Regional
1. North Dakota
2. Wisconsin
3. Colorado College
4. St. Cloud State
Maryland Heights, Mo. Regional
1. Denver
2. Michigan State
3. Providence
4. Michigan
We immediately have one first-round conference matchup – North Dakota vs. St. Cloud. This requires a switch. You don’t want to move North Dakota from Sioux Falls, so you have to switch St. Cloud. The Huskies cannot switch with Michigan as that would create a Denver vs. St. Cloud first round. So the closest No. 4 seed is RIT.
Providence Regional
1. Boston College
2. Quinnipiac
3. Maine
4. Bemidji State (or CCHA champion)
Springfield, Mass. Regional
1. Boston University
2. Minnesota
3. Massachusetts (regional host)
4. St. Cloud State
Sioux Falls, S.D. Regional
1. North Dakota
2. Wisconsin
3. Colorado College
4. RIT (or AHA champion)
Maryland Heights, Mo. Regional
1. Denver
2. Michigan State
3. Providence
4. Michigan
Technically, this bracket works and satisfies all requirements. But would I make further changes? There are two to consider.
First, I’d love to get Wisconsin to Maryland Heights, which is a community known for its love of the Badgers. Though there aren’t a ton of tickets to be sold for this region in a small building, I’d still love to see it backed with Badgers fans.
The other is to bring Providence back to its home city, even though the Friars aren’t the hosts (Brown is host).
Let’s deal with Wisconsin first. Swapping the Badgers and a conference opponent, Michigan State, only changes things by one seed (they are the No. 6 and No. 5 overall seeds, respectfully). I don’t have a problem with this.
Providence Regional
1. Boston College
2. Quinnipiac
3. Maine
4. Bemidji State (or CCHA champion)
Springfield, Mass. Regional
1. Boston University
2. Minnesota
3. Massachusetts (regional host)
4. St. Cloud State
Sioux Falls, S.D. Regional
1. North Dakota
2. Michigan State
3. Colorado College
4. RIT (or AHA champion)
As for getting Providence closer to home, I’m not very sympathetic for this. You would have to swap Maine and Providence, and realistically the Maine fanbase is probably more supportive than Providence’s and likely brings the same number of fans to the regional. Thus, I’m not going to make this switch right now. If, say, this was switching Providence for Colorado College and moving the Tigers to Maryland Heights and the Friars back to their home city, I’d do that in a heartbeat.
However, I’m happy leaving the brackets as they are, despite the number of rabbit holes I may have dug this week.
Thus, the final bracket is:
Providence Regional
1. Boston College
2. Quinnipiac
3. Maine
4. Bemidji State (or CCHA champion)
Springfield, Mass. Regional
1. Boston University
2. Minnesota
3. Massachusetts (regional host)
4. St. Cloud State
Sioux Falls, S.D. Regional
1. North Dakota
2. Michigan State
3. Colorado College
4. RIT (or AHA champion)
The North Dakota defense was on full display last weekend against Western Michigan (photo: Russell Hons).
Third-ranked North Dakota’s 3-0 home win Saturday over No. 12 Western Michigan saw the Fighting Hawks capture their fourth Penrose Cup title in five years, as the NCHC’s regular-season champion.
That kind of regular success always looks a little bit different from one year to the next, and this season has been no exception. Seven freshmen and seven transfers make up a hefty chunk of UND’s roster, and to hear Hawks coach Brad Berry say it, his returning players were more important to their program’s 21st conference crown than outsiders might know.
“Our leadership has included showing those 14 players what our culture is about, what our expectations are here and what our standards are each and every day that you walk into the Ralph (Engelstad Arena),” Berry said. “That comes from continuity of returning players passing all that onto the new faces in our lineup.
“This year’s team found a way to find some chemistry early. It was a situation where they got together in the summer and trained together in off-ice workouts and got to meld together as a team to get close, and that transferred over into when they got here in late August to start our academic year, and then into our games in October. It comes from good leadership in the locker room, and we’ve got very skilled players here who have accepted their roles on the team. It’s a situation where the players have really driven the bus this year.”
Berry also pointed to UND’s play this season at the back end of the ice. Senior goaltender Ludvig Persson has been good, posting a .908 save percentage and continuing to be the reliable option that he had been prior to this season for Miami, but the defense in front of him has been another reason why UND (24-8-2) has six more wins than it did at the end of last season.
“We have very high-skilled players and we have players who play and compete hard, and we call it heart skill. Those guys have had an opportunity to showcase their talent through the air, but the other part for me is that I feel we’ve been strong in goal this year,” Berry said. “Having Ludvig come in here was a big deal for us.
“Last year, our play away from the puck and our goals-against wasn’t great, and it led to us falling short of where we needed to go. It’s been very consistent and strong for us this year in goal, and it has given us a chance, and our guys have played very well without the puck, as far as a lot better defensively in front of our goaltender. That’s the biggest difference for us this year.”
UND finishes its regular-season slate this weekend on the road against Omaha, where the Hawks had to claw out of a one-game hole to win in three last March in the first round of the NCHC playoffs. The Mavericks currently find themselves fifth in the conference but could jump into the top half just in time with good results against UND, and if fourth-place Colorado College struggles in its home-and-home series against Denver.
“Omaha’s going to be a hard-working team, and they’re going to play with a lot of energy this week, because they’re playing for a lot,” Berry said. “They’re playing for moving up in the PairWise (Rankings) to get into the national tournament, and there’s still a home-ice spot available for the playoffs.
“They’re going to be playing for a lot, but so are we. We want to stay as a No. 1 seed for regionals, and we want to move up from where we are in the PairWise, and we want to keep moving forward here with the momentum that we’ve got.”
Beni Halasz was in net for Northern Michigan’s two wins last weekend against Bowling Green (photo: Northern Michigan Athletics).
As those who have followed the conference currently known as the CCHA for the past decade know, things in this conference are rarely easy.
Even though Minnesota State had previously won six consecutive MacNaughton Cups, the path to the MacNaughton is rarely easy. Championships are usually won by a few points here and a few points there. It typically follows that any team can beat any team on a given weekend.
Last weekend’s regular-season finale was the epitome of this. Going into the final two games of the season, two teams were still alive for the MacNaughton Cup, and six teams had the possibility of finishing in home ice slots.
In the end, Bemidji State ended up winning the MacNaughton by nine points, while second place and seventh place were separated by just five points.
But–as most coaches will tell you–it’s a new season now. Previous records don’t matter. Every team has the chance to win four games and make a run to win the Mason Cup.
Take it from Bemidji State coach Tom Serratore, whose top-seeded Beavers, coming off their first MacNaughton Cup championship since 2017, will host eighth-seeded Ferris State in the first round of the CCHA’s Mason Cup playoffs.
“The first round of the playoffs is always stressful for everybody,” Serratore said. “They’re tight games, and typically there’s always many games in one. You just have to keep an even keel. Now we’re at the point where it’s win or go home.”
Win or go home is right, especially considering that this season, nobody in the CCHA is going to be an at-large NCAA tournament team. The team who wins the Mason Cup is moving on to the national tournament (aside from St. Thomas, who is ineligible for the tournament as they transition to Division I…. but we’ll discuss that more in-depth if it happens).
For reference, here’s a list of the first-round matchups, with the teams’ final conference record and total league points in parenthesis:
1. Bemidji State (15-7-2, 48 points) vs. 8. Ferris State (6-17-1,19 points)
2. St. Thomas (12-11-1, 39 points) vs. 7. Lake Superior State (11-12-1, 34 points)
3. Michigan Tech (12-10-2, 39 points) vs. 6. Bowling Green (11-12-1, 35 points)
4. Minnesota State (12-10-2, 38 points) vs. 5. Northern Michigan (10-10-4, 36 points)
That’s a lot of matchups between teams who could have been on the other side of the home-ice cut line if a single result had gone their way. In such a tightly-contested league, every coach is expecting a battle in their quarterfinal round.
Take, for example, Bemidji’s matchup with Ferris. On paper this looks like the easiest to predict. However, there’s more than meets the eye: The Bulldogs beat the Beavers once in Big Rapids and forced overtime in one of their games in Bemidji. All four matchups between them were in doubt until the final buzzer.
“I don’t look at anything, what place they’re in, their PairWise, anything,” Serratore said. “If you start looking at that kind of stuff, your mind will start playing tricks on you. All I can tell you is that we’re 2-1-1 against them this year. They beat us (in Big Rapids), we went to an overtime game when we were here, and they’ve all been tight games. They beat us in the playoffs here before. Really, it doesn’t matter. Any matchups in college hockey, every game is going to be a nailbiter.”
St. Thomas head coach Rico Blasi pointed out that his team’s matchup with Lake Superior State could have gone the other way.
“This is a really good hockey team. They play hard, they’re really well structured. They really took it to us the second night here…. There’s a lot of good things that they do, and they’re a really good hockey team,” Blasi said in his media conference on Monday. The Tommies and the Lakers split their lone two-game series in Mendota Heights in November. “Second to seventh place, it could easily be flipped right now, and we could just as easily be going to Lake State, so this is a big time challenge and a step for our program.”
The Tommies, in their third year after moving up from Division III, have taken great strides since their inaugural season and had a chance to win the MacNaughton before injuries started to pile up in the second half of the season.
“As I look at the regular season overall, with the adversity that we’ve had since January 1, not having a full lineup, we’ve lost I think 150 man games,” Blasi said. “I’m really proud of how we finished the regular season. But now we’ve got a new season and all bets are off.”
The Tommies finished tied for second along with Michigan Tech, who was the team most picked to win the CCHA at the start of the season. Tech also had to deal with some injuries and adversity throughout the year but played their way into a home ice spot in the final six games of the season, taking 12 of 18 points.
“When I look at the whole grand scheme of things, we were picked to win the league, and we finished tied for second, with a pretty good finish. In our last three weeks we played teams that were all ahead of us. I give our guys a ton of credit.,” Tech head coach Joe Shawhan said in his media session this week. “There were a lot of expectations, and I like that. I like those expectations, but when all is said and done my message to the group was that you had a really good run of consistent hockey to end the year.
“We went through the top of the league in the last three weeks, all of them playing their game, on a roll, playing for a championship. we were really the only team that was fighting from the outside… We were five points out of a home ice playoff berth. Two games out with four games left, and we ended up finishing second place. I look at all the positives. It’s the end game we’re after. The journey helped us grow, and to get where we are right now, I like where we’re at (going into the playoffs).”
The final playoff series is a rematch of last season’s CCHA Mason Cup championship game, which was hosted by Minnesota State. This time, the Wildcats are heading back to Mankato a few weeks earlier, but NMU head coach Grant Potulny said that wasn’t the first thing on his team’s mind.
“Things work out the way they’re supposed to work out, and it worked out that we’re supposed to play Mankato in the first round this year,” Potulny said. “There’s no rhyme or reason to it, they finished four we finished five and you’ve got to go win two games on the road, which is no easy task. If you’re thinking about last year, it’s not going to do you any good for this year.”
Cortland’s 15-4-0 and making a comeback after their slow start to the season (Darl Zehr Photography)
The 2024 D-III Women’s NCAA Tournament is upon us, here we are with our game picks as Myself, Tim Costello, & Brian Lester make our Round One picks!
2024 Women’s D-III NCAA Tournament Bracket (Graphic by Scott Huston, Contributor – @DIIIHockeyNews)
#8 Hamilton (15-6-6) vs. #10 Nazareth (22-6-1)
Brian Lester
The Continentals fell short of a conference championship, but the good news is they have new life in the tournament. They haven’t played their best down the stretch, winning just two of their last six, but two of those games ended in a tie. Another was a one-goal loss.
When these two teams played in the regular season, Nazareth prevailed 2-1 in overtime, something the Continentals have played in 12 times this season.
For the Golden Flyers, this is their third consecutive trip to the tourney and they are coming off their third conference title in a row. Interestingly enough, this is also the third year in a row these two teams have met in the tournament. Keep in mind, Nazareth has won 15 consecutive games and is impressive on the road, going 9-1-1, and it hasn’t given up more than a goal in any game during its streak. We’re going with the upset as Nazareth avenges last year’s 3-1 loss. – Nazareth, 3-2
Tim Costello
The Golden Flyers have had a great season and face a Hamilton team that lost the NESCAC championship game after knocking off the top seed, Amherst. Sage rink will be buzzing and All-NESCAC defensive player Sami Quackenbush will make sure her team moves to action for the weekend. Close game goes to the Continentals – Hamilton, 3-2
Chris Sugar
Nazareth is one of the youngest teams in D-III, they’ve had an excellent season under Head Coach Chris Baudo once again. Winner of this game visits Adrian, it’ll be a great game. I like Nazareth to take this one, I think they make the next step this season. Hamilton performed great in their NESCAC quarterfinal game vs Trinity who upset many teams this season, but ultimately, I like Nazareth on the road. – Nazareth 3-2 OT
#6 Middlebury (16-6-4) vs. Western New England (17-7-3)
Brian Lester
Middlebury just won its 12th conference title over the weekend. Now, it takes aim at an NCAA tourney run. Don’t bet against the Panthers. After all, they do have goalie Sophia Will on their side. She recorded a total of 50 saves in wins over Colby and Hamilton and missed on just one save out of 77 attempts in the conference tourney.
And here’s the other thing. Middlebury has a winning tradition. It won a national title in 2022 and has won five titles in all.
That kind of history can be intimidating for a team making its first ever trip to the tourney, which is what Western New England is doing in just its third year as a varsity sport. The Golden Bears is 1-3 against nationally ranked opponents this year and is led by Rieley Jessie-Gerelli, who has recorded five shutouts in goals. Look for Middlebury to move on. – Middlebury, 4-0
Tim Costello
The Golden Bears hit the road to face a Middlebury team that has found its game over the last four weeks and having surrendered just one goal in the NESCAC tournament. Home ice does matter at this time of year and so does experience where coach Bill Mandigo has taken teams on tournament runs. WNEU stays close but the Panthers close it out – Middlebury, 2-0
Chris Sugar
This game between Middlebury and Western New England is one where I say let’s go Golden Bears, give it a great fight and maybe shock the world, but I can’t see Bill Mandigo’s Panthers losing this one. Middlebury was great in-conference, decent out-of-conference, and will be interesting to see how they fare vs Plattsburgh in the quarterfinals. The Panthers fared very well during conference-play this season, allowing very few goals including only one during the NESCAC tournament, WNE will need to play the game of their life if they want to win this one and visit the Cardinals. – Middlebury 4-1
#7 Cortland (20-5-2) vs. #14 Elmira (20-7-1)
Brian Lester
Cortland is riding high after stunning Plattsburgh for the conference title 2-1 in overtime and has 20 wins on the year, tying for the most in program history. The Red Dragons are also headed to the dance for the first time, which only adds to an already memorable season. Goalie Molly Goergen was the MVP of the tourney and Dany Donegan is just hit the 100-point milestone.
Elmira split with Cortland in the regular season, winning 3-0 and losing 2-1. That loss was on the road. The Soaring Eagles are in the tourney for the 36th time and they are 21-14 there, earning a championship game spot seven times. Erika Goleniak leads the team with 14 goals and 17 assists. Tradition and history tells you Elmira is the favorite. But I’m going to say the magic continues for Cortland. – Cortland, 2-1
Tim Costello
Sometimes it isn’t about the pedigree it is the roll teams get on in March that makes the difference. Hard to argue the long and prominent history of the Elmira program but Cortland just feels different having knocked off Plattsburgh for the SUNYAC title. That kind of win can take you a long way – Cortland, 4-2
Chris Sugar
Cortland and Elmira are intriguing, both teams finding themselves into the tournament when it wasn’t necessarily expected. Elmira hadn’t fared well vs Norwich but avoided them in the NEHC’s when USM defeated the Cadets, Cortland defeated Plattsburgh who hadn’t lost a league title since 2011. Elmira’s goaltending has been on a rotation and the team has hit a few bumps in the road this season. I think Cortland with home-ice takes this one, Red Dragons seem to really have it this year. – Cortland 3-1
The NCAA National Collegiate women’s hockey tournament bracket will be unveiled on Sunday, and Nicole Haase (@NicoleHaase) and Todd Milewski (@ToddMilewski) have a look at the conference tournament games that will happen before then. Jeremy Gibson, chair of the NCAA Women’s Ice Hockey Championship Committee and athletic director at Merrimack, joins the show to discuss how the group makes its decisions and what latitude it has with teams and seeds.
Union topped Cornell 3-2 last Friday night in Ithaca, N.Y. (photo: Lexi Woodcock/Cornell Athletics).
The wild ECAC Hockey season that featured more parity than any recent memory ended this past weekend, which means the road to Lake Placid, the Whitelaw Cup and the NCAA tournament kicks off for real this week with single-elimination first round games.
After a week in which virtually every spot aside from first-place Quinnipiac remained up for grabs, here’s the final result:
1. Quinnipiac
2. Cornell
3. Colgate
4. Dartmouth
5. Clarkson
6. Union
7. St. Lawrence
8. Harvard
9. Princeton
10. Yale
11. Brown
12. Rensselaer
Unlike last year, when three teams tied for the final two home slots, the only tiebreaker required came in the race for ninth place, where Princeton and Yale broke a tie for 25 points with the Tigers’ two-game season sweep. That means the 2024 ECAC Tournament looks a little something like this:
First Round: Single Elimination
Friday, March 8
No. 9 Princeton at No. 8 Harvard: 7 p.m. (Bright-Landry Hockey Center, Cambridge, Mass.)
No. 10 Yale at No. 7 St. Lawrence: 7 p.m. (Appleton Arena, Canton, N.Y.)
Saturday, March 9
No. 11 Brown at No. 6 Union: 4 p.m. (Messa Rink, Schenectady, N.Y.)
No. 12 RPI at No. 5 Clarkson: 7 p.m. (Cheel Arena, Potsdam, N.Y.)
Quarterfinal Round: Best-of-Three Series
Friday-Saturday, March 15-16 (If Necessary: Sunday, March 17)
No. 5 Clarkson or best-remaining seed at No. 4 Dartmouth
Second-highest remaining seed at No. 3 Colgate
Second-lowest remaining seed at No. 2 Cornell
No. 12 RPI or lowest-remaining seed at No. 1 Quinnipiac
Championship Weekend: Single Elimination
Friday-Saturday, March 22-23
Semifinal 1: March 22, 4 p.m.
Semifinal 2: March 22, 7 p.m.
ECAC Championship: March 23, 7 p.m.
How bad did I get it?
I’m doing things a little bit differently this year and borrowing some formatting from Atlantic Hockey colleague and mentor/writing sibling Chris Lerch by introducing a look at how badly I got my preseason predictions. I actually went through things on Sunday night and didn’t think I did bad, but a couple of really big misses are going to stick out:
Quick thoughts:
-I’m pretty sure Quinnipiac could drop internal votes from the voices in my head and still finish first.
-Cornell gave the Bobcats a good run for their money at the end of the season, but a good hockey team finished a couple of hairpoints behind. I’d personally love to see what the Big Red could do with the same number of games.
-I’m notoriously low on the format, but Reid Cashman and Dartmouth cashed big time checks by taking seven different games to the shootout. They also won three of them with an extra fourth overtime win, which means a team with the same number of wins as Union or St. Lawrence gained its first bye in nine years with the same number of losses as Cornell, one of the least-defeated teams in the nation.
-I specifically said Harvard walked a balance beam heading into the season, but the well-documented struggles from the first half of the season cost the Crimson a shot at a first round bye. That they’re playing at home for the first round is a credit to their resilience across the final two months.
-A changeover in head coach didn’t stop Colgate from reaching a first round bye for the first time since 2014-2015.
Previewing the First Round
RPI at Clarkson
RPI’s game at Clarkson took place in November, but the Engineers’ win at Cheel Arena was the last Golden Knights’ Friday night loss at home. They had dropped the two previous Fridays to single games against Penn State and Lake Superior State, but RPI’s entry marked a turning point for a team that finished the year by only losing three other games in its own building.
If there’s a key to this game, it’s what happens if and when RPI specifically takes a penalty. Clarkson’s power play was 51st in the nation at just under 16 percent, but the Engineers paired a team that absorbed a top-20 PIM rate with a penalty kill that ranked last in Division I as one of two teams under 70 percent. That said, removing the 40-plus power play goals by opponents drops the Engineers from 4.1 goals per game allowed to a 2.76 goals against average, meaning Clarkson could have its hands full if the game stays five-on-five.
Brown at Union
Brown’s last-day shootout win over Harvard saved the Bears from a second consecutive trip to the North Country by instead sending them to a place where they previously earned a 3-2 overtime victory. Somewhat surprisingly, it was their first overtime win since a 2022 first round series game against St. Lawrence, but it helped pave a road that ended with a second straight 11th place finish while the Garnet Chargers fell out of first round bye contention only after splitting their final two weekends.
Straight from the fun fact department, this is just the second time the two teams will ever cross paths with one another in a postseason game, but their only other meeting was notable for the fourth-seeded Dutchmen’s win over the seventh-seeded Bears in the 2013 ECAC Championship at Atlantic City’s Boardwalk Hall. That the teams are in this position is a bit of a surprise after Brown gained significant steam near the middle of the season, but an unkind final two months prevented a regulation regular season win after the Harvard-Dartmouth sweep.
Yale at St. Lawrence
The Saints were an exceptional second half team that did a great job of avoiding regulation losses down the stretch, and after their 5-1 loss at Cornell in February, St. Lawrence didn’t lose a game by more than one goal until the final game at Quinnipiac. The team earlier beat the Bobcats with a bruising 3-1 decision at home, then rode three shootout games and an overtime win to over Colgate to a seventh-place finish.
Yale is a prime dark horse candidate because of its strength on the defensive end and in net, in particular. Goalie Jack Stark joined Cornell’s Ian Shane and Quinnipiac’s Vinny Duplessis as the three goalies averaging less than two goals per game in ECAC play, and his save percentage moved from .922 to .928 – both tops in the league – after removing his five non-conference games that featured a five-spot by Denver around Thanksgiving.
Princeton at Harvard
Princeton’s first game was at Harvard, but the 4-4 tie started a trend where the Tigers gained a second point after the third period. Of their Ivy League-leading six wins against Ancient Eight rivals, three required overtime, which in turn allowed Cornell to claim the “league title” while simultaneously enabling the Crimson to earn home ice despite having four less overall wins and two less league wins.
That said, handicapping this game is nearly impossible because both games took place in the first half of the year. After a 5-2 win at Baker Rink closed 2023, a six-game losing streak tailspun Princeton into a 1-8 stretch where the only win was an overtime non-conference victory over Army. The sweep over Yale and Brown helped, but Harvard finished the season with one regulation loss after the Beanpot and a 2.00 goals against average in games aside from that 6-2 loss at Union.
Dan Laughlin has been UW-Superior’s women’s hockey head coach since 2003 (photo: Holden Law).
Wisconsin-Superior has announced that Dan Laughlin, one of the longest-tenured coaches in NCAA Division III women’s hockey, is retiring.
“Coach Laughlin has been the backbone of our women’s hockey program for the past two decades. His legacy leading the program extends well beyond the awards, accolades and championships,” said UW-Superior athletics director Nick Bursik in a statement. “We are thankful for his service, leadership and the positive impact he has had on the lives of hundreds of student-athletes. We wish him the best in his future endeavors.”
A 1994 graduate of UW-Superior, Laughlin started his coaching career with the USHL’s Sioux City Musketeers before returning to UW-Superior as an assistant women’s hockey coach in 2002. He became the program’s fifth head coach in 2003, and his hiring made an immediate impact.
In his first season, Laughlin guided the Yellowjackets to 19 wins and the program’s second of four NCHA regular-season championships. In 2007-08, the Yellowjackets set a program record with 23 wins and the team advanced to the NCAA Division III tournament for the only time in program history, where they finished fourth. Laughlin’s teams won three NCHA regular-season titles (2004, 2007, 2008), one NCHA playoff championship (2008) and qualified for two NCAA tournaments (2006, 2008).
In addition to team success, Laughlin helped his players achieve individual accolades. Two players – Erin Kegley and Gina Baranzelli – received NCHA player of the year honors. On 12 occasions, Yellowjackets coached by Laughlin were named All-American by the ACHA, including Kegley, who was a four-time All-American (2004-2007). Including this season, 44 players received all-conference recognition from the NCHA or WIAC.
Laughlin earned personal accolades himself, as well. He was named the NCHA coach of the year four times (2004, 2007, 2008, 2012) and WIAC coach of the year twice (2015, 2018). Further, Laughlin was a finalist for the NCAA Division III women’s hockey coach of the year award on seven occasions.
Laughlin’s final victory in 2023-24 was his 300th at UW-Superior and in 21 seasons with the Yellowjackets, he fashioned a mark of 300-209-44. Combined with his time as an assistant coach, Laughlin was behind the bench for 308 of the 359 wins in the history of the Yellowjacket women’s hockey program to date.
A national search to hire Laughlin’s replacement is underway.
Quinnipiac split over the weekend but is still in a good place for an NCAA tournament berth as the Bobcats look to defend their national championship (photo: Rob Rasmussen/P8Photos.com).
Each week during the season, we look at the big events and big games around Division I men’s college hockey in Tuesday Morning Quarterback.
Ed: Jim, we saw the last four regular-season champions crowned last weekend, and all but Hockey East and the NCHC are now in the playoffs.
The top two teams in the Big Ten and CCHA met to decide the regular-season titles. (Hats off to the schedule makers in those two conferences!)
Let’s start with the CCHA.
Bemidji State needed only two points on the weekend, but clinched in a convincing way over Minnesota State with a pair of shutouts, 6-0 and 2-0. Tom Serratore’s Beavers have been terrific down the stretch, unbeaten in their last eight games and picking up 21 out of 24 league points. Bemidji also only allowed 14 goals in those contests while piling up 31, a big turnaround from some lopsided numbers before semester break.
Should the Beavers win the CCHA – their only route into the NCAA tournament – they’d likely be the 15th or 16th overall seed. While Bemidji would be a big underdog against Boston College or Boston University, I’m certain they wouldn’t underestimate a Tom Serratore-coached team playing this well.
Jim: I think the CCHA championship is the best regular-season story this year.
Bemidji State went 7-1-2 down the stretch to win the title, its first since 2017. And Tom Serratore guided this team down the stretch to win this title, despite the significant feedback I received from CCHA fans that told me the Beavers had no chance.
You mentioned that three other teams clinched this weekend, which included Michigan State, North Dakota and Boston College.
All three were impressive, but I have to talk about BC, which has won 12 straight Hockey East games and beat New Hampshire 1-0 on Sunday to clinch the Eagles’ 18th league title, expanding their record.
BC is proving they can win games in multiple ways. They can score, no doubt, but on Sunday they proved they can stop teams as well.
Is BC the most complete team out there?
Ed: I will say without a doubt Boston College is the most complete team. I said, “Yes!” to myself immediately when you asked and then I decided to look at some numbers to see if I could back that up.
Individually, BC has the top three scorers in the nation – all Hobey Baker nominees – in Will Smith (17 goals and 37 assists for 54 points), national goal-scoring leader Cutter Gauthier (31-20–51), and Gabe Perrault (15-35–50). Plus Ryan Leonard is not far behind at 25-23–48. Rookie goalie Jacob Fowler is No. 8 in goals against and tied for fifth in save percentage.
Overall, Boston College is second in the nation in scoring and fourth in team defense. The Eagles have the No. 3 power play at 27.94% and the top penalty kill at an astronomical 90.08%.
So whether it’s a gut reaction or a dissection of the numbers, I have to not only call them complete, but maybe the biggest favorite to win the tournament that we’ve seen in quite some time. They’re all but a lock for the No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament and have already sewn up a No. 1 regional seed.
At this point, BC, BU, North Dakota, Denver, Michigan State, and Wisconsin are the teams that are locks for the NCAAs. As we head into playoffs and into Hockey East’s last week, there are still up to eight at-large berths up for grabs.
Last weekend saw some teams help their cause and others slip into dangerous territory in the PairWise. Who gained the most from last weekend?
Jim: That’s a difficult question.
Honestly, Boston College probably did the most, winning twice in regulation against New Hampshire while No. 2 in the PairWise, Boston University was idle. The Eagles lead in the RPI is now greater than .0200, which virtually anoints the Eagles as the number one overall seed.
But two teams who really helped their cause were Massachusetts with a pair of overtime wins versus UMass Lowell and Colorado College, which tied and beat Minnesota Duluth.
Neither of these teams took all six points, but honestly at the PairWise bubble, that doesn’t matter. Not losing is the key for every bubble team right now and UMass moved to 12th overall while Colorado College is now 11th overall. Math says UMass still has a better chance to make the tournament, but both teams did themselves well with this past weekend.
Teams that did not help their cause included St. Cloud State, Western Michigan and Cornell. All are at or near the current bubble.
What concerns you most about these teams?
Ed: Let’s start with St. Cloud State and Western Michigan. The Huskies can finish anywhere from second to fourth in the NCHC regular season, while the Broncos will finish either fifth or sixth. So it’s possible that they could meet in St. Cloud for the conference quarterfinals. Wins by Western Michigan would be more valuable as the road team and a series like that could make or break either team in the PairWise if swept.
But this coming weekend, St. Cloud visits Minnesota Duluth and Western Michigan is home against Miami to wrap up the season. The Broncos should be expected to prevail against Miami, while SCSU and UMD have a bit of a rivalry match, even in a somewhat down year for the Bulldogs. St. Cloud as the road team would really help itself with a sweep, while WMU gets a little less out of two wins as the home team against a lower-ranked opponent. In either case, anything less than a win and an overtime win probably means treading water in the PairWise for both.
Cornell still has a mathematical path to an at-large bid, but it’s only about a 4% chance. The Big Red had the opportunity to move up in the PWR, but a loss to Union on Friday coupled with an overtime loss to Clarkson and a tie with St. Lawrence on a north country swing the weekend before really makes winning the ECAC Hockey playoffs virtually the only route for the Big Red. That has to be disappointing when just three weeks ago, Cornell was in position for an at-large bid.
I mentioned eight at-large berths as the maximum still up for grabs. Upsets in Hockey East, the Big Ten, the NCHC, and anyone other than Quinnipiac winning the ECAC means fewer at-large bids. What teams do you see, if any, that are teams to watch for an upset in a conference championship?
Jim: I feel like you are baiting me with this question as I have said all season that I feel like the top 14 in the PairWise will still make the field.
For the most part, that hasn’t changed. Obviously the AHA and CCHA champions will take the final two spots, but I do feel like the other four champions will come from teams inside the current top 14.
But I will answer the question.
Honestly, the ECAC has the best chance of an upset. Cornell is currently outside of the cut line and could win the tournament. I want to add Colgate and Clarkson to that list as well.
In the NCHC, unless Omaha goes on a run, I don’t see anyone busting the bubble. Big Ten, maybe Notre Dame, but not really.
That leaves me with Hockey East. Could New Hampshire make a run? Yes. Maybe if UConn gets hot with a goalie. But honestly, I think one of the best Hockey East teams win that title.
I still hold the cut line at 14, relying on Quinnipiac to win in Lake Placid. Maybe naive, but that’s where I am today.
Michigan State remains sixth, Quinnipiac stays seventh, Minnesota retains the No. 8 spot, Maine holds steady at No. 9. and Colorado College is up one to No. 10 this week.
Providence falls one spot out of the top 10, sitting 11th this week.
No new teams enter this week’s rankings.
In addition to the top 20 teams, nine other teams received votes in this week’s poll.
The USCHO.com Division I Men’s Hockey Poll is compiled weekly and consists of 50 voters, including coaches and media professionals from across the country. Media outlets may republish this poll as long as USCHO.com is credited.
Hobart is back to defend its 2023 NCAA championship (photo: Kevin Colton – HWS).
Defending champion Hobart, Trinity and Utica got spots in the quarterfinals as the brackets were revealed Monday for the 2024 NCAA Division III men’s hockey tournament.
Thirteen teams were picked, including four at-large picks to go along with nine automatic qualifiers. Defending national runner-up Adrian, Curry, Elmira and Geneseo were chosen as the at-large teams.
Winners of five first-round games played on March 9 will join Trinity, Hobart and Utica in the March 16 quarterfinals. The final four teams standing will go to the Koeppel Community Sports Center in Hartford, Conn., for the semifinals on March 21, with the winners facing off for the championship on March 23.
The first round games are: Endicott at Elmira, Wisconsin-Stevens Point at Adrian, St. Olaf at St. Norbert, Curry at Geneseo and Cortland at Plymouth State.
The Nittany Lions earned their second straight CHA Tournament title and NCAA bid thanks to a 1-0 win on Saturday. Mercyhurst goalie Ena Nystrøm made 45 saves, but it was Mya Vaslet’s goal just four minutes into the game that proved to be all Penn State needed for the win. They will have the week off and find out their NCAA opponent next Sunday.
ECAC
Brown at (5) Colgate
On Friday, Danielle Serdachny led the Raiders with two goals and an assist while Kas Betinol, Kaitlyn O’Donohoe and Dara Greig each scored to give Colgate a 5-1 win. Kayle Doyle was stout for Brown through the first 30 minutes, but the Raiders kept pushing and finally broke through. Ava DeCoste was the goal scorer for the Bears in the loss. Saturday’s game was much the same as Brown looked to be headed to the third down just 1-0 on a goal from Elyssa Biederman, but Sydney Morrow scored with less than 30 seconds left in the second and that seemed to break things open. Doyle had 50 saves overall – 38 through the first two periods. Allyson Simpson, Emma Pais and Neena Brick added third period goals. Cameron Sikich had the power play goal for Brown.
(12) Princeton at (3) Clarkson
In Friday’s most entertaining game, Clarkson forced overtime after pulling their goalie to even the score with about 90 seconds to play. They had scored first on a Jenna Goodwin goal later in the first period, but Princeton immediately responded with a Sarah Paul power play goal. Kate Monihan’s goal in the second had the Tigers up 2-1 before Clarkson’s late heroics. After a scoreless first OT period, with plenty of chances for both teams, Alexie Guay knocked in a rebound to give the Golden Knights the 3-2 win. On Saturday, the Golden Knights left no doubt. The teams fought back and forth to a scoreless first, but then Clarkson came out firing. Dominique Petrie, Haley Winn and Anne Cherkowski all scored in a five minute span in the middle of the frame to put Clarkson up 3-0. Sara Swiderski scored a minute into the third to extend it to 4-0. Emerson O’Leary responded a minute later to get Princeton on the board, but Goodwin scored shortly thereafter to make it 5-1 and Winn extended it to 6-1 with about 10 to go. Sarah Fillier scored twice to bring the score to 6-3 but Princeton couldn’t close the gap further and Clarkson took the win and sweep.
(14) Yale at (7) St. Lawrence
Emma-Sofie Nordström made 31 saves and Julia Gosling scored twice to lead the Saints to a 4-1 win on Friday. After a back and forth first, Gosling’s power play goal gave SLU a 1-0 lead in the second. The game broke open in the third as Katina Duscio and Anna Segedi extended St. Lawrence’s lead to 3-0. Gracie Gilkyson scored for Yale to make it 3-1, but they couldn’t complete a comeback and Gosling’s empty-netter sealed the win. Nordström was once again huge in game two, making 41 saves to stymie Yale. SLU used a goal in each period – from Sarah Marchand, then Aly McLeod and then Gosling – to stake a 3-0 lead. Jordan Ray’s late power play goal was all the Bulldogs could find and St. Lawrence took the 3-1 win and series sweep. They will face Clarkson in the ECAC semifinals.
(9) Quinnipiac at (6) Cornell
The Big Red had a 2-0 lead after the first period Friday thanks to a rebound putback by Georgia Schiff and a shot from the slot by Lily Delianedis. But Quinnipiac pushed back in the second as Kahlen Lamarche and Madison Chantler each lit the lamp to tie the game 2-2. The two teams pushed each other in the third, but could not find an equalizer. Annelies Bergmann made several point-blank saves in the final minutes of regulation to help force overtime. Cornell killed an early OT penalty and then Karel Prefontaine took advantage of a mistake by Quinnipiac goalie Logan Angers when she left her crease. Prefontaine’s shot from a sharp angle won the game for the Big Red. In the second game, Cornell left no doubt as Schiff scored twice while Delianedis, Mckenna Van Gelder and Avi Adam each added a tally to give the Big Red a 5-0 win and sweep. They will face Colgate in the ECAC semifinals.
Hockey East
Holy Cross at (11) Connecticut
Coryn Tormala’s power play goal had Connecticut up 1-0 after the first. Ashley Allard cleaned up a rebound from a Jada Habisch shot to put them up 2-0 midway through the second and then Habisch lit the lamp herself on a short-hander near the end of the frame to make it 3-0. After the power play expired but just five seconds before the intermission, Holy Cross pulled one back with a goal from Lilly Feeney. Brianna Ware tipped in a goal two minutes into the third to put the Huskies up 4-1. Reghan Chadwick narrowed the gap for Holy Cross, but they ran out of time to mount a comeback and Connecticut took a 4-2 win to advance to the Hockey East Semifinals on Wednesday.
Merrimack at (14) Northeastern
After a scoreless first, Merrimack opened the scoring with a goal from Alex Ferguson to go up 1-0. That seemed to shake things loose for Northeastern, who went on to score four unanswered to take the 4-1 win. Skylar Irving carried the puck in by herself to even the score 1-1 and Katy Knoll’s game-winner came later in the second. In the third, Ella Blackmore pushed the lead to 3-1 and Irving’s empty-netter secured the win.
Vermont at New Hampshire
Rookie goalie Sedona Blair made 15 saves, giving her 889 saves, which breaks the UNH program single-season saves record. She also earned the shutout as the Wildcats took a 3-0 win. Chavonne Truter deflected a shot in while screening the goalie to make it 1-0 New Hampshire midway through the second. Tamara Thiérus forced a turnover and wrapped the puck around the net to make it 2-0 and Annie Berry added an empty-netter to give UNH the win. They will travel to Northeastern to play the Huskies in the Hockey East semifinal on Wednesday.
Providence at Boston College
The Friars outshot the Eagles 47-35, but Boston College skated away with a 2-1 overtime victory on Friday. Grace Campbell made 46 saves for the Eagles to keep her team in the game as after a back and forth first, Providence took a 1-0 lead in the second on a goal from Audrey Knapp. In the third. Kate Ham pounced on a rebound in front of the net and hit away until it found the back of the net. The two teams needed overtime to find a winner and then Sammy Taber called game with an absolute snipe. BC will head to UConn for a Hockey East semifinal on Wednesday.
NEWHA
Stonehill at Saint Anselm
Two of the best games of the weekend happened in NEWHA. First, Stonehill took the win in overtime when Saint Anselm took back to back penalties. The second was a too many players infraction when the player left the box before the expiration of her first penalty. The Hawks killed the first penalty, but could not stop Alexis Petford’s shot from the slot that gave Stonehill their first ever berth into the NEWHA Championship game. Before the climatic ending, all the scoring came in the second frame. Natalie Tulchinsky put Saint Anselm up 1-0 four minutes in. Petford equalized a few minutes later with a slap shot after some gorgeous passing by her teammates. Brooke Schneiderhan put the Hawks up 2-1 on the power play, but the Skyhawks responded with a gorgeous backhander from Bailey Feeney.
Franklin Pierce at LIU
The postseason brings out the best in the Franklin Pierce Ravens. When they played LIU in the semifinal last season, they scored in the final 90 seconds to force overtime. On Saturday, that same resilience came back to serve them well. That and having Grace Schuck on their team. LIU opened the scoring on a goal from Ryane Kearns, who took a turnover straight to the net. But Schuck replied 22 seconds later with a turnover and goal of her own to make it 1-1. Ashley Morrow pushed LIU ahead with a gorgeous solo effort before the end of the first to make it 2-1 and Maggie Culp hit Mikayla Lantto with a stretch pass she turned into a goal to extend the lead to 3-1. But the Ravens don’t give up. LIU held the shot lead heading into the final frame 22-12, but FPU outshot them in the third and OT 21-15. Franklin Pierce pulled their goalie with three minutes left and Schuck scored twice in 33 seconds to tie the game and force overtime. LIU just missed on a shot from distance at the empty net that might have put the game out of reach. It took most of the overtime period that was chaotic and back and forth with stellar goalkeeping from both Jill Hertl and Tindra Holm keeping their teams in the game. The game winner from Claire Casey came as Holm made a stop at the post but the puck was uncovered. Casey kept hitting at it until it popped up and over Holm’s shoulder and into the net. The goal was reviewed for offside, but eventually called good. FPU advances to the NEWHA championship game to face Stonehill. FPU last won the NEWHA Tournament in 2021, the year before the conference received an NCAA autobid.
WCHA
Bemidji State at (1) Ohio State
OSU scored three times in the first six minutes of game one, which set the tone for the series. Jenna Buglioni led the Buckeyes with two goals and two assists while Cayla Barnes added two goals and an assist. They put 62 shots on net and cruised to a 10-1 win. The victory secured their third-straight 30-win season – the third in program history. An 8-0 win on Saturday secured the sweep. Jenn Gardiner had two goals and an assist while Joy Dunne added a goal and two assists and Kiara Zanon had three helpers in the win.
St. Thomas at (2) Wisconsin
A quiet first period had the teams scoreless at intermission. Kirsten Simms opened the scoring less than a minute into the second. Lacey Eden tapped in a rebound to double the lead midway through the frame, but St. Thomas’ Lauren Stenslie had a gorgeous solo effort to cut the lead to 2-1. In the third, it was again Simms that put the Badgers ahead, but Stenslie had another special play to close the gap to a single goal. The junior had an outstanding game and kept her team in it throughout. But it was Simms’ game, as she set up Britta Curl with just more than six to play to push the lead to two goals. Wisconsin won 4-2. On Saturday, the Badgers came out with more power to take down the Tommies 9-1 and sweep the weekend. Britta Curl and Casey O’Brien each scored twice, while Lacey Eden, Anna Wilgren, Vivian Jungels, Laila Edwards and Katie Kotlowski also lit the lamp. Maddie Jurgensen was the goal scorer for St. Thomas in the loss.
Minnesota State at (4) Minnesota
On Friday, the Gophers skated to a 2-0 lead by midway through the 2nd thanks to goals from Lauren O’Hara and Ella Huber. Just 17 seconds after Huber, Kennedy Bobyck knocked in a rebound from Alexis Paddington’s shot off the post and that set the tone for the rest of the game. Jamie Nelson tapped in a back door pass from Kamryn Van Batavia to send the teams to the third frame tied 2-2. Mankato’s third line in particular was relentless in this game. Madison Mashuga gave the Mavericks their first lead on a breakaway. Huber responded for Minnesota to tie the game 3-3 with just under 15 left in the 3rd. Nelson got her second with some pretty puckhandling through the defense to make it 4-3 MSU, but Huber completed a hat trick with about six to play, tying the game 3-3. The Mavericks showcased more speed on the game-winner as Charlotte Akervik and Van Batavia took off and Van Batavia put home a rebound from Avervik’s shot to give Minnesota State the 5-4 advantage and eventual win – her first career game-winner. On Saturday, the Gophers came back with a decisive 7-1 win led by Josefin Bouveng’s two goals and three assists. Madeline Wethington, Abbey Murphy, Madison Kaiser and Huber also scored in the win. In the deciding third game, Huber put her team up 1-0 early in the first, but Mankato was tough on defense, blocking 24 shots. They struggled to get much going on offense, getting just 11 shots on goal. Bouveng scored with five to play to extend the lead to 2-0 and added an empty-netter a few minutes later to secure the 3-0 victory and series win. The Gophers will face Wisconsin in the WCHA semifinal.
(10) St. Cloud State at (8) Minnesota Duluth
Reece Hunt was involved in all five Bulldog goals (1g, 4a) to lead UMD to a 5-0 win over St. Cloud State on Friday. In the game, Mannon McMahon became UMD’s all-time games played leader with 169 games. Mary Kate O’Brien, Clara Van Wieren, Olivia Wallin and Ida Karlsson also scored in the win. On Saturday, Ève Gascon put up a 27-save shutout and McMahon scored twice to lead Minnesota Duluth to a 2-0 win and weekend sweep. The Bulldogs will play Ohio State in the WCHA semifinal.
Michigan State players celebrate their first-ever Big Ten regular-season championship last Friday night at Wisconsin (photo: Michigan State Athletics).
Each week, USCHO.com will pick the top 10 moments from the past weekend in our Monday 10 feature.
1. Beavers batter Mavs to clinch MacNaughton
The last time a team other than Minnesota State had its hands on the MacNaughton Cup, the CCHA didn’t even exist. That was in 2017.
Since then, the Mavericks had won six in a row, straddling two leagues–the WCHA and the CCHA. And it just so happens that the last team to win the cup in 2017 is also the one to break Minnesota State’s six-season lock on the 111-year-old trophy.
This past weekend, Bemidji State emphatically battered their instate rivals to clinch their first CCHA title since 2017. The Beavers, who have taken points in eight consecutive games, came into the weekend needing one point to clinch a share of the cup and two to clinch outright. Instead, they took all six, winning 6-0 on Friday behind two goals and two assists from senior Jackson Jutting and a 28-save shutout by Mattias Sholl, then winning Saturday night’s game 2-0 behind yet another shutout–this time from senior Gavin Enright.
It was the first time in the 50-year, 145-game history of the Bemidji/Mankato rivalry that the Beavers have been able to sweep the Mavericks with shutouts in back-to-back games. The Beavers now have home-ice advantage throughout the CCHA playoffs, which begin next week when they take on No. 8-seeded Ferris State in a best-of-three quarterfinal matchup.
2. Fighting Hawks capture Penrose
The Beavers weren’t the only team in green to capture a league title this weekend. The second to do so was North Dakota, who swept Western Michigan 5-3 and 3-0 over the weekend to capture their sixth Penrose Cup in 11 seasons.
UND’s sweep, coupled with Denver’s sweep of St. Cloud State over the weekend, meant the Fighting Hawks were able to clinch the league title with a week left in the regular season.
Jackson Blake had two assists on Friday and a goal on Saturday to notch his 50th point of the season; he’s the first UND player since Brock Boeser and Drake Caggiula in 2015-16 to reach 50. Ludvig Persson was also huge for the Hawks, making 34 saves Friday and 35 Saturday to help his team lift the cup.
UND has one more weekend of regular-season play at Omaha before the NCHC tournament quarterfinals begin. They will take on Miami starting March 15.
3. Sparty wins first-ever B1G title
But wait, there’s more!
There was a third green-clad team to clinch a league title this weekend. Michigan State beat Wisconsin 5-2 on Friday night in Madison to win its first-ever Big Ten championship.
The Spartans used a pair of goals by senior Jeremy Davidson, a goal and two assists from Reed Lebster and 44 saves by freshman goaltender Trey Augustine to win their first regular-season league championship since they won the CCHA title in the 2000-01 season. The Badgers rallied to win 4-1 on Saturday night thanks to a pair of goals from both Sawyer Scholl and Carson Bantle.
MSU finished the B1G regular season with 52 points, just two ahead of the Badgers, and will have a first-round bye in the B1G playoffs, which begin next week. Meanwhile, the Badgers will host Ohio State in their best-of-three series.
4. Eagles clinch Hockey East
The final program to clinch a league title this weekend doesn’t wear green, but Boston College’s rivals are all green with envy following the Eagles’ 1-0 win over New Hampshire on Sunday night.
Senior defenseman Eamon Powell scored the game’s only goal midway through the third period and goaltender Jacob Fowler made 27 saves to help BC clinch its 18th Hockey East regular-season title and first since 2021 with a week remaining.
The Eagles, who have won 12 straight Hockey East games, have a seven-point lead over second-place BU and a 20-point lead over third-place Maine. BC takes on Merrimack in their regular-season finale next Saturday.
5. Colonials return to AHA playoffs with big upset
Atlantic Hockey playoffs started on Saturday, and they’re already off to a great start.
The highlight of the weekend (unless you’re a Bentley fan) was 11th-seeded Robert Morris knocking off seventh-seeded Bentley 4-3 in overtime late Saturday night. The Colonials, of course, are back on the ice this season after the school announced that the program would be shut down after the 2020-21 season. So when freshman Cameron Garvey’s goal with 10 seconds left in the first overtime period went into the back of the net, it was cathartic for RMU hockey fans, who are glad that the revived program is showing that it’s still committed to playing hard every week despite finishing last in AHA.
The Colonials will look to keep their Cinderella run going this weekend when they take on top-seeded RIT in the quarterfinals next week. In the other two AHA first-round games, the higher-seeded teams emerged victorious. Seventh-seeded Niagara beat 10th-seeded Army 4-1 while eighth-seeded Canisius topped ninth-seeded Mercyhurst 5-2.
This means that Canisius will travel to Holy Cross for their quarterfinal series this week, while Niagara will head to Sacred Heart in their series. The other AHA quarterfinal series will see fourth-seeded Air Force host fifth-seeded AIC.
6. ECAC playoff picture finalized
Even though Quinnipiac wrapped up the ECAC regular-season championship last weekend, there was still plenty to play for in the conference this weekend.
Coming into the final two games of the season, Dartmouth and Clarkson were tied for the fourth and final first-round bye in the ECAC tournament. In the end, Dartmouth managed to edge out Clarkson by a single point — Clarkson’s overtime win over Quinnipiac on Friday night opened up the door for Dartmouth, who took all three points from Brown on Friday then beat Yale in regulation on Saturday to clinch a first-round bye in the tournament for the first time since the 2010-11 season.
The Big Green join Quinnipiac, Cornell and Colgate in the top four. On the other end, Clarkson, Union, St. Lawrence and Harvard secured quarterfinal home ice; they will play Princeton, Yale, Brown and RPI, respectively, in the single-game first round next Saturday..
7. CCHA separated by five points
Although Bemidji State, as mentioned previously, ended up winning the CCHA by nine points, the rest of the league was incredibly tight: Second through seventh places were separated by just five points and the three of the four playoff matchups weren’t officially determined until after the final games on Saturday.
In the end, St. Thomas tied with Michigan Tech for second place and earned the No. 2 seed thanks to the head-to-head tiebreaker. St. Thomas will host its first-ever playoff series at the Division I level next week, taking on Lake Superior State in the quarterfinals, while third-seeded Michigan Tech will host Bowling Green, a team they just swept a week ago on the road, in theirs.
Minnesota State nearly missed out on home ice altogether but were helped by Northern Michigan’s sweep of Bowling Green; the Mavericks will host fifth-seeded Northern Michigan in a rematch of last season’s CCHA Mason Cup title game won by MSU.
8. Gophers take four from Wolverines to set up B1G tourney
Minnesota came into the weekend needing just two points to clinch third place in the Big Ten. They ended up getting four.
The Gophers dominated Michigan 6-2 on Friday night to secure the No. 3 seed in the B1G tournament. Then they staged a furious comeback on Saturday night to force overtime before ultimately losing 6-5. Although both the Gophers and the Wolverines already knew they had home ice for the first round of the playoffs — Minnesota will host Penn State and Michigan will host Notre Dame — the most important thing about this weekend was the Pairwise positioning.
Minnesota, at No. 7 in the Pairwise, is in decent shape to make the tournament but Michigan, who dropped to No. 15 after Friday’s game but moved back up to 13 following Saturday’s results, still has work to do to make sure they get in. A B1G tournament title would make that discussion moot.
9. Pioneers creep ahead in NCHC standings
Denver is basically a lock for the NCAA tournament at this point, but their sweep at St. Cloud State, the Pioneers’ first since 2007, helped them leapfrog ahead of the Huskies for second in the tightly-packed NCHC standings and lock in home ice for the first round of the playoffs.
The Huskies, meanwhile, have lost three of their last four and dropped to No. 14 in the Pairwise–firmly on the bubble. They head to Minnesota Duluth in their regular-season finale needing some wins to clinch both conference points and Pairwise positioning.
Elsewhere in the conference, both Colorado College and Omaha are alive for the fourth and final home-ice slot. CC is four points ahead of Omaha and takes on rival Denver in a home-and-home this weekend; Omaha hosts UND.
10. Sun Devils still alive, barely
Following their controversial weekend in Alaska, Arizona State seemed to have run out time to climb the Pairwise, but that doesn’t mean the Sun Devils have given up.
They swept Long Island 4-2 and 4-3 in their final home games of the 2023-24 season. And although their prospects for an at-large bid look nearly impossible–they are currently No. 18 in the Pairwise–they are still breaking records.
The victories against LIU gave them their 22nd and 23rd victories (a program record). The final two games of the season see ASU traveling to Alaska to take on Alaska Anchorage. As of this writing on Sunday night, the Devils have, according to some predictions, a less than 1% chance of making the NCAA tournament as an at-large bid.
The math seems like it’s not on their side, but it’s a possibility. But first, they must beat the Seawolves on the road to stay alive.
Hobart successfully defended their NEHC title with a 5-0 win over Skidmore on Saturday and now look to a defense of last year’s national championship (Photo by Kevin Colton)
What a great championship weekend across the East! More than half of the nine games played were one-goal affairs that included a couple of overtime thrillers and one double-overtime marathon played. More surprising was the continued “upset bug” that saw Cortland take the SUNYAC with an overtime win over defending champion Plattsburgh. Hobart (NEHC), Plymouth State (MASCAC), and Trinity (NESCAC) won comfortably while Endicott (CCC), Utica (UCHC), and Assumption (NE-10) won nail-biters that also included some bonus hockey in D-II. Monday’s NCAA tournament announcement will be interesting based on at-large bids and seeding for this week’s first round games but here is the recap of some thrilling action that decided championships in the East:
CCC
The defending champions from Endicott played host to Salve Regina, who knocked off top seed Curry last week, looking to capture a CCC title in their final season in the conference.
The first period saw the Gulls break the ice with a goal from Cass Bowes for a 1-0 advantage after twenty minutes of play. Both goaltenders, Endicott’s Atticus Kelly and SRU’s Cayden Bailey showed they were on top of their game making key saves to keep goals off the scoreboard.
The second period saw the Seahawks tie the score off the stick of Damon Zimmer and the game looked like it would be tied at 1-1 after two periods of play before Endicott scored in the final minute to take a 2-1 lead. Andrew Kurapov’s one-timer from the top of the circle beat Bailey with just 57 seconds remaining in the period. Jackson Sterrett fed Kurapov beautifully after Zach Mazur had won puck possession deep in the Seahawk zone to start the play.
Kelly earned his keep in the Gulls goal in the final period stopping all 11 Seahawks shots on the way to thirty-two saves as the game ended with the 2-1 final for Endicott who became the first team in CCC history to repeat as conference champions.
Endicott receives the auto-bid to the NCAA tournament and will find out their opponent on
Monday during the NCAA selection and bracket show at 10 AM EST.
Endicott celebrated back-to-back CCC championships with a hard fought 2-1 win over Salve Regina on Saturday (Photo by Endicott Athletics)
MASCAC
The top seed Plymouth State Panthers hosted No. 2 Fitchburg State as the Panthers were seeking a fifth straight MASCAC championship against the team other than them that last won the title in 2018.
In a dominant performance, PSU limited the Falcons to just three shots on goal in each of the first two periods of play while Payton Schaly, Connor Tait and Jeremey Rancourt scored all the goals Kalle Andersson would need in a 3-0 win. Andersson finished the contest with thirteen saves (7 in the final period) to earn the shutout while Schaly’s first period goal proved to be the game-winner for the Panthers who successfully extended their championship streak to five with the win.
Plymouth State takes the auto-bid with he MASCAC title and await the outcome of the selection show for their opponent in the NCAA tournament.
Plymouth State earned their fifth consecutive MASCAC championship with a 3-0 win over Fitchburg State on Saturday (Photo by PSU Athletics)
NE-10
The only game on championship weekend that extended beyond a single overtime featured No. 3 seed Southern New Hampshire looking to upset top seed Assumption for the only title available for D-II teams playing in the NE-10.
The Greyhounds scored first with Leo Piandes netting the first goal of the game on the power play in the opening four minutes of play. Ten minutes later, the Penmen leveled the score at 1-1 when Connor Ball beat Assumption’s Thomas McLarnon.
The second period saw power play goals from both teams with Shane Sullivan once again giving the advantage to the Greyhounds before Matt Amante scored just a couple of minutes later to level the score at 2-2 after two periods of play.
Both teams were seeing great scoring chances thwarted as McLarnon and SNHU’s Collin Berke were outstanding in goal turning back several Grade A opportunities. The shot totals mounted with both netminders stopping everything they saw in the third period to send the game to a full 20-minute overtime. Assumption held a 54-33 shot advantage at the end of regulation. In overtime both teams had several chances turned away as the Penmen held a 15-9 shot advantage but could not solve McLarnon for the game winning goal. A second overtime was needed to decide an NE-10 champion and in the seesaw battle of chances, first-year Jonathan Surrette took a breakout pass from Sean Corliss and rifled a shot high over Berke’s blocker for the game-winner just over thirteen minutes into the second overtime period.
Berke finished the game recording seventy-two saves while McLarnon made fifty-six saves for the champion Greyhounds who finished their campaign with a 25-7-0 record and their second NE-10 title in three years.
Assumption completed their domination of the NE-10 this season with a 3-2 double-overtime win over SNHU to capture the conference title (Photo by Julia Jacobsen)
NEHC
The NEHC title game saw No. 3 Skidmore travel to “The Cooler” to face top seed and the nation’s No. 1 team Hobart who has been unbeaten on home ice this season.
After a spirited opening nineteen plus minutes of play that saw Hobart dominate the shots on goal statistic, Tanner Hartmann gave the Statesmen a 1-0 lead in the final ten seconds of play in the first period. In the opening minute of the second period, Khalil Fontana extended the lead to 2-0 as the Statesmen scored twice in just over 40 seconds of game time not including the first period break.
Hartmann netted his second goal of the game with a shorthanded gem to send Hobart to the second break leading 3-0. Just 26 seconds into the final period, Artem Buzoverya gave Hobart a 4-0 lead and Chris Duclair closed out the scoring with an empty-net goal in a comfortable 5-0 win over the Thoroughbreds. Tate Brandon finished the contest stopping 51 of 55 Hobart shots while Damon Beaver earned his sixth shutout of the season stopping all 21 Skidmore attempts on goal.
“I thought from the drop of the puck our guys were locked in, playing the type of hockey we can play, and I couldn’t be happier,” said head coach Mark Taylor. “We came out and we played Hobart hockey. We played with real purpose and real focus and played together and win or lose that is all you can ask for – but it is nice when you win.”
Hobart earned their second consecutive league title and the NEHC auto-bid and likely will be the top seed in the NCAA tournament earning an opening round bye while Skidmore awaits and hopes to extend their season with an at-large bid in the national tournament.
A familiar scene for Hobart celebrating another goal in the pursuit of a second consecutive NEHC title (Photo by Kevin Colton)
NESCAC
The semifinal and championship game were hosted by top seed Trinity who opened semifinal action on Saturday against No. 7 Middlebury while No. 3 Tufts faced No. 4 Hamilton.
In the first semifinal, the Bantams got a late goal from Gerard Marretta and a power play goal from Spencer Korona in the final minute of play to post a 2-0 lead after the first period of play where Trinity outshot Middlebury by a 14-3 margin. The Panthers responded in the second period and two goals from Paddy Bogart sent the teams to the locker room tied at 2-2 after the second period. The Third period was all Trinity as Kyle Tomaso scored an unassisted goal to give the Bantams a 3-2 lead and Marretta and Connor Sedlak would add insurance tallies for a 5-2 win to earn their spot in Sunday’s title game.
In the other semifinal, opportunities were plentiful between Tufts and Hamilton as the teams combined for eighty-three shots on goal. Tyler Sedlak’s second period goal for the Jumbos proved to be the only goal of the game as Jack Grant (37 saves) and Peyton Durand (45 saves) were stellar in the crease for the respective teams. Durand stopped all eighteen chances sent his way by the Continentals in the third period and Tufts earned their first championship game appearance with a 1-0 victory.
In the championship game, Trinity took a lead on a goal by Richard Boysen assisted by Spencer Korona with just under five minutes remaining in the opening period. Boysen was not finished with his offensive contributions as he added his second of the period with just four seconds remaining on the clock and a 2-0 lead. There would be no other scoring until the final two minutes when Devon Tongue scored an empty-net goal and Boysen added another for a hat trick to ice a 4-0 win for Trinity. Tufts netminder Peyton Durand was outstanding in goal making thirty-four saves while Devon Bobak, supported by strong defense and shot blocking, made twenty-eight saves to earn the shutout win.
Trinity celebrates their 4-0 win over Tufts earning their seventh NESCAC championship overall (Photo by TrinColl Athletics)
SUNYAC
The SUNYAC championship featured defending champion Plattsburgh hosting No. 4 seed Cortland fresh off their upset win of top seed Geneseo last weekend.
Both teams had their skating legs in the opening period but neither team was able to get a puck past the opposing netminder in a scoreless first period. Just over the midway mark of the second period sophomore Colby Seitz gave the visiting Red Dragons a 1-0 lead that they took to the locker room after forty minutes of action.
A Cortland penalty right after the opening face-off in the third period gave Plattsburgh a power play and Ryan Bonfield made it count to tie the score at 1-1. Nate Berke, who assisted on Seitz’s earlier goal gave Cortland a 2-1 lead with under four minutes remaining, but Bonfield netted his second of the period with the goaltender pulled for the extra attacker to tie the score at 2-2 and just 31 seconds remaining in regulation time sending the game to overtime. In the extra session, last week’s hero at Geneseo emerged again for the Red Dragons as Anthony Bernardo took a pass from Cameron Knowlton and slipped a backhand shot through Jacob Hearne at 9:13 of overtime to give Cortland their first-ever SUNYAC championship with a 3-2 win. Goaltender Jack Riedell stopped forty-one shots in for Cortland who awaits their NCAA match-up on Monday earned with heir SUNYAC auto-bid.
Cortland won their first ever SUNYAC title with a 3-2 overtime win over Plattsburgh on Saturday (Photo by Gabe Dickens)
UCHC
The UCHC championship game featured top seed Utica hosting No. 2 Stevenson in a game loaded with skill and two teams that like to play fast.
In the opening period, Eric Vitale found the back of the net behind the Mustangs’ Ty Outen for a 1-0 lead that held up until the final two minutes of the period when Kyle Lightfoot scored a power play goal to tie the score at 1-1 at the end of the first period.
The second period saw the Pioneers engineer a pair of goals from Griffen Barr and a power play tally from Jakub Breault to take a 3-1 lead into the final period. Stevenson was in full attack mode and fired eighteen shots at Utica’s Ethan Roberts looking to equalize the score. Frank Vitucci’s goal midway through the period was the only shot to get by Roberts as the Pioneers held on for the 3-2 win and their third consecutive UCHC championship. Roberts stopped seventeen of his twenty-eight saves in the final period and earned tournament MVP honors surrendering just two goals in three games.
Utica earned the UCHC auto-bid and while ranked nationally at No. 2 await their placement in the national tournament on Monday, 3/4.
The Pioneers held off a determined Stevenson squad to capture their third consecutive UCHC title (Photo by Maxwell LeBuis – YSM Media)
Three Biscuits
Anthony Bernardo – Cortland – scored his second overtime winning goal in the SUNYAC tournament to give the Red Dragons a 3-2 win over Plattsburgh and their first conference title on Saturday night.
Richard Boysen – Trinity – scored a hat trick to pace the Bantams to a 4-0 win over Tufts to earn their seventh NESCAC championship on Sunday afternoon.
Jonathan Surrette – Assumption – netted the game-winning goal in the second overtime period as the Greyhounds took the NE-10 title with a 3-2, 2OT win over Southern New Hampshire on Saturday.
Bonus Biscuits
Andrew Kurapov – Endicott – scored the game-winning goal for the Gulls in their 2-1 championship win over Salve Regina on Saturday afternoon.
Kalle Andersson – Plymouth State – stopped all seventeen shots he faced in the Panthers 3-0 championship win over Fitchburg State on Saturday.
Tanner Hartmann – Hobart – scored a pair of goals, including one shorthanded to pace the Statesmen to the second consecutive NEHC title with a 5-0 win over Skidmore on Saturday.
Ethan Roberts – Utica – stopped twenty-three shots including seventeen in the final period as the Pioneers downed Stevenson, 3-2 to earn their third consecutive UCHC championship.
What a great weekend of hockey with action from the opening puck drop to the final horn or in some cases “sudden-victory goal.” Just thirteen teams now remain in D-III in pursuit of a national championship starting on Saturday, March 9. The East will have Hobart, Utica, Trinity, Endicott, Plymouth State, Cortland entering the tournament auto-bids while Geneseo, Curry, and Elmira appear to be competing for any of the at-large selections.
Thanks to Russell Jaslow for post-game audio from the Hobart-Skidmore game.
UMass scored a pair of overtime wins over the weekend with Ryan Ufko netting the winner in both games (photo: UMass Athletics).
Here is a rundown of how the top 20 teams in the USCHO.com Division I Men’s Hockey Poll of Feb. 26 fared in games over the weekend of March 1-2.
No. 1 Boston College (27-5-1)
03/01/2024 – No. 1 Boston College 5 at No. 17 New Hampshire 3
03/03/2024 – No. 17 New Hampshire 0 at No. 1 Boston College 1
No. 2 Boston University (22-8-2)
Did not play.
No. 3 North Dakota (24-8-2)
03/01/2024 – No. 12 Western Michigan 3 at No. 3 North Dakota 5
03/02/2024 – No. 12 Western Michigan 0 at No. 3 North Dakota 3
No. 4 Wisconsin (25-9-2)
03/01/2024 – No. 6 Michigan State 5 at No. 4 Wisconsin 2
03/02/2024 – No. 6 Michigan State 1 at No. 4 Wisconsin 4
No. 5 Denver (23-8-3)
03/01/2024 – No. 5 Denver 6 at No. 15 St. Cloud State 2
03/02/2024 – No. 5 Denver 7 at No. 15 St. Cloud State 2
No. 6 Michigan State (22-9-3)
03/01/2024 – No. 6 Michigan State 5 at No. 4 Wisconsin 2
03/02/2024 – No. 6 Michigan State 1 at No. 4 Wisconsin 4
No. 7 Quinnipiac (24-8-2)
03/01/2024 – RV Clarkson 3 at No. 7 Quinnipiac 2 (OT)
03/02/2024 – St. Lawrence 1 at No. 7 Quinnipiac 8
No. 11 Colorado College (19-10-3)
03/01/2024 – Minnesota Duluth 2 at No. 11 Colorado College 2 (OT)
03/02/2024 – Minnesota Duluth 1 at No. 11 Colorado College 4
No. 12 Western Michigan (18-13-1)
03/01/2024 – No. 12 Western Michigan 3 at No. 3 North Dakota 5
03/02/2024 – No. 12 Western Michigan 0 at No. 3 North Dakota 3
No. 13 Cornell (17-6-6)
03/01/2024 – Union 3 at No. 13 Cornell 2
03/02/2024 – Rensselaer 1 at No. 13 Cornell 3
No. 17 New Hampshire (17-14-1)
03/01/2024 – No. 1 Boston College 5 at No. 17 New Hampshire 3
03/03/2024 – No. 17 New Hampshire 0 at No. 1 Boston College 1
The NCAA National Collegiate women’s hockey tournament bracket will be unveiled on Sunday, and Nicole Haase (@NicoleHaase) and Todd Milewski (@ToddMilewski) have a look at the conference tournament games that will happen before then. Jeremy Gibson, chair of the NCAA Women’s Ice Hockey Championship Committee and athletic director at Merrimack, joins the show to discuss how the group makes its decisions and what latitude it has with teams and seeds.
