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
PAULA: Dan, that was a tournament weekend for the ages. The level of skill and grit on display in all four regionals matched anything I’ve seen in my decades of covering college hockey. There are some obvious things to mention and a bunch of things to dissect.
I’ll start with the obvious: Wisconsin’s comeback win over Michigan State. The Badgers were down 3-1 with less than five minutes remaining in the Worcester regional final game and willed their way to a Frozen Four berth with three goals in the span of five minutes and 11 seconds of real playing time.
Luke Osburn scored at 15:13. Gavin Morrisey scored at 15:47. And then a defenseman, Ben Dexheimer, finds the net just 24 seconds into overtime to give the Badgers the win. All of that in front of rookie Dan Hauser’s 24-save performance. Hauser, often mentioned as an afterthought in a conference where other goaltenders are household names.
Adding to Wisconsin’s story, both the Badgers and the Wolverines — the other Big Ten team heading to Vegas — ended their seasons last year in the B1G playoff quarterfinals.
It was such a great weekend of hockey and promises to be an electric Frozen Four. Where do you want to start, Dan?
DAN: Holy moly, is that a good Michigan team or what?
Colleague John Doyle and I had front row seats to watching the top-ranked Wolverines during their first round matchup against my beloved Bentley Falcons, and I was truly blown away by Michigan’s ability to take advantage of a team’s overall mistakes. I was super impressed by Bentley in the first 20 minutes of that game in Albany, but the Falcons essentially made two mistakes over a 20-minute period — and gave up two goals. One was a rocket on a quick-to-develop 2-on-1, and the second was Ben Robertson’s run to glory that began behind his net and ended with a goal that was scored just inside of Bentley’s blue line. I tallied approximately 19:30 of game time that the Falcons stood toe-to-toe with the No. 1 team in the land, but those 30 seconds were all it took to build a 2-0 lead that eventually snowballed into a 5-1 win.
Oh, and to top that off, Michigan had a 4-1 lead on Minnesota-Duluth before UMD staged a furious rally in the third period, a sign that a team built on pride isn’t ever going to lose its season without one last dying effort. Impressive all around, actually.
Head and shoulders, the teams advancing to the Frozen Four are the best four teams in this tournament. North Dakota is bringing its tradition back to the biggest stage in college hockey, and Denver is Denver. Good Lord is there ever a team that shows up in March quite like Denver.
And so we set a collision course for the desert and fabulous Las Vegas with a ton of national championship games and appearances in tow, and while we need to have our annual attendance conversation at some point, I think this is the perfect setup to introduce the best of the college game to the one of the newest pro hockey markets. I can’t wait to see how all of this turns out. Early returns — what are you expecting from the atmosphere in Sin City?
PAULA: I’ll circle back around to your question about atmosphere, Dan — because we do need to have our annual discussion about attendance, and that’s the perfect place for it — but I don’t want to short anything that needs to be noted about the weekend.
You mention the Wolverines, and yes they certainly did exploit Bentley’s mistakes. They also came really close to losing that regional title game for a couple of reasons that may get them into trouble in Las Vegas.
Michigan can bedazzle unaccustomed to its offense early in a game. The Wolverines are fast, excellent puck handlers, and can score from seemingly anywhere — and they do all that with confidence. But they were fortunate that they were able to capitalize and score those three goals early in that game, because when Minnesota Duluth adjusted, the Bulldogs were nearly more than a match for them. Had Duluth drawn any other opponent, we’d be seeing them in Vegas.
Denver was the best team in the tournament, hands down. That’s no slight to the other three teams that emerged, but there’s no question in my mind that the Pioneers played the best hockey of the weekend, followed very closely by North Dakota. I mean no disrespect to the conference that I’ve covered since its inception, but we could be looking at an all-NCHC national championship game.
Now back to your question. I expect the atmosphere to be fantastic in Las Vegas. We know that there are many, many fans who plan their entire year around the Frozen Four, attending regardless of who’s playing. It’s an annual event, and they’ll show in force as they always do.
Add the draw of Las Vegas itself, and I expect it to be well attended. The Golden Knights — who just fired Bruce Cassidy and hired Maine alum and one of my all-time favorite NHL coaches, John Tortorella — have a loyal fan base, and I hope they show out for the festivities, too.
As for the regionals, it’s time to either find better destinations and venues or put them back on campuses. I think 6,500 is a criminally generous attendance figure for the Penn State-Duluth game. That arena was dead. Games beginning right after lunch? Games overlapping — and moved around for other events — for the television audience? There has to be a better way.
DAN: Is there, though?
Apologies for sounding contrarian here, but I’m not sure that we’re asking the right questions. We’re going high level about attendance and assuming that the rubber stamp to move on campus fixes all of our problems, but I think the national tournament needs to ask a few more questions before we ever move things onto campus homes. Do the buildings, for example, have a good working press area for photographers, reporters, statisticians and video productions? Does the lighting support a television broadcast, and is there enough of a viewpoint to provide proper angles and production that goes through a truck-based, as opposed to room-based, production for a worldwide network?
Does the building have enough infrastructure to support a two-team format or a four-team format, and is this a requirement? How deep is that requirement against a standard home game for things like laundry and equipment and parking and staffing? Does the weekend coincide with any other events on campus and how do those events collide with the national tournament and the ability to provide certain access to the national stage? If the buildings are small, how do they expand the buildings and can the footprint be grown? Do the schools supply things like food for press and media?
Also, what’s the current process for determining bid locations, and if the same sites are the only ones that are bidding, how can the bid process become more attractive to other locations? How much does ESPN play a role in that — much like how network partners help in the bowl process for determining locations and teams. How are other sites bidding on things?
Let’s take a more holistic view. If the top eight seeds were declared hosts, we’d have had games at Michigan, Minnesota-Duluth, Western Michigan, Denver, North Dakota, Providence, Michigan State and Dartmouth. Can those sites support four-team regionals, and if not, how do we move to a three-weekend format on short notice? For example, if the regional final would’ve gone to Minnesota State-Cornell, are we doing that in Kalamazoo, or are we moving that one week later for Cornell? Can Cornell host that next weekend, and if not, how do we determine a process for moving that to a more palatable location?
Maybe an example helps illustrate my problem — in 2023, a No. 14-ranked Indiana State baseball team hosted a four-team bracket and advanced to the Super Regionals — college baseball’s version of the Sweet 16 — by sweeping Wright State and Iowa over three games, but the Sycamores had to travel to unseeded and unranked TCU after the Horned Frogs won the Fayetteville Regional hosted by Arkansas. The city of Terre Haute was hosting the Special Olympics Indiana Summer Games during the weekend of the Super Regionals, so TCU — a lower-seeded team — hosted a nationally-ranked program. The factors in play: a lack of hotel space, a lack of support staff for the games, and a lack of space for the ESPN production crew. Oh, Indiana State lost that series in two straight, too.
So I apologize for the lengthy and salty response, but it’s significantly easier to swallow these issues when there’s a 64-team bracket. Sixteen teams play in the NCAA hockey tournament, and I’m not sure that all of them can host the necessary games to advance to a Frozen Four without a significant conversation. It doesn’t mean that I think we need to stay at neutral sites, and I agree that something needs to improve. I’m just not sure it’s straightforward.
Can you convince me otherwise?
PAULA: I’m not sure I can convince you of anything, Dan, but I do think that the possibility of having top seeds host regionals must be part of the discussion.
I was at Yost in 2003 when Michigan hosted a regional and it was incredible. Facilities on campuses are an issue, as they were then in that old barn, but there is no reason to dismiss the notion outright — in spite of the many objections you introduce.
You say we’re asking the wrong questions and I concur. One of the questions that needs to be asked, though, is whether or not the NCAA actually cares about the gate and/or the atmosphere in a given arena that hosts a regional.
Another question to be asked — what, exactly, does the NCAA want from hockey regionals beyond the emergence of the Frozen Four field? Because whatever’s going on now doesn’t seem designed to grow the sport in meaningful ways.
And I never suggested that a solution was straightforward. Your questions about the bidding process, making hosting more attractive to potential bidders, the role of ESPN in the way things are set up — all excellent questions. Lots of moving parts and lots to consider, but I think it comes down to one thing, Dan.
If the NCAA cares about the student-athlete experience as much as it claims to, it wouldn’t have teams play in near-empty or emotionless venues.
Every year, media and fans bring up the same old flaws in the system. Nothing seems to change.
Dan, this is the last TMQ of the season, so I’d like to pivot before we sign off. How would you sum up this past NCAA season, if you could?
For me, the way in which the Big Ten appears to have realized its potential — finally — dominates my thinking about the season. Given the scope of the entire Big Ten organization and all this specific organization is capable of doing with its resources, this feels like something brand new to me. I don’t know if the progress B1G Hockey has made this season will result in its first-ever national championship, but it does feel game-changing to me, in some ways.
This leap forward wouldn’t have been possible, IMO, without the addition of CHL talent this year.
Something else not to be ignored: the dominance of the NCHC without all of the Big Ten’s resources.
One more thing: I’m sad to see Bob Motzko out at Minnesota, although I know why the program made the change. I also know that Brett Larson is a fantastic choice for the job there and look forward to seeing what he and his staff will do.
Bobbie Motzko is one of the real ones in college hockey. A good guy, a good coach, and someone who’s taught me a lot about the game. I’ve known Bobbie since my first year covering college hockey in 1995-96, a year before USCHO came to be when he was in his second year as an assistant at Miami. He’s contributed a lot to the game and I look forward to whatever he does next.
What about you, Dan? How can you summarize or cap the season?
DAN: I always enjoy having the final word, but I was left completely speechless after Mercyhurst University announced the discontinuation of its Division I men’s hockey program. A founding member of the old MAAC, the program is the latest casualty in higher education’s declared quest to remain nimble and financially flexible among its “evolving” needs, and it abruptly canceled a program that began in 1988 as a Division III program before college hockey’s changing tides forced a move to Division II and, eventually, Division I.
It’s unsurprising that college hockey folks are dismayed by the loss of a high-caliber and high-quality program. Mercyhurst’s recent run was admittedly tougher to find wins, but the program was long considered a tentpole within Atlantic Hockey’s constant shuffle and recalibration. The Mercyhurst Ice Center was one of the few home buildings that wasn’t one of the league’s municipally-owned shelters, and head coach Rick Gotkin helped steer the team to three conference championships at a time when the majority of the league simply tried to stay afloat.
A recent renovation project funded entirely by private donations within the last 10 years helped advance both programs before the recent news that a department-wide move to Division I would include future projects for every on-campus competition facility, including the home ice rink. Rick’s last season included fond memories and a farewell stop that included one last playoff victory, and I had the distinct honor of wishing him well with a long and happy, healthy retirement after the Bentley series went to triple overtime (one last memory for us to share).
It felt, at least temporarily, like Mercyhurst pointed its nose towards a new era under head coach-in-waiting Tom Peffall, who unveiled a Giving Day video on the team’s X feed approximately 24 hours before the university announced its decision to disband the program, but we’re instead left to watch two dozen players enter the transfer portal for a second straight year after American International moved its team to Division II.
I don’t know all of the details surrounding the university’s decision, but we’re trying to grow the game. College hockey programs, staff members, university officials, leagues, players — everyone, really — talks about the golden era within the game and how everything is pointing towards a deeper and more robust college game. The CHL’s arrival and the transfer portal era is starting to figure out its way, and then a university destroys a traditional program from out of left field and without warning to its league, its coaches or even its players.
Not to end on a bad note, but it puts plenty of things into perspective about the current day. We should value everything that’s in our lives, including the people who cross our wake. We’re all very lucky to have our luxuries in life, and I hope that we can celebrate college hockey within the Frozen Four by honoring the teams and players — all of them — that got us to this point.