Season previews for leagues
The top four finishers in the ECAC made the NCAA tournament last season, with Cornell advancing to the Frozen Four. I’d expect at least that many this year, with an outside chance for a fifth to also break through. Cornell comes in as the coaches’ preseason pick for the top spot. There was a decent … Read more
As this is the first preview of the season, let’s take a moment to look at the bigger picture of the sport as a whole. One topic is going to dominate conversations this season – with USA and Canada no longer centralizing their players prior to the Olympics in February in Italy, collegiate players from … Read more
Last year, Hobart won the national title game against an incredibly good Trinity team backstopped by goaltender Devon Bobak who returns to the Bantam crease. Key losses among the senior defense and forward groups along with the departure of assistant coach Kim Weiss to the Colorado Eagles (AHL affiliate of the Colorado Avalanche) will mean … Read more
The MIAC never seems to disappoint when it comes to being competitive. The race for the regular-season championship and the five conference tourney spots up for grabs always seems to be a fight to the finish. Last year, Augsburg held a two-point edge over Bethel for the regular-season title, but the Oles, who finished fifth … Read more
Plymouth State has ruled the roost in MASCAC hockey for several years in a row and in their final season in the conference face new challengers in Anna Maria and Rivier who now make the conference a 10-team league for the upcoming season. The former Independents will bring a lot of enthusiasm to their first … Read more
SUNYAC has also been impacted by conference re-alignment as the long-expected adoption of SUNY-Canton to the league was offset by the departures of Brockport and Geneseo to the UCHC for the 2024-25 season. So, the former nine-team league will play as an eight-team conference moving ahead with travel partners that will better facilitate travel and … Read more
By Brian Lester No question the NCHA is a pretty strong hockey conference, especially with two of the nation’s best teams in it. Reigning league champion Adrian leads starts the year at No. 3 nationally in the USCHO.com poll while St. Norbert is ranked fifth and projected to be the Bulldogs’ biggest challenger to a … Read more
The MAC was largely played as a subset to the UCHC schedule in recent years with just a handful of teams competing in both conferences and all were dependent upon winning the UCHC for a shot on the national tournament stage. As we enter the 2024-25 season, the re-aligned MAC finds seven teams moving over … Read more
The UCHC was among the most impacted D-III hockey conferences moving from an 11-team league in 2023-24 to just a six-team conference in 2024-25 before further planned re-alignment for the 2025-26 campaign. Misericordia, with head coach Kevin Cole, will field its inaugural D-III hockey squad this season that enables an eight-team MAC league … Read more
Gone is the Commonwealth Coast Conference as this season a re-brand re-names the 40-year old league to the Conference of New England or the CNE. While the eight-team league for hockey maintains the same number of competitors, two Rhode Island schools have swapped leagues for the 2024-25 season with Salve Regina moving to the NEHC … Read more
The 2024-25 season already brings us several conference re-alignments and a new playing league to the D-III mix that will impact conference races and national tournament bid opportunities next spring. In what will be the final season of the NEHC as we have seen it in recent years, the conference adds Albertus Magnus from the … Read more
No surprise here. UW-Stevens Point is the favorite in the WIAC and a contender on a national level as well. While the Pointers are the favorite, UW-Eau Claire and UW-Stout will take aim at being the team to beat in the conference. And you can never count out UW-River Falls. Northland is picked last but … Read more
The Assumption Greyhounds took their second NE-10 championship in the past three years last spring with a thrilling double overtime win over Southern New Hampshire. While the Greyhounds dominated the regular season behind their high-powered offense, the playoffs proved to be much more challenging in the only D-II conference playing NCAA hockey. The pre-season poll … Read more
There’s a saying in Texas high school football: The best teams don’t rebuild, they reload. The saying is altogether appropriate for Hockey East as it enters its 41st season of play. The biggest stars in the league from 2023-24 have taken their game to the NHL — Boston University’s Macklin Celebrini (San Jose) and Lane … Read more
Fans of Big Ten hockey had good reason to think that 2023-24 would be something of a fairy tale season for at least one B1G team. For the second consecutive year, the Big Ten led all Division I conferences in nonleague play, tallying a .731 interconference win percentage, up a few points from the season … Read more
The offseason is becoming a thing of the past for most sports, with lots of activity despite no games being played. This was the case with Atlantic Hockey America, which was busy this summer combining Atlantic Hockey (men) and College Hockey America (women) into a single hockey-only conference, Atlantic Hockey America. Michelle Morgan, in her … Read more
A true season of transition for the CCHA is set to begin this month. The league has been active in the transfer portal in more ways than one this offseason. The league’s individual programs added players and coaches, yes, but the league itself is also set to have some big roster changes starting this year. … Read more
There’s going from strength to strength, and then there’s the NCHC’s situation heading into the new season. For the first time in the conference’s 12-year history, the NCHC has seen eight teams picked in the USCHO.com Top 20 Preseason Poll. Defending national champion Denver is at the top almost by default, getting 42 of 50 … Read more
Even the most casual observer knew ECAC Hockey faced impossible odds at replicating its success last season. The only league untouched by realignment found itself entering the 2023-24 year with a defending national champion that represented college hockey’s truest and latest success story, but watching Quinnipiac finally cap its rise to the elitist class included … Read more
Last season’s conference tournament showed that quite literally anything can happen in this conference. That makes it difficult to predict how things might play out over the course of the season, but does mean that it should be an absolute blast to watch. Fifth-place Franklin Pierce nearly took the conference tournament crown after an amazing … Read more