Season previews for leagues
Last year’s champion Stevenson was the inaugural regular season and CHC tournament champion. Favorites Endicott topped Stevenson in the conference preseason poll by just two points. The Gulls return most of their roster, while Stevenson graduated 13 players. Dark horse If anyone will unseat the top two, it’s Morrisville State College. They made a great … Read more
Last year’s champion Adrian and St. Norbert tied for the regular-season championship, sharing the Peter’s Cup for most points (35) in the regular season. Adrian won the Harris Cup, but it was St Norbert that made the deepest run in the NCAA tournament, advancing to the final, where it lost 5-1 to Wis.-Stevens Point. Adrian … Read more
Last year’s champion Wis.-River Falls and Wis.-Eau Claire shared the regular-season league championship. It was the 18th time in program history the Falcons have won a title. The Blugolds won their second league crown. Wis.-Stevens Point won the WIAC tourney, though, and enjoyed a memorable postseason run, winning its fifth NCAA championship with a 5-1 … Read more
Last year’s champion Augsburg won the regular season and conference tournament titles last year. The Auggies topped St. John’s 5-4 in a triple-overtime thriller in the MIAC title game and went on to play in the NCAA tournament, where they fell to St. Norbert 6-1 in the quarterfinal round. Favorites Augsburg, St. John’s, and St. … Read more
With the 2016-17 season here, how do the teams stack up in Hockey East? Our columnists make valid points and make bold predictions. Boston College If Boston College were any other program, you might resign to the fact that 2016-17 will be a rebuilding season. It looked like after last season’s run to the Frozen … Read more
Times are changing for Hockey East and a quick look at the league’s coaches poll proves that not only is this no longer your father’s Hockey East, it might not even be your older sibling’s Hockey East. It has been five years since Boston College ripped off four straight postseason titles. And in that time … Read more
What can we expect in ECAC Hockey during the 2016-17 season? Our columnists have the rundown of all the teams, in alphabetical order: Brown Brown had a rough go of it last season. The Bears’ five wins marked the third straight year the program’s win total had dropped since appearing in the conference championship game … Read more
Departures are inevitable in college hockey, but the top ECAC Hockey teams seemed to have been hit especially hard last offseason. Most notable were Harvard’s Jimmy Vesey, who ended his four-year career in Cambridge by winning the Hobey Baker Award as college hockey’s top player, and Yale goalie Alex Lyon, who signed a professional contract … Read more
As the Big Ten teams enter the 2016-17 campaign, each club has strong assets returning, but question marks as well. Here are the six team capsules, in alphabetical order: Michigan Last season 25-8-5, 12-5-3-2 Big Ten (second) Lost to North Dakota in the deciding game of the 2016 Midwest Regional. Names to know One of … Read more
Going into year four of the Big Ten, Minnesota is once again picked to be atop of the standings, but that’s about the only thing that has been consistent over the four seasons the conference has been in existence. Well, kind of. Aside from the inaugural season where the Gophers and Wisconsin made the NCAA … Read more
It’s only early October, but the Atlantic Hockey schools are already planning to still be playing meaningful games next spring. Here are the AHC team capsules in predicted order of finish: 1. Rochester Institute of Technology Last Season 18-15-6, 14-9-5 (fifth) in the Atlantic Hockey. Won playoff title and lost to Quinnipiac in the first … Read more
The start of a new season always comes with optimism, and for Atlantic Hockey, hopes are sky-high after a momentous offseason. New Digs Three schools announced plans to upgrade their facilities, including a pair of upgrades that begin this season. American International is moving from the Olympia Ice Center to downtown Springfield’s MassMutual Center. Sacred … Read more
What will the WCHA look like in the near future? That seems to be the theme to the questions that curious fans and reporters continue to ask following a tumultuous offseason that saw the league announce a series of significant changes. First, the league announced that it was eliminating the neutral-site championship semifinals and finals. … Read more
Even with all the offseason changes, the WCHA still looks to be a talented 10-team conference in 2016-17. Here is a team-by-team look at what to expect this season in the WCHA: Alabama-Huntsville Last season 7-21-1 overall, 5-17-6 WCHA (10th in conference). Missed playoffs Names to know Junior Max McHugh led the Chargers with 15 … Read more
The NCHC was a difficult enough conference to succeed in before one of its member teams won a national championship. Don’t expect that to change in the wake of North Dakota’s title success earlier this year. If anything, the grind is likely to now become even more brutal. Half of the eight-team league qualified for … Read more
The eight NCHC teams all have something to prove and something to gain in 2016-17. Here is what you need to know for each school on the eve of the new season: Colorado College Last season 6-29-1, 4-19-1 (eighth in conference). Lost to North Dakota in the first round of the NCHC tournament. Names to … Read more
Last year saw a transition in the ECAC, as the league which had often been dominated by Ivy League teams like Harvard and Cornell saw two non-Ivies, Quinnipiac and Clarkson, finish 1-2 in the league and then advance to the NCAA tournament. Colgate also seemed to come out of nowhere and make a challenge, defeating … Read more
For the last several years, Hockey East has been about the Boston teams. With Boston College being led by two of the most prolific scorers in the game in Alex Carpenter and Haley Skarupa, and Northeastern matching with Kendall Coyne, and Boston University having strong players like Marie-Philip Poulin, the Boston teams have dominated the … Read more
The late addition of Amanda Kessel back to Minnesota’s lineup gave the Gophers just the jump they needed heading into the playoffs last season, and they rode that momentum to a sixth NCAA title, defeating Boston College in the final. The Gophers graduated a strong senior class, as in addition to Kessel, they lost scoring … Read more
The CHA has, in its history, been about one team: Mercyhurst. The Lakers have finished first in the league in 11 of 12 seasons, and even before the CHA tournament gave the winner an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, Mercyhurst usually qualified as an at-large team. Other CHA teams have challenged the Lakers at … Read more