This Week in … columns; weekly columns on a league, region or gender-division
Every coach wants his team to be playing its best hockey at the end of the season. The ability to enter the postseason with momentum can never be underscored, and in a league like Atlantic Hockey, recent history has proven Cinderella can come out of the first round and dance the glass slipper right to … Read more
It says something about Minnesota Duluth’s quality of play this season that three ties and three wins in the month of February has proven to be a mild disappointment for the Bulldogs. Entering the second half, the Bulldogs were in first in the NCHC. A few ties, and a loss to Colorado College, have them … Read more
Say this for Western Michigan head coach Andy Murray: He doesn’t like to get ahead of himself, and he works to make sure his players don’t either. These are undoubtedly heady days for the Broncos’ hockey program. Western is 4-1-1 in its last six games and is fresh off its first-ever series sweep of North … Read more
The Boston College Eagles are a team on the brink. Two brinks actually. They’re on the brink of winning their 14th Hockey East regular season championship. They’ll get at least a share of the title if they split with UMass Lowell this weekend, since they hold a two-point lead on their closest challenger, Boston University. … Read more
The Alaska Anchorage Seawolves could lift a trophy this weekend and still miss the playoffs. Odd? Of course. But Alaska is known as the Last Frontier, and it’s a fitting theme for Alaska-Anchorage heading into the final weekend of the WCHA regular season. While several WCHA teams are battling for playoff positioning, the Seawolves have … Read more
Division I women’s hockey has seen the addition of four teams in the past six seasons — Lindenwood in 2011, Penn State and RIT in 2012, and Merrimack in 2015. Lindenwood and RIT has been playing Division III hockey before making their teams Division I. Penn State added men’s and women’s hockey Division I hockey … Read more
Teams head into the first round of conference tournaments this weekend. As each conference has a different format, here’s a breakdown of each conference and how their first-round matchups shake out. Colonial No. 1 seed Endicott (21-3-1, 11-1-0) and No. 2 seed Morrisville State (18-6-1, 8-4-0) earn byes to the semifinals, which will be held … Read more
The second season of conference tournament play has arrived. It is a reset opportunity for every team entering the playoffs in their pursuit of a conference title. Here is a quick preview of the upcoming games starting with first round matchups on Wednesday and leading into semifinal matchups and title games this weekend. CCC Endicott … Read more
Take one glance at the offensive stats of Augsburg and it’s easy to see what makes the team tick. It’s all about the balance. A total of 14 players have tallied at least 12 points, while 22 players in all have recorded at least one point for the Auggies, who have scored 98 goals off … Read more
Dartmouth enters the final weekend of the regular season with a one-point lead for the final home-ice berth in the first round of the ECAC Hockey playoffs. So while there is plenty on the line for this year when the Big Green host Clarkson and St. Lawrence this weekend, the stretch run has provided valuable … Read more
It hasn’t been smooth sailing, but this weekend, Minnesota will host its shared-border rival at home with a chance to put the regular-season conference race to bed. The Gophers, who hold a three-point lead over Wisconsin in the Big Ten standings and have a 90 percent chance of winning the regular-season crown, will host the … Read more
It’s a well-known cliché in sports. Taking it one day at a time. One game at a time. But Canisius coach Dave Smith says that’s what his team is doing as it rides an unprecedented unbeaten streak, currently at 14 games (11-0-3) going into the Golden Griffins’ final regular-season game on Thursday. “It sounds like … Read more
So your team starts out the season at 8-0-0 and is outscoring your opponents by a 45-15 margin — everything is playing out your way. Then you hit a little rough spot before the break and lose four in a row, including three at home, and you may wonder what happened to the team. The … Read more
Trevor Boyd had a phenomenal freshman season at Adrian, and has picked up where he left off a year ago. Boyd, who tied for first in goals scored last season (16), leads the nationally ranked Bulldogs in points (31) and goals (16) this year. “I’m not really surprised by my success because I put in … Read more
It’s been an up and down season for the Oswego State Lakers. Currently ranked no. 10 in the country, they’re the only squad to have beaten No. 1 Plattsburgh, a feat they accomplished on the road. But they’ve also stumbled, especially coming out of the winter break, said coach Diane Dillon. Some of the inconsistency … Read more
All too soon, the seemingly endless regular season comes down to one final weekend. Months of work can be decided by a single game, period, or play. The final weekend of the season might not bring a ton of suspense for the top spot in each of the conferences, but there are plenty of battles … Read more
In what’s turning into an annual rite of passage, Atlantic Hockey enters its final two weekends with nearly every playoff position fully up for grabs. Ten of the 11 slots in the playoff race are separated from someone else by one point, and, for yet another season, parity is turning the proverbial “mad dash to … Read more
The first thing that Nate Arentz noticed about the MacNaughton Cup was the weight. “I was having an argument with someone else and they were saying that the Stanley Cup was heavier,” the Bemidji State senior forward and captain said. “I said, ‘No way.’ And I was right, because it’s definitely heavy.” Arentz and the … Read more
Heading into last weekend, Colgate’s chances of hosting a first-round playoff series hinged on grabbing a four-point weekend. Colgate entered the weekend with 10 points, two points behind Dartmouth for eighth and one point behind Princeton for ninth. The Raiders did their part as they defeated Brown on Saturday 2-1 and picked up a key … Read more
One of the catchphrases you will head a lot of coaches use is a “team’s identity.” Almost every coach will tell you that learning and understanding that identity takes time. Some call their team a work in progress from Day 1 of the season right through to the final game. But establishing an identity certainly is … Read more