Weekend brings an abundance of regrets to WCHA race When the dust settles on the WCHA season on March 3, the results of this past weekend may come back to haunt a handful of teams as they eye the first round playoff matchups. The league’s bottom three teams (Wisconsin, Minnesota State, and Alaska-Anchorage) earned in … Read more
Nebraska-Omaha (13-11-6, 10-7-5 WCHA) at No. 15 Colorado College (15-11-2, 12-9-1 WCHA) Tyler: UNO is probably the most inconsistent and unpredictable team in the WCHA, not only wins and losses, scoring and goaltending as well. If Josh Thorimbert returns this weekend, which CC coach Scott Owens is optimistic about, CC is going to shut the Mavericks down. … Read more
The WCHA announced Saturday that Minnesota freshman forward Kyle Rau has been suspended for one game for a check he levied upon Denver forward Jason Zucker in the Pioneers’ 5-3 win over the Gophers last night (Feb. 10) in Denver. Zucker needed to be helped off the ice and did not return after the incident … Read more
Nebraska-Omaha (12-11-5, 9-7-4 WCHA) at Michigan Tech (13-13-2, 10-8-2 WCHA) Tyler: The hotels will be full in Houghton this weekend with the annual Winter Carnival, but the Mavericks won’t be lodging in them. UNO will stay 45 minutes away in Baraga, Mich., according to the Omaha World Herald. The Huskies haven’t exactly derived any kind of an … Read more
Bemidji State (12-12-2, 6-10-2 WCHA) at Nebraska-Omaha (15-10-2, 11-9-0 WCHA) Tyler: UNO’s goaltending is highly questionable with Ryan Massa questionable after he suffered a concussion against Minnesota State, Jan. 21. He’s been the one guy to emerge from UNO’s goaltending situation with stability. He allowed three goals on 110 shots in his last three games but … Read more
Minnesota State (8-17-1, 4-13-1 WCHA) at Bemidji State (11-11-2, 5-9-2 WCHA) Tyler: Minnesota State had one of the worst power plays in the WCHA, but its clicking since Christmas, converting seven times in 26 attmepts. The Beavers are killing at a league-worst 76.4-percent rate over that stretch but this doesn’t make the Mavericks good enough to … Read more
Nebraska-Omaha (11-9-4, 8-5-3 WCHA) at Minnesota State (7-16-1, 3-12-1 WCHA) Tyler: The goaltending job at UNO should be Ryan Massa’s to lose going into this weekend after his last two performances, holding Quinnipiac to one goal on 25 shots and Minnesota-Duluth to one goal on 44 shots. Minnesota State’s offense is not all that explosive … Read more
No. 1 Minnesota-Duluth (14-3-3, 10-2-2 WCHA) at Nebraska-Omaha (10-8-4, 7-4-3 WCHA) Tyler: The CenturyLink Center is a big building that’s going to be packed and wild this weekend to greet the nation’s No. 1 team. So was Western Michigan’s barn but the Bulldogs went in and pushed the Mustnags around in UMD sweep last weekend. UNO’s top … Read more
What Huntsville really exposed Alabama-Huntsville shocked the college hockey world once again when it upset Denver, 3-2, Friday night. No one saw that coming. Not anyone who looked at the matchup going into the weekend, not George Gwozdecky and neither did us when we picked Denver to sweep the series. The Chargers did it by erasing a … Read more
No. 5 Notre Dame (12-6-3, 8-3-3-0 CCHA) at No. 3 Minnesota (15-6-1, 11-3-0 WCHA) Saturday only Brian: The Irish have proven to be notoriously slow starters thus far this season having allowed the game’s first goal in 12 of 21 games and fallen behind by two in half of those contests. Opponents have outscored Notre Dame … Read more
Happy Friday and welcome to this week’s edition of WCHA picks (brief pause to allow the applause to die down). Today we give you five of the weekend’s seven match-ups as we focus on the Friday-Saturday series. But wait, there’s more! As an added bonus, check back tomorrow for a special Saturday picks blog as … Read more
Michigan Tech (9-10-1, 6-7-1 WCHA) vs. Boston College (12-7-0, 9-4-0 HE) at Great Lakes Invitational — Friday Brian: Third-ranked Boston College ruined what should have been the most intriguing matchup of the weekend by losing to Michigan and robbing us of the first head-to-head meeting between Michigan Tech coach Mel Pearson and his long-time mentor, Red … Read more
After a one-week hiatus, the “ever-popular” picks blog makes its triumphant return today but only in sneak-peek fashion as we only have a pair of Thursday games. As an added bonus, however, we opted to pick Western Michigan and St. Cloud State as a series. No need to thank us. The rest of our apparently … Read more
With precisely half of the WCHA’s 2011-12 season schedule in the rear view mirror as we travel to our various holiday destinations, we thought it appropriate to take a look back before visions of sugar plums begin dancing in your heads. As we head into the first college-hockey-free weekend in nearly three months, we find … Read more
With only four matchups this weekend, the biggest news in the past seven days came from off the ice. Nebraska Omaha coach Dean Blais dismissed senior forward Alex Hudson last week after his second violation of team rules. With Hudson gone, where does that leave the Mavericks up front? Hudson (4-6–10) was scoring on around … Read more
Michigan Tech (9-8-1, 6-7-1 WCHA) at Northern Michigan (8-7-3, 5-6-3-2 CCHA) Tyler: Both teams are better in this year’s matchup than when the teams met last season. The Wildcats are in the PairWise Rankings top 16 (where teams typically need to be to make the regional tournaments). The Huskies are in a week-in, week-out fight to … Read more
Minnesota State scored more goals in one game than it had in nearly eight years as the Mavericks routed Alabama-Huntsville 9-1 on Saturday night. But that eight-goal blowout was an aberration in an otherwise thrilling weekend of WCHA action. Seven of the 12 games on the schedule were decided by one goal or less and … Read more
No. 1 Minnesota-Duluth (11-3-2, 9-2-1 WCHA) at Wisconsin (7-8-1, 4-7-1 WCHA) Tyler: The Bulldogs can cash in on the power play, facing one of the nation’s worst penalty kills (73.5 percent) but the Badgers have played well in their own building this season with a 7-3 home record. Wisconsin is rested and desperate for a WCHA win; … Read more
No. 4 Minnesota-Duluth (9-3-2, 7-2-1 WCHA) at No. 20 Michigan Tech (8-5-1, 5-4-1 WCHA) Tyler: Michigan Tech has been on the run the last couple weeks and Minnesota-Duluth spent last weekend resting. Kenny Reiter has been as hot of goaltender as anyone the last month and he’s out to prove the week off won’t affect … Read more
Princeton (2-6-1, 2-5-0 ECAC) at No. 10 Denver (5-3-3, 4-2-3 WCHA) Tyler: The Pioneers are unbeaten in five of their past six games but they need to start finishing games. The Pioneers lost third-period leads in two of those ties. Denver has scored only one goal in third periods in the six-game stretch dating back to Oct. … Read more