{"id":151119,"date":"2025-02-05T14:00:54","date_gmt":"2025-02-05T20:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/?p=151119"},"modified":"2025-02-05T11:40:18","modified_gmt":"2025-02-05T17:40:18","slug":"this-week-in-nchc-hockey-taking-a-look-at-ncaa-tournament-contenders-as-conference-continues-to-be-unpredictable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/2025\/02\/05\/this-week-in-nchc-hockey-taking-a-look-at-ncaa-tournament-contenders-as-conference-continues-to-be-unpredictable\/","title":{"rendered":"This Week in NCHC Hockey: Taking a look at NCAA tournament contenders as conference continues to be unpredictable"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Western Michigan captain Tim Washe has compiled 17 points in 24 games this season for the Broncos (photo: Colorado College Athletics).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There\u2019s still more than a month left of regular-season hockey yet to be played, but as now, the NCHC is on course to have three of its teams play in this year\u2019s NCAA tournament.<\/p>\n

That could certainly change, especially if a lower-seeded team goes on a tear at just the right time and wins the conference\u2019s playoff title or, depending on the team, picks off the right opponents. Unpredictable as that might be, it would be a fool’s errand to say it won\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s only coming up on three years ago that Minnesota Duluth won the 2022 NCHC Frozen Faceoff as the No. 4 seed. St. Cloud State did the same in 2015, and in 2014, Denver won as the sixth seed.<\/p>\n

The landscape is a little different now, of course. Western Michigan is one of the best teams in college hockey, and if the NCAA tournament began today, the Broncos and Denver would both be in line for No. 2 regional seeds. Arizona State would also make the cut, in the Sun Devils\u2019 first season as a conference member.<\/p>\n

Could we still have more NCHC teams fight their way into contention? Time will tell, and you already know to follow my colleague Jim Connelly\u2019s weekly Bracketology columns<\/strong><\/a> to see who might be going where come late March. But for now, let\u2019s take a closer look at the NCHC\u2019s contenders.<\/p>\n

Western Michigan (No. 5 in the PairWise Rankings)<\/strong>: The Broncos are fresh off a road split against a Colorado College team that appears to be course-correcting, picking up wins over ranked opponents in two of the Tigers\u2019 last three games. But WMU is generally great on the road (8-3-0) and is 9-1-1 at home, too, leaving the Broncos in good shape down the stretch. They have a reasonably favorable remaining schedule, too, with only two games against teams currently in line for a NCAA tournament spot (at Arizona State, Feb. 21-22).<\/p>\n

Denver (tied with Boston University for 8th)<\/strong>: The Pioneers did split a road series two weeks ago against a Minnesota Duluth team that has been struggling for consistency, but on the whole, what\u2019s not to like about the defending national champions? They\u2019re 4-1-1 in their last six games, and after only falling in a 16-round (sixteen!) overtime shootout last Friday against Omaha, DU came back the next night and scored 11 unanswered goals in an 11-2 win. Imagine putting seven past your conference\u2019s reigning goaltender of the month. Or don\u2019t, because the Pioneers just did it.<\/p>\n

Arizona State (13th)<\/strong>: I\u2019m not sure there\u2019s a team I\u2019m higher on at this point than the Sun Devils. After dealing with several injury concerns with top-tier players earlier this season, ASU has won five of its last six games. Here\u2019s hoping that Artem Shlaine makes a quick but safe return to the lineup, following a scary hit last Saturday at Miami that sent him awkwardly flying into the bottom of the boards behind the RedHawks\u2019 net. He is listed as day-to-day, which, for whatever it\u2019s worth, is a far better prognosis than it could\u2019ve been.<\/p>\n

North Dakota (22nd)<\/strong>: It\u2019s hard to know what to make of the Fighting Hawks. They\u2019re hovering above the .500 mark both home and away, but after losing three of four against Arizona State and Western Michigan, UND came back last week and took five points with a regulation win and shootout victory at St. Cloud State. The Hawks still have Denver and WMU left to play, as well as Omaha and Duluth down the stretch, but I\u2019m very interested to see how UND\u2019s home series this weekend with Colorado College will go. If the Hawks manage a couple of convincing wins there, bundle that with their 6-2 win Saturday at SCSU and you\u2019ve got a team looking plenty dangerous.<\/p>\n

The NCHC\u2019s chances for additional NCAA tournament teams goes down considerably after UND: St. Cloud State is 29th in the PairWise, with Omaha 33rd, Colorado College 35th, Duluth 37th and Miami tied for second-bottom at 62nd.<\/p>\n

But again, anything can happen. Watch this space.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s still more than a month left of regular-season hockey yet to be played, but as now, the NCHC is on course to have three of its teams play in this year\u2019s NCAA tournament. That could certainly change, especially if a lower-seeded team goes on a tear at just the right time and wins the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":89,"featured_media":151120,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[812],"coauthors":[810],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThis Week in NCHC Hockey: Taking a look at NCAA tournament contenders as conference continues to be unpredictable - College Hockey | USCHO.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There\u2019s still more than a month left of regular-season hockey yet to be played, but as now, the NCHC is on course to have three of its teams play in this\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151119\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"This Week in NCHC Hockey: Taking a look at NCAA tournament contenders as conference continues to be unpredictable - 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