It’s conference championship weekend, we’ve got some new faces in the mix, one conference giving us a first timer in the NCAA tournament since both have not been to the dance and they play for the conference title this weekend, you love to see it. We’ll recap briefly this past week and then look ahead at the games we’ve got this weekend to determine the auto-bids and see how the results affect pairwise.
CCC
It’ll be a new face in the NCAA tournament this season coming from the CCC. We’ve got the Golden Bears of Western New England vs the Colonels of Curry. WNE is a 4th year program (three years of playing due to covid year), while Curry is in their 3rd season. Head Coach Katie Zimmerman of WNE and Kelly Rider of Curry have done amazing jobs with the programs considering where they began and what it takes to build programs from nothing.
This past weekend, the Golden Bears defeated Univ. New England 2-1 and Curry shocked #13 Endicott, shutting them out 1-0.
Curry enters the final with a record of 2-0-3 in their last five games, winning three-consecutive shootouts, then shutting out Salve Regina and Endicott for the two wins. It’ll be quite the story if Curry can pull this off, a team that’s played everyone close, but hasn’t gotten the consistency they’ve wanted on a weekly basis. Still though, the Colonels are currently 11-11-5, their best season to date.
Western New England enters this game at 16-7-1, a stellar season for them, best as a program considering how young they are like Curry. WNE earned the #2 seed in the CCC, while Curry holds the #5. Western New England’s Head Coach Katie Zimmerman has worked wonders with this program, she took on a team, like Coach Rider, that was new and had to be built from the ground up. She’s led the Golden Bears to three seasons with records of: 7-15-4, 15-8-3, & now so far, they’re 16-7-1.
WNE has had Endicott’s number on occasion, that was the expected matchup we thought we’d see, but Curry has arrived and is looking to shock the world just like WNE.
Pairwise Analysis:
One team will come out of the CCC, it’s that simple. Endicott was the highest-rated team in PWR, they lost to Curry, that tanked their rating and the auto-bid will be the lone bid. It’ll be between Curry & Western New England.
NEHC
What a shocking weekend we saw in the NEHC… Norwich, the team who seemed to be the frontrunner for the auto-bid, fell to Cinderella Univ. Southern Maine over the weekend, losing 2-1 in overtime. The Huskies will be facing Elmira, the Soaring Eagles defeated William Smith a handily 4-0, sending them to the finals.
The Huskies of USM have pulled off a historic season for the program for various reasons, led by three-time NEHC goaltender of the year Haley McKim. USM defeated Elmira for the first time ever as a program earlier this season, winning 1-0, now they recently defeated Norwich as mentioned by the score of 2-1 in OT, the first time the Huskies have ever beaten the Cadets in program history as well.
Head Coach John Lauziere has his team rolling, speaking to him early in the season really showed his confidence and optimism in his group. It seems to be paying off for him and it’s nice to see a new face in the final’s vs the usual teams.
Hall of Fame Broadcaster Jim Ward can still be heard yelling from his home:
“HUSKIES WIN!!!!
HUSKIES WIN!!!!
HUSKIES WIN!!!!
THE HUSKIES WIN!!!!
WE’RE ONTO THE SHIP!!!!!!!” (via @JimWard_USMpxp on X (Twitter)).
Pairwise Analysis:
Like the CCC, we’ll see one bid come from the NEHC, Elmira or Univ. Southern Maine. Elmira’s looking to get back to the dance under first-year Head Coach Greg Haney, the program’s third HC in three years.
Norwich wasn’t high enough for an at-large in the first place, but losing to USM dropped them out of the picture completely.
NESCAC
The matchups have been set for the NESCAC semifinals set to be played at Orr Rink in Amherst, MA as it was last season.
The four matchups in the quarterfinals resulted like this:
#3 Amherst 2-0 Bowdoin
#7 Middlebury 4-1 Williams
#8 Hamilton 2-0 #10 Trinity
#12 Colby 3-2 Wesleyan
The matchups we’ll see in the semifinals are this:
#8 Hamilton vs #3 Amherst
#10 Colby vs #7 Middlebury
It’ll be an interesting weekend, seeing four top-ten teams in the NESCAC tournament, great competition within the league as always. Hamilton ended Trinity’s hot streak; the Bantams pulled many upsets this season just like Wesleyan who was also eliminated.
Colby is a team that’s been slightly underrated compared to the other NESCAC competition this season, the Mules sit at 17-7-1 (8-7-1 conference), compared to Hamilton who sits at 14-5-6 (6-5-5 conference).
Amherst has dominated once again, currently 21-2-2 (12-2-2 conference) led by sophomore goaltender Natalie Stott, who’s led the Mammoths once again to a top-seeded season within the conference.
Pairwise Analysis:
It’s another season where all teams will be invited to the NESCAC invitational that might be held in UW-River Falls. We may see four teams in the dance, one via auto and three via at-large. If Cortland loses to Plattsburgh, Colby may sneak into the final spot, which many including myself would argue deserve in over others.
Current teams projected to make the tournament via Pairwise rank (assuming favorites win):
#3 Amherst (21-2-2) – auto
#6 Middlebury (14-6-4) – at-large
#7 Hamilton (14-5-6) – at-large
#9 Colby (17-7-1) at-large
No one is denying these teams aren’t skilled, but if you’re hardly .500 in your own conference and your overall wins are nearly equal to your ties + losses, then I’m sorry, I’ll take the Blugolds of Eau Claire (21-6-0), Saint Mary’s (19-5-2), or Augsburg (19-7-0).
If the NESCAC is this good where these records are frontrunners, Amherst is the best team in the country and UW-River Falls at 27-0-0 is #2. There’s a strong argument to be made based on these statistics. I don’t believe this, but if these records are considered frontrunners, I don’t know why Amherst isn’t the highest-rated team in the country at 21-2-2?
SUNYAC
The SUNYAC has greatly improved over the years and this season was one of the best. Plattsburgh will face Cortland in the finals, the common finals matchup, but Oswego made great sides this season, only falling 2-1 to Cortland in the semifinals.
Plattsburgh will host Cortland who defeated the Cardinals once this season, winning 3-2, but fell to the Cardinals on two other occasions during league play.
Morrisville made strides, but the Mustangs fell short to Plattsburgh 5-1, not much else was expected, but the Mustangs made great strides under a new coaching staff, first year Head Coach John Briggs and first year assistant Monica Cahill. Briggs, coming over from the Red Dragons coaching tree and Cahill coming in as a former player.
Pairwise Analysis:
The SUNYAC is intriguing… Plattsburgh is in with a win or loss, but Cortland is looking to make the dance after narrowly missing it on multiple occasions in the recent years, most famously missing the final at-large spot by 0.001 or so to Colby.
Cortland may still get in with a loss to Plattsburgh due to the Cardinals being so highly ranked. Colby would need to lose, but if Hamilton loses, they may fall a little as well. If River Falls defeats Eau Claire, Cortland remains above them, but Cortland needs a few things to fall into place if they want in with a loss. Highly possible, but they’d need a few dominos to fall their way if they were to lose to Plattsburgh this weekend.
In short, the SUNYAC will have Plattsburgh no matter whether it’s auto or at-large. They will get two teams in if Cortland defeats Plattsburgh or if the correct teams lose for Cortland’s sake who would be trying to get an at-large.
UCHC
The UCHC comes down to the two common teams we’ve seen as of late, Nazareth & Utica will be battling at it once again in Rochester, NY this weekend for a trip to the NCAA tournament. Utica’s never been, this would be their first-ever appearance in the dance. Nazareth has made it numerous times, most recently the past two seasons they’ve made the tournament after defeating Utica both times in the UCHC final.
Nazareth sits with a record of 21-5-1, Head Coach Chris Baudo has put up an impressive record with a young program, 115-25-7. Utica sits with a record of 22-3-2, Head Coach Dave Clausen with a career record of 348-213-37.
I’ll turn things over to Scott Kinville, owner of the Central New York Hockey Report (CNYHockeyReport.com) to give a brief preview of this game:
“The number one seed Nazareth Golden Flyers (21-5-1 overall, 19-0-1 UCHC, #13 USCHO) and number two seed Utica Pioneers (22-3-2 overall, 16-2-2 UCHC, #11 USCHO) collide in Rochester this Saturday for the UCHC Championship for the second season in a row. It is a rematch of last season’s thrilling 3-2 double overtime victory by the Golden Flyers, sending them to the NCAA Tournament and ending the Pioneers season. Like last season, the winner of this game will go on to the NCAA Tournament via the UCHC automatic bid, while the loser will most likely have their season ended. Nazareth won both regular season matchups between the teams this season.
The Pioneers are a veteran heavy team, while the Golden Flyers are one of the youngest teams in Division III. Otherwise, the similarities between the squads are striking. They are top two in the conference in goals per game and goals against per game, and top three in the UCHC on the power play and penalty kill. On the other end of the ice, both teams have outstanding goaltending. Utica’s Angela Hawthorne did not play in the regular season games against Nazareth, will be in net on Saturday with her 0.94 GAA. Her counterpart, McKinley Hoff, is second in the UCHC in GAA at 0.96.
It’s been 11 games since Utica has beaten Nazareth. To advance to the NCAA Tournament, they will have to overcome the Golden Flyers on the ice and the mental obstacle that comes with going that long without a win over that opponent.”
I spoke with Head Coach Dave Clausen of Utica and asked him some questions. His initial thoughts were: “Looking forward to what should be a fantastic hockey game. We have played them five times in the last two years and they’ve all been one goal games.”
I asked Coach Clausen if the mental aspect of this game plays a bigger role than most would think, seeing he has one of the oldest teams in women’s D3 hockey versus one of the youngest in Nazareth. Coach Clausen said:
“The mental part of the game is always important. While the games haven’t gone our way, they’ve all been competitive. We expect it to be tough, but I think we know we can compete.”
Look for another amazing game between these two this weekend.
Pairwise Analysis:
One team will receive a bid, If Utica wins, Nazareth’s PWR will be tanked, if Nazareth wins, Utica isn’t high enough to receive a bid in the first place via at-large. This game determines it all.
