Men’s college hockey tournament season 

On most people’s minds right now in the college sports world is March Madness. But in addition to the nationally covered basketball phenomenon, the college hockey season is at its peak. Tournaments are winding down, and the field is closer to being set. Thirty-eight teams remain in national title contention, a number that will shrink to 16 over the next two weeks. 

Today will see the start of the Big Ten and Hockey East tournaments, the only two tournaments yet to start due to their exclusively single-elimination nature.  

Boston University will host Vermont while Merrimack hosts UMass Lowell. Northeastern will host New Hampshire in Boston College’s Conte Forum due to the closure of Matthews Arena.  

Providence, Massachusetts and UConn are the first three seeds and will await the winners of these games. Providence will play the lowest seeded of the three and UConn will play the highest.  

Boston College will host Maine in the second round as the four and five seed.  

Providence has an NCAA ticket, with UConn, Massachusetts and Boston College potentially able to get at-large bids. For everybody else, the conference title is the only way. 

Michigan hosts Notre Dame, Penn State hosts Minnesota and Wisconsin hosts Ohio State for three other matchups today coming from the Big Ten. The winners will be reseeded alongside Michigan State for the semifinals Saturday.  

All of the top four seeds will make the NCAA tournament, while Notre Dame, Minnesota and Ohio State will only qualify with conference wins. 

Friday begins the ECAC quarterfinals, which will all be four game sets. Quinnipiac will host Clarkson, Cornell will host Harvard, Dartmouth will host Colgate and Princeton will host Union. The winners will be reseeded for on campus, single-elimination semifinals the following weekend.  

Quinnipiac, Dartmouth and Cornell will receive at large bids regardless of outcome.  

The AHA semifinals also start on Friday in three-game fashion, with Holy Cross at Bentley and Robert Morris at Sacred Heart.  

The AHA does not have any ranked teams, meaning they will bid steal from whatever team finishes 16 in NPI due to the autobid their conference winner will receive.  

This also means that the conference tournament is the only way for any of these teams to qualify and a series loss is the end of the season.  

Many eyes are on the NCHC Frozen Faceoff, featuring four of the top eight teams in the nation. On Saturday, four teams will faceoff to determine the conference title game the following week in a single-elimination fashion. No. 2 North Dakota hosts No. 8 Minnesota Duluth while No. 4 Western Michigan hosts No. 6 Denver in two incredible games that will culminate in an even better championship game.  

The CCHA is where things get interesting in terms of NPI. Augustana will play St. Thomas and Minnesota State will play Michigan Tech in single-game semifinals on Saturday to determine the conference finals. 

Why this is more complicated than the other conference comes down to where these teams all slot in NPI. Augustana currently sits at 13 with a solid lead over Massachusetts at 14. St. Thomas sits at 15, Minnesota State at 17 and Michigan Tech at 19, with little difference between teams next to each other from 14 to 21.  

Any of the bottom three who loses in the first round is out. Augustana losing would drop them, but their season would become reliant on the results of UMass, UConn, St. Thomas and more.  

For whoever makes the final, a win would grant them the autobid. For Augustana, a loss in the title game likely still earns them an at-large bid. For St. Thomas, it comes down to how UMass and UConn do. For Minnesota State, there is still a scenario where they lose in the final and get in if most things go right. And even for Michigan Tech, a finals loss could still result in a tournament bid.  

By next week, things will be far more ironed out in terms of who’s in and who’s out. At most, 28 teams will be alive after the week, and as few as 20 can remain.  

All of the conference finals will take place on March 21, and the field will be set and released on March 22.