Yes, 11 teams make the tournament. But two of those 11 spots will go to automatic bids to the winners of the CHA and NEWHA; right now none of the teams in those two conferences are in the top 11 in the Pairwise, so their autobid will go to a team from outside the top 11. That means UW will have to be in the top 9. And the team sitting at #9 during the conference tournaments has to worry about an 'upset winner' in one of the tournaments. Right now Northeastern is the only HE team in the top 11; if, say, Vermont were to knock them off and win the HE autobid, then the team sitting at #9 in the Pairwise gets bumped out of the tournament. So a team needs to shoot for the top 8 to be at all 'comfortable' in getting an at-large NCAA bid. (And right now, #8 is exactly where UW is.)
(Adding: we're big Colgate fans this weekend!
We were talking about what it would take to make or not make the NCAA field a couple weeks ago. Since then, things have gone quite well for Wisconsin, and not just the wins over Mankato and St Thomas.
Wisconsin had been sitting in 8th in the Pairwise and the NPI (no longer the RPI). At that point, the teams closest to catching them in the NPI and pushing them down to the 'bubble' spot of #9 were Cornell and Clarkson. While UW was winning four games, Clarkson lost one and tied one along with two wins, and Cornell lost three of four. As a result, Cornell has dropped all the way to 13th, while Clarkson moved UP to #9 - other teams also lost ground, Duluth, eg, dropped from 7th to 8th with their losses to Minnesota (UW moving up to #7).
Of course, Wisconsin still has tough games ahead. So how safely ahead are they in front of Clarkson (and Penn State and Vermont)?
Well, in the NPI. the lead Wisconsin has over Clarkson is 0.0316 (with bigger leads over PSU, Vermont, Cornell, etal). How big a lead is that. Duluth dropped two games this weekend to Minnesota, and their NPI dropped by 0.0074. And their 'position' in the NPI - won-loss record, strength of schedule, etc - is pretty comparable to Wisconsin's. So it's reasonable to expect that Wisconsin dropping a pair to Minnesota, or Ohio State, would cost them a similar amount.
That is, there is a reasonable expectation that Wisconsin could lose both games to Minn, and both to Ohio State, and lose their WCHA tournament semi-final, and STILL maintain a lead over Clarkson and the others for 8th place in the NRI and Pairwise.
Nothing set in stone yet, but it would take a whole lot of bad for Wisconsin to not make the NCAA field.
(Thanks to Grant for publishing the numbers so one can do such quick-and-dirty comparisons.)