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Tournament Predictions #1 - NCHC

StateofHockey78

New member
Good morning! Thought I would throw out some tournament predictions now that all the conferences are in playoff mode. I'll start off with NCHC, would love to get some opinions from others as I've only seen these teams from afar as a Gopher follower. Thanks!

Quarters -

ND sweeps Miami
CC wins a tough series 2-1 - I'm thinking Omaha holds onto an NCAA birth by getting a game here
WMU wins 2-1 - I don't like what I've seen from SCSU down the stretch. WMU hasn't been a whole lot better, but I think Western finds a way on the road. This one is the biggest toss up for me, what level of play will we see from SCSU?
DU sweeps UMD

Semi's -

ND gets the last laugh after dropping 4 to CC this year. I see this as a pick 'em, but give ND the nod with the crowd and the revenge factor. High chance for OT.
DU cruises to the final over WMU. Even if SCSU sneaks past WMU I don't see DU having much problem in this game.

If healthy, I like DU to win over ND. In my opinion DU has been more consistent in the 2nd half and if Rizzo is healthy, they will be tough to beat. (I don't know the extent, but thought I heard he was out vs CC last weekend?)

I think NCHC gets 4 in the dance. Will be very curious to see what happens in the SD regional if Omaha ends up a 4 seed.
 
First off, a comment on your picks. I think if WMU beats SCSU, they would play ND, not CC vs. ND. I think they re-seed for the Frozen Faceoff.

I tend to think UND beats Miami in two, although Miami played them tough this year given the Persson situation.

I also like CC in three over Omaha. These teams only played two games, and they were in Omaha (UNO win and tie), but I like CC at home. Plus, I don't think UNO has gone to the tournament in either the WCHA or NCHC, so I think that's a funny trend (can't speak about their time in the CCHA).

I'm not sure about the WMU/SCSU prediction. They split in St. Cloud earlier in the year, but frankly SCSU had the much better of the play, and their win came with a controversial no goal by SCSU which caused the game to go to overtime. SCSU also swept at WMU early in the year. I think I tend to like SCSU in three in this one.

DU will sweep UMD, imho.

I like DU over UND in the final.
 
First off, a comment on your picks. I think if WMU beats SCSU, they would play ND, not CC vs. ND. I think they re-seed for the Frozen Faceoff.

I tend to think UND beats Miami in two, although Miami played them tough this year given the Persson situation.

I also like CC in three over Omaha. These teams only played two games, and they were in Omaha (UNO win and tie), but I like CC at home. Plus, I don't think UNO has gone to the tournament in either the WCHA or NCHC, so I think that's a funny trend (can't speak about their time in the CCHA).

I'm not sure about the WMU/SCSU prediction. They split in St. Cloud earlier in the year, but frankly SCSU had the much better of the play, and their win came with a controversial no goal by SCSU which caused the game to go to overtime. SCSU also swept at WMU early in the year. I think I tend to like SCSU in three in this one.

DU will sweep UMD, imho.

I like DU over UND in the final.

Thanks for correcting me on the reseeding, I completely missed that. Good insight into the SCSU v WMU series as well. Thanks!
 
I think NCHC gets 4 in the dance. Will be very curious to see what happens in the SD regional if Omaha ends up a 4 seed.

Considering that North Dakota is almost assured to be in that regional as the #1 seed, Omaha would not be placed there. Any 4 seed from the Nacho is going to end up with either BC or BU (assuming that Denver stays as a 1 and doesn't get pipped by Michigan State for the last one).
 
Considering that North Dakota is almost assured to be in that regional as the #1 seed, Omaha would not be placed there. Any 4 seed from the Nacho is going to end up with either BC or BU (assuming that Denver stays as a 1 and doesn't get pipped by Michigan State for the last one).

Omaha must be placed there as they are the host team.
 
Considering that North Dakota is almost assured to be in that regional as the #1 seed, Omaha would not be placed there. Any 4 seed from the Nacho is going to end up with either BC or BU (assuming that Denver stays as a 1 and doesn't get pipped by Michigan State for the last one).

North Dakota would go to Missouri unless 5 NCHC teams make the tournament.
 
North Dakota would go to Missouri unless 5 NCHC teams make the tournament.

I was listening to a podcast yesterday, sounds like they might break the rules in the name of attendance. You could have both Omaha and UMass as 4's lining up against in conference foes. hard to justify moving BU to SD or MO and moving ND out of SD given the attendance draw.
 
I was listening to a podcast yesterday, sounds like they might break the rules in the name of attendance. You could have both Omaha and UMass as 4's lining up against in conference foes. hard to justify moving BU to SD or MO and moving ND out of SD given the attendance draw.

I agree with you here. I have also heard a lot of ND fans have already made reservations for Sioux Falls. Sioux Falls is a bigger arena and would get filled up with ND there.
 
CORRECTION: You would think that the 4 vs 5 pairing in the NCHC first round would be pretty fairly matched. But over the past 6 seasons with the full best-of-3 series (2017-2019 and 2022-2024), the #4 seed home team is an amazing 11-3, winning 5 of 6 series. Conversely, the 3 vs 6 pairing has had more upsets: the #6 seed has won 2 of the past 6 series, and the #3 seed has a less impressive W-L record of just a 10-6 against #6.
 
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You would think that the 4 vs 5 pairing in the NCHC first round would be pretty fairly matched. But over the past 6 seasons with the full best-of-3 series (2017-2019 and 2022-2024), the #4 seed home team is an amazing 12-2, winning all 6 series. Conversely, the 3 vs 6 pairing has been frought with upsets: the #6 seed has won 3 of the past 6 series, and the #3 seed has W-L record of just a 9-7 against #6.

Didn’t #5 Omaha just beat #4 CC?
 
Good catch, thank you. I have corrected the records above.

I still don't think the numbers are that unexpected.

For series records since the inception, and ignoring 2020 when there were no playoff games, and 2021 when it was just single elimination at the Ralph, we see this:

#1 - 8-1
#2 - 8-1
#3 - 5-4
#4 - 6-3
#5 - 3-6
#6 - 4-5
#7 - 1-8
#9 - 1-8

3 through 6 in that conference has always been tight, and we've seen some traditionally good teams take their place down at #6, like UND and UMD.

Wins and losses (including the quarters at the Ralph in 2021) are:

#1 - 17-3
#2 - 17-5
#3 - 14-10
#4 - 13-8
#5 - 8-13
#6 - 10-14
#7 - 5-17
#8 - 3-17
 
I was at tonight's title game. Omaha looked good early. It was hard to tell it Omaha just ran out of gas or if Denver just took it to a level Omaha couldn't match. Either way I didn't think the level of play was all that great at times. Attendance for the weekend was awful, less than 16k for the entire weekend. Not surprising for the chip with the teams in it, but I was pretty surprised ND didn't have more people in the semi. Haven't been to the NCHC tourney in a few years, was this just an anomaly or has this tourney interest dipped?
 
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