2020-21 Division I Hockey Thread

This week's NCAA Div I men's poll from USA Today/USA Hockey Mag ...

 

And nonetheless, the Div I women's rankings also from USA Today/USA Hockey Mag ...

 

THE only quibble I have is Providence retaining the #7 seed, it was reported that Maine's Women's team upset Providence last week....knocking them from the unbeaten ranks

 

From: College Hockey News

 

USCHO.com's "This Week in (NCAA Div I men's) Hockey" features ...

• This Week in WCHA Hockey: Bowling Green ‘pretty lucky’ playing nine games as ‘our guys feel good’

• This Week in Big Ten Hockey: Reflecting on first part of ’20-21 season, expectations on second half

• This Week in Atlantic Hockey: Long Island making impact against AHA squads, gaining confidence by the day

• This Week in Hockey East: With slow start in past, Providence improving as 'players know the standard'
• This Week in NCHC Hockey: Nebraska product, Western Michigan senior Frank takes in pod on native turf

Merry Christmas to all , and to all ... COVID Freedom!

 

Time to rest ...

 

A little national-level press for the Sun Devils road warriors ... ESPN.com: Inside Arizona State's 36-day road trip to start the 2020-21 college hockey season

 

University of Vermont men are hosting Northeastern tonight in Hockey East play, in the first Catamounts home game of the 2020-21 season. Interesting trivia for the UVM team: They have a freshman forward on their roster who is the youngest player in college hockey. Per the team's season preview ...

ETA: The Cats also have taken advantage of the recent NCAA immediate transfer waivers ruling, by adding senior forward Tristan Mullin from Cornell.

 

CC has like five different jerseys and I just don't understand why. Their new logo is pretty good, but I didn't even see a problem with the old one.

 

USCHO Division I Men's Poll - December 28, 2020

Rnk	Team	(First Place Votes)	Record	Points	Last Poll
1	Minnesota	(36)	8-0-0	795	1
2	Boston College	(4)	5-1-0	755	2
3	North Dakota		7-2-1	727	3
4	Minnesota Duluth		5-2-2	673	4
5	Minnesota State		3-1-1	622	5
6	St. Cloud		6-3-0	581	6
7	Bowling Green		8-1-0	514	9
8	Michigan		5-5-0	492	7
9	Massachusetts		5-3-1	463	10
10	Clarkson		4-3-0	401	8
11	Omaha		6-3-1	364	11
12	Quinnipiac		6-2-0	343	16
13	Northeastern		3-1-2	325	12
14	Wisconsin		5-5-0	286	13
15	Providence		2-2-1	227	15
16	Denver		3-6-1	193	14
17	UMass Lowell		1-1-0	191	17
18	Notre Dame		4-5-1	111	18
19	Lake Superior		4-0-2	85	20
20	AIC		5-2-0	48	19

Others receiving votes: Robert Morris 45, Ohio State 41, Michigan State 30, Arizona State 25, Michigan Tech 18, New Hampshire 9, Boston University 8, RIT 6, Western Michigan 6, Penn State 5, Bemidji State 5, Colgate 4, Mercyhurst 2 ...

 

USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine College Hockey Poll

Women's Poll

(2020-21 Season, Week 6)

First-place votes in parentheses

Rank	School	Last Week's Rank	2020-21 Record	Weeks in Top 10
1.	University of Wisconsin, 184 (15)	1	1-1-0	6
2.	University of Minnesota, 170 (4)	2	5-1-0	6
3.	Ohio State University, 154	3	2-2-0	6
4.	Northeastern University, 128	4	1-1-0	6
5.	Colgate University, 116	5	4-1-1	5
6.	University of Minnesota Duluth, 100	6	4-2-0	6
7.	Clarkson University, 68	8	1-2-1	6
8.	Boston College, 53	9	5-3-0	5
9.	Providence College, 45	7	6-1-1	4
10.	Quinnipiac University, 17	10	2-0-0	2

Others Receiving Votes: Mercyhurst College, 6; Boston University, 2; University of Connecticut, 1; Penn State University, 1.
Notes: The University of Wisconsin holds the top spot in the rankings for the sixth week with184 points and 15 first-place votes... The WCHA has four teams represented in the rankings, while the Hockey East Association and ECAC have three... Team records are listed as W-L-T. ...

 

Boston University has cancelled their weekend series for both the men and women. I'd be very surprised if the men play at all this year.

 

So you believe the weekend cancellations go beyond "Boston University's testing schedule and cadence resulting from the holiday break and the teams' return to campus"?

 

One team that sure seems to be rising fast is Quinnipiac. I've been following them as the Panthers 3rd round pick last year, Ty Smilanic, is on a team. Their power play seems deadly!

 

expected return is next weekend..... all Hockey East teams have pivoted games at some point with the blessing of the league

Maine and UMASS Lowell were flipped to a Sunday/Monday schematic after what transpired a few weeks back....

 

I'm fairly new to NCAA hockey. Is it normal for teams to have a really long break over Christmas time? I'm saying that because I'm following Merrimack, and they should have a break from December 20th to January 8th, but because of a postponement they haven't played since December 13th. That's almost a month off!

 

Christmas holiday breaks for 2 up to 4 weeks have been typical for college hockey, coinciding with class breaks & campus shutdowns. This season, the game scheduling chaos has amplified/extended many of those pauses in play. Some of the Div I conferences (women & men) had started adding holiday tournaments to fill in part of the calendar break period, but those have become COVID victims as well.

 

yes.... in the case of Maine Athletics.... we haven't had a home contest until just recently when Memorial Gym aka "The Pit" (separate from Alfond Arena) recently was cleared to resume activities in the America East Conference in January.... in addition to what Hockey East does and has been doing for 35+ seasons.

 

Coaches polls for D1 hockey rankings are a bigger crapshoot than usual this season, with reductions in the number of competing teams in several conferences & postponements/cancellations of games occurring regularly. At this point, I look at the rankings below the top 3 or 4 spots as more of a popularity contest crossed with a nod toward past performance for those teams. [Some fans of the top-ranked teams may argue that's true for the upper tier as well.] The real sleight of hand will come when the NCAA has to determine its 2020-21 RPI rankings (or whatever substitute scheme they conjure up) for year-end tournament seeding.

 

Not necessarily, but it does not make me bullish on the outlook. While it wasn't the first cancelled series for the Terriers, it was the first to be nixed without any new positive tests. Once the team returns to campus, they will obviously get tested, and it wouldn't surprise me at all if a positive one popped up.

Admittedly, I have been drained of all shreds of optimism since October and a saner person might see things differently. If you were to dismiss my outlook on my extreme pessimism, well, you wouldn't be wrong.

 

I'm certainly empathetic to your hockey pessimism this season. I've had my up & downs as I've allowed myself to be hopeful first for resumption - with limited options - of the monthly hockey road trips that usually mark the winter calendar for my wife & me (now scratched off completely for 2020-21); then had to give up on attending local Tier 3 junior games to fill the gaps (after reports of unsafe fan behaviors at their venues); and finally was told that our area's Div I women's team would not be allowing fan attendance for their delayed season (despite their historical gate numbers all but guaranteeing unsupervised social distancing in the new 2,500-seat arena). If it wasn't for Hockey East's decision to free stream men's & women's games his season, I'd have probably headed to my basement & told my wife to wake me next September. But we're all in this together, aren't we?

 

Starting to see a balancing of talent across Div I men's teams, where the smart coaches with scholarship headroom are shaping competitive rosters for the unknown 2021 post-season tournament seeding process AND for the next few years.

USCHO.com: Western Michigan adds three freshman hockey players at semester break, all eligible to play immediately

 

Hockey East games featured on the CBS Sports College Sports Live free stream this first weekend of 2021 ...

 

Congratulations to the University of Vermont Catamounts women's team freshman goaltender Jessie McPherson, who stopped all 14 shots she faced (including two tough saves in the closing flurry) to earn her first collegiate victory AND her first shutout in a 4-0 home win over the Holy Cross Crusaders.

 

Hello all.

Some of us on the Blues board were wondering if anyone here has been able to see any of UMass - Amherst, specifically Matt Kessel, play? He’s almost matched his point total from last year but we were just wondering if anyone has seen how he’s actually played.