The scattering of various college conferences has made it more difficult to keep track of all the action, but this is the week when it blossoms. And it happens among both the men’s and women’s leagues.

The disparity in how leagues run their playoffs is a drawback, because they don’t all do the same thing to get to the same objective — which is the NCAA tournament itself.
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For example, the NCHC has had a long, rugged season. But in the closing weeks, North Dakota captured the championship, finishing 15-8-1, to narrowly edge preseason favorite Denver (15-7-2), season upstart Colorado College (14-8-2) and sputtering but potent St. Cloud State (11-9-4).

To end the regular season, fifth-place Omaha swept North Dakota, while seventh-place UMD swept St. Cloud State and Western Michigan secured sixth place ahead of UMD. But NCHC plays its quarterfinals as a best-of-three series, which pretty much assures upsets will be at a premium, if evident at all.

Winter wonderland in Denver, not Duluth
One of the most ironic parts about the system is that UMD — from the usual winter wonderland of Northern Minnesota — has not had a single snowstorm this year and the brown grass and fields look more like mid-October than March. So, as the Bulldogs gathered for their flight to Denver to play the team that looked like the NCHC’s best when they swept UMD in Duluth a few weeks ago, they were unprepared for an 11-hour delay and an overnight stay in a Minneapolis hotel before finishing their trip.

The reason was a near-foot-deep snowstorm that hit Denver recently, closing businesses, closing freeways and shutting down the airport. In a normal season, the Denver players and staff may look apprehensively to an upcoming trip to Duluth because of possible blizzards, but this time, it is the Duluth traveling party that had to fly to Denver in order to experience winter!

UMD’s sweep of rival St. Cloud State may have been more timely than the snows of Denver, because UMD snapped a losing streak in the process and seem poised to prove that if they are on their game they can beat anybody.

North Dakota shouldn’t expect any problems with last-place Miami, and could easily prove their last-series losses were just resting up their top guns for this weekend’s series at Grand Forks. Omaha, which has been tough to beat for all NCHC foes all season, is also fighting this week’s wintry weather to make it to Colorado Springs for the three-game series against CC. And the most competitive and intriguing series of the whole first round could well be Western Michigan’s trip to St. Cloud to play the Huskies.

The winners of those four NCHC series will advance to St. Paul and take over Xcel Energy Center — home of the Minnesota Wild — for the last convening of the Final Faceoff for NCHC semifinals and finals before the teams scatter to play at higher home sites. There are some who already miss the chance to show their stuff to the major Twin Cities media and population centers, which have proven so popular over the years.

Big Ten, CCHA playoff status
The Big Ten has only Minnesota among state teams, and the Gophers face a major challenge in a one-game showdown against Michigan. After winning the last two titles, Minnesota finished third (13-7-4) behind Michigan State (16-6-2) and Wisconsin (16-7-1), and ahead of fourth-place Michigan (11-11-2), which has a disappointing record for such a talent-laden team. It is Michigan that returns to 3M Arena at Mariucci to face Minnesota this weekend, and the Wolverines blew a big lead before subduing Minnesota in overtime two weeks ago in the second game of their season.

The strange thing is that Minnesota-Michigan is a one-game showdown, just as the other semifinal series when Ohio State plays at Michigan State, having already upset second-place Wisconsin, although the Badgers will surely get voted back into the NCAA field. Instead, the Badgers get a week’s rest.

The biggest turmoil is happening in the CCHA, where the whole season has been a wonderful, storybook twist. Bemidji State won the league (15-7-2) ahead of St. Thomas (12-11-1) and the deadkick for third between Michigan Tech (12-10-2) and Minnesota State Mankato (12-10-2). Lake Superior State finished seventh at (11-12-1), tied with Bowling Green, before the Lakers went to St. Thomas and ruined the Tommies season by splitting 4-1 victories in their best-of-three and then Lake Superior State stunned St. Thomas 3-2 in overtime in game 3.

That reversal sends Lake Superior State to Bemidji State, while MSU-Mankato plays at Michigan Tech.

When all the league playoff shooting subsides, we can dust ourselves off, put the snowshovels aside, and get ready for what is certain to be controversial NCAA selections.

But for now, the league playoff theory remains intact as the most exciting, we just have to stay alert to find out if our favorite league playoff ends this week, or ends net week, or overlaps to encompass both this weekend and next. All we know is they will be exciting.,

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Coleman’s hat trick leads Miami to Frozen Faceoff title

Minneapolis — St. Cloud State knew the necessary work to reach the NCAA Tournament had been completed Friday afternoon.

But the Huskies just missed their chance to do something they hadn’t accomplished in 14 years, and that was to win a postseason conference title.

Miami, led by Blake Coleman’s hat trick, handed SCSU its first loss of the postseason by a score of 3-2 in the NCHC Frozen Faceoff championship game.

“I loved how we competed tonight,” SCSU coach Bob Motzko said. “We left it all out there. We had some great looks at the end to get the thing tied up. I like a lot of things about our hockey team tonight.”

The loss drops SCSU (19-18-1) from ninth to 12^th in the PairWise Rankings, but Friday’s win over North Dakota had already ensured the Huskies a requisite record above .500 and enough cushion in the PairWise to qualify for an NCAA regional.

Where and when they play will be announced at 11 a.m. Sunday.

Still, SCSU’s focus was winning a title Saturday, but instead it lost its third conference title game since it beat North Dakota in the 2001 Final Five championship.

“The good news is that our season isn’t over,” Huskies forward Brooks Bertsch said. “I think we can take something out of this loss and into next week and the NCAA Tournament.”

The Huskies got on the board first Saturday, thanks to a goal by Joey Benik 12 minutes into the game, but every time SCSU scored, Coleman had an answer.

He answered Benik’s goal when he deflected a cross-ice pass from Riley Barber out of mid-air and into an open net 4:15 later.

Jonny Brodzinski gave SCSU the lead again on a one-timer on the power play at the 6:03 mark of the second period, but Coleman came back with a power-play goal on a one-timer 1:34 after Brodzinski scored.

Coleman scored the game-winner 1:43 after his tying goal. Twenty nine minutes and 20 seconds was all Coleman needed to record the hat trick, and 34:12 was the time of the game in which he was forced to leave.

Coleman leveled SCSU’s Joey Rehkamp and made contact with his head, resulting in a five-minute major penalty and a game misconduct. It was Coleman’s third game misconduct of the season, which means he’ll miss Miami’s first NCAA tournament game.

“That’s my understanding,” Miami coach Enrico Blasi said.

But the senior center still left the biggest footprint in the game Saturday with three goals, a 14-2 faceoff record and half the minutes played.

“That’s a senior, and it was a blow to Miami when he got knocked out of the game because he was having an unbelievable night,” Motzko said.

SCSU had chances to score late in the game with a flurry of Grade-A opportunities in the final minute as the teams scrambled in front of the Redhawks net.

Rehkamp had the best chance to score with less than 60 seconds left with the puck at the top of the crease. He had Miami goalie Jay Williams beat, but as he brought the puck from forehand to backhand, a Miami defender used his stick to break up the chance.

Each goalie, SCSU’s Charlie Lindgren and Williams, finished with 18 saves. Lindgren was forced to make a big pad save on Miami’s Austin Czarnik on a shorthanded breakaway in the second period.

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