Wednesday, March 11, 2026

Men’s Notes: Playoff Championships, NCAA Berths in Full Focus

All Six Conference Tournaments Underway

Conference playoff tournaments are now in full swing in NCAA Division I men’s hockey. Four leagues (Atlantic Hockey America, CCHA, ECAC Hockey, NCHC) got things underway last week, while the Big Ten and Hockey East open their tournaments tonight.

Here is a look at where each conference tournament stands:

Atlantic Hockey America
Regular-season champion: Bentley
Scoring champion: Felix Trudeau, Sacred Heart (25 GP, 16-17—33)
This weekend’s semifinal best-of-three series feature No. 1 seed Bentley hosting No. 4 Holy Cross, and No. 2 Sacred Heart hosting No. 3 Robert Morris … Defending tourney champ Bentley swept Mercyhurst in the quarterfinals, but required a triple-overtime victory in Game 1 to do so … Holy Cross swept RIT, with Jack Stockfish (Jr., North Bay, Ontario) scoring the OT game-winner in Game 2 … G Ajeet Gundarah (So., Richmond, British Columbia) stopped 52 of 54 shots in SHU’s sweep of Niagara … RMU used a school-record 60 saves from Charlie Schenkel (Fr., Toronto, Ontario) to dispatch of Air Force in Game 3 of their series.

AHA Men’s Championship Page

Big Ten
Regular-season champion: Michigan State (third consecutive)
Scoring champion: Gavin McKenna, Penn State (24 GP, 11-27—38)
Three quarterfinal matchups take place Wednesday: No. 2 seed Michigan hosting No. 7 Notre Dame, No. 3 Penn State versus No. 6 Minnesota, and No. 4 Wisconsin against No. 5 Ohio State … Michigan State, which has won the last two Big Ten tournaments, has a bye into Friday’s semifinals.

Big Ten Tournament Page

CCHA
Regular-season champion: Minnesota State (second consecutive)
Scoring champion: Stiven Sardarian, Michigan Tech (24 GP, 10-22—32)
No. 1 seed Minnesota State will host No. 4 Michigan Tech in one of Saturday’s semifinal single-game elimination matchups, while No. 2 St. Thomas takes on No. 3 Augustana in the other … MSU defeated Ferris State in three games – the only CCHA quarterfinal series to go the distance – behind Alex Tracy’s (Sr., Chicago, Ill.) 13th career shutout in Game 3 … MTU advanced by sweeping Bowling Green, avenging a BGSU sweep in Houghton one week earlier … St. Thomas and Augustana also advanced via sweep, eliminating Lake Superior State and Bemidji State, respectively … This marks Augie’s first-ever appearance in the CCHA semifinals.

CCHA Mason Cup Playoffs Page

ECAC Hockey
Regular-season champion: Quinnipiac (sixth consecutive)
Scoring champion: Hayden Stavroff, Dartmouth (22 GP, 22-15—37)
Higher seeds will host best-of-three quarterfinal series this weekend: No. 1 Quinnipiac vs. No. 8 Clarkson, No. 2 Dartmouth vs. No. 7 Colgate, No. 3 Cornell vs. No. 6 Harvard, and No. 4 Princeton vs. No. 5 Union … The four lower seeds all advanced with opening-round wins last week, while the high seeds received byes into the quarterfinals … Cornell is trying to win its third straight ECAC Hockey playoff title but its first under new head coach Casey Jones (Cornell ’90).

ECAC Men’s Hockey Championship Page

Hockey East
Regular-season champion: Providence
Scoring champion: James Hagens, Boston College (24 GP, 13-15—28)
The Hockey East Tournament gets underway tonight with a trio of single-game elimination matchups: Vermont at Boston University, New Hampshire at Northeastern, and UMass Lowell at Merrimack … The winners of those games will advance to face Providence, UMass and UConn, each of whom earned byes into Saturday’s quarterfinals … A fourth quarterfinal matchup, Maine at Boston College, is set for Friday.

Hockey East Tournament Page

NCHC
Regular-season champion: North Dakota
Scoring champion: Bennett Schimek, Arizona State (23 GP, 10-19—29)
The league’s top four seeds all advanced with quarterfinal sweeps last week: North Dakota over Omaha, Denver over Miami, Western Michigan over Colorado College, and Minnesota Duluth over St. Cloud State … That sets up the following single-game semifinal matchups for Saturday: UND vs. UMD and DU vs. WMU … In both of UMD’s wins over SCSU, Zam Plante (So., Hermantown, Minn.) scored an extra-attacker game-tying goal, then proceeded to score the OT winner in both … Liam Valente (Sr., Märsta, Sweden) scored the OT series clincher in Game 2 of WMU’s series win over the Tigers.

NCHC Frozen Faceoff Page

Daily Scoreboard | Weekly Schedule | Scoring Leaders | Goaltending Leaders

Must Read:

College Hockey News: Alaska wins thriller to take inaugural UCHC
College Hockey News: Q&A with Denver head coach David Carle
Elite Prospects: Gavin McKenna’s improved details launch him into scoring race
Grand Forks Herald: Could the NCHC’s new tournament format lead to bigger college hockey changes?
Grand Forks Herald: Will college hockey send a tea back to the Spengler Cup?
USCHO: Robert Morris turns around its season after “never losing belief”

Must Hear:

CHN Insiders: Playoff time
College Hockey Today: Meet Me in St. Louis
Pucks in Deep: Featuring Wisconsin forward Quinn Finley
USCHO Upon Further Review: Considering 10 candidates for the Tim Taylor rookie of the year award
USCHO Weekend Review: All higher seeds advance in weekend full of overtime games

Dafoe Delivers:

F Chase Dafoe (Gr., Beverly, Mass.) scored 24 seconds into overtime Saturday to give top-seeded Alaska a 4-3 win over host Lindenwood, securing the inaugural United Collegiate Hockey Cup for the Nanooks.

Alaska G Lassi Lehti (Sr., Espoo, Finland) was named tournament MVP and joined teammates Michael Citara (Gr., New Hope, Pa.) and Nathan Rickey (So., New Lenox, Ill.) on the all-tournament team.

UCHC All-Tournament Team
G – Lassi Lehti, Alaska (MVP)
D – Nathan Rickey, Alaska
D – Nolan Seed, Lindenwood
F – Michael Citara, Alaska
F – Jacob Fletcher, Lindenwood
F – Noah Serdachny, LIU

Milestone Markers:

A pair of senior forwards are just one goal away from joining an exclusive college hockey club.

UMass Lowell’s Jay Ahearn’s (Gr., Staten Island, N.Y.) and Ohio State’s Davis Burnside (La Grange, Ill.) each need just one more goal to hit 50 for their NCAA careers. Both players have already surpassed 100 collegiate points, so with one more goal they would join Michigan’s T.J. Hughes (Sr., Hamilton, Ontario) and St. Thomas’ Lucas Wahlin (Sr., Woodbury, Minn.) as the only active NCAA Division I men’s players with both 100 career points and 50 career goals.

Gotkin’s Goodbye:

Mercyhurst’s loss to Bentley on Saturday in the Atlantic Hockey America quarterfinals was the 1,310th and final game for legendary head coach Rick Gotkin (Brockport State ’82).

College hockey’s longest-tenured head coach in 2025-26, Gotkin spent 38 seasons behind the Lakers’ bench and won more than 600 games combined at the Division I, II and III levels. Gotkin began his coaching career in 1982-83 as an assistant coach for his alma mater Brockport State.

Mercyhurst assistant coach Tom Peffall (Gwynedd Mercy ’14) will take over the program in 2026-27.

From Zero to 60:

A pair of Atlantic Hockey America netminders put together historic performances of 60-plus saves last weekend during the league’s quarterfinals.

On Friday, Mercyhurst freshman Charles-Edward Gravel (Lévis, Quebec) made what is believed to be a school-record 65 saves in an eventual 4-3 triple-overtime loss to top-seeded Bentley.

Two days later, Robert Morris freshman Charlie Schenkel (Toronto, Ontario) turned aside a school-record 60 shots in a 5-2 win over Air Force in Game 3 of that series.

The only goalie in Division I men’s college hockey this season with more single-game saves was Canisius sophomore Petter Wickström Stumer (Stockholm, Sweden), who had an incredible 72 saves in a 4-3 regulation win over Lindenwood on Jan. 3.

NCAA Milestone Watch:

150 Career Games Played (skaters)
148 – F Matt DeBoer, Holy Cross

100 Career Points
99 – F Christian Fitzgerald, Wisconsin
98 – F Matt DiMarsico, Penn State
97 – F Stephen Castagna, Bentley
97 – F Nate Hanley, Union
97 – F Jack Musa, UMass

50 Career Goals
49 – F Jay Ahearn, UMass Lowell
49 – F Brandon Buhr, Union
49 – F Davis Burnside, Ohio State
49 – F Dylan James, North Dakota
47 – F Aiden Fink, Penn State
47 – F Brody Lamb, Minnesota

50 Career Wins
48 – Kyle Chauvette, New Hampshire

10 Career Shutouts
9 – Trey Augustine, Michigan State
8 – Michael Hrabal, UMass
8 – Josh Kotai, Augustana

SID Stuff:

After struggling to a 3-28-3 record in 2024-25, Miami turned things around in a historic way this season en route to an 18-16-2 overall record.

All 18 of those wins came during the regular season and, according to research by Miami Assistant Director of News, Data and Information Tim Cary, that 15-win improvement was the third-largest regular-season turnaround in Division I men’s college hockey dating back to at least 1978-79.

Only UMass Lowell in 2011-12 (+17) and Notre Dame in 1987-88 (+16) enjoyed more dramatic regular-season improvements during that time.

Notebook Quotebook:

“When you have Zam Plante, anything can happen.”

— Minnesota Duluth sophomore F Jayson Shaugabay (Warroad, Minn.) on linemate Zam Plante (Hermantown, Minn.), who has scored the game-tying goal late in the third period in three straight games while tallying the overtime winner in each of the last two (source: Duluth News Tribune).

NHL Note of the Week:

After nine-plus seasons and more than 500 games in the American Hockey League, Detroit Red Wings F Dominik Shine (Northern Michigan, 2013-17) scored his first NHL goal Sunday in New Jersey.

Shine’s tally midway through the third period was the final insurance in a 3-0 victory and it came in his 14th career NHL game (fifth game this season).

A former NMU standout, Shine earned back-to-back All-WCHA honors as a junior and senior.

Fries at the Bottom of the Bag:

Denver freshman G Johnny Hicks (Kamloops, British Columbia) is 10-0-1 with a 1.03 GAA and .959 save percentage since starter Quentin Miller (Fr., Montreal, Quebec) went down with an injury early in a Jan. 24 win over St. Cloud State … Robert Morris blocked an NCAA season-high 40 shots in Sunday’s 5-2 win over Air Force in Game 3 of the Atlantic Hockey America Quarterfinals … AFA senior D Chris Hedden (Kalamazoo, Mich.) had 13 shots on goal in that game, the most by any player in the country all season … Sacred Heart’s AHA Quarterfinals Game 2 win over Niagara on Saturday was the Pioneers’ 21st victory of the season, tying the school record … Union’s nine goals Saturday against Brown were an ECAC Hockey Tournament single-game record … Colorado College announced a five-year contract extension for head coach Kris Mayotte (Union ’06) on Tuesday.

Longest Active Team Winning Streaks:

7 games, Denver (began Feb. 7 vs. Colorado College)
6 games, Sacred Heart (began Feb. 20 vs. Holy Cross)
4 games, Holy Cross (began Feb. 27 vs. RIT)

Longest Active Point Streaks:

12 games, F James Hagens (Boston College)
- 10-9—19, began Jan. 30
9 games, F Rieger Lorenz (Denver)
- 6-6—12, began Jan. 31 vs. Minnesota Duluth
7 games, F Rhys Chiddenton (Canisius)
- 2-5—7, began Feb. 13 vs. Holy Cross
7 games, F Sam Harris (Denver)
- 3-7—10, began Feb. 7 vs. Colorado College
7 games, F Gavin McKenna (Penn State)
- 3-13—16, began Feb. 14 at Michigan
7 games, F Cole Reschny (North Dakota)
- 1-7—8, began Feb. 14 vs. Miami

Longest Active Goal Streaks:

6 games, F Michael Mesic (Bentley)
- 7-4—11, began Jan. 9 at Air Force
4 games, F Cole Eiserman (Boston University)
- 4-3—7, began Feb. 14 vs. New Hampshire

Longest Active Goalie Winning Streaks:

7 games, Johnny Hicks (Denver)
- Began Feb. 7 vs. Colorado College
6 games, Stephen Peck (Michigan)
- Began Jan. 10 vs. Notre Dame
5 games, Ajeet Gundarah (Sacred Heart)
- Began Feb. 20 vs. Holy Cross
5 games, Nate Krawchuk (RPI)
- Began Feb. 6 at Clarkson

Conference Websites

College Hockey Inc. Resources:

Did you know? 93% of NCAA Division I men’s hockey players earn their degree!