Familiar foe, similar styles sets stage for historic Omaha-Colorado College NCHC playoff series

By Joe Paisley

Omaha is going to look familiar to Colorado College fans, and not because the teams played each other just three weeks ago.

The fifth-seeded Mavericks are a physical team that uses in-your-face defense to create turnovers and generate transition offense with enough offensive talent to capitalize on those chances.

Omaha (20-10-4) is one of the better faceoff teams in men’s Division 1 and uses that to gain puck possession to build offensive pressure in the opposing zone or alleviate it in their own end.

Sound familiar, Tiger faithful? Those are some of the reasons this NCHC home quarterfinal playoff series for fourth-seeded CC (20-11-3) promises to be a tight one.

“They pressure pucks really well,” CC coach Kris Mayotte said “The physical attributes are much the same. Because we are similar, that is why it will be such a good battle.”

“They do a good job keeping three guys above you,” he added. “Their D corps is big, strong and mobile so you have to find a way to get inside the dots against them.”

One reason Omaha went 1-0-1 against the Tigers three weeks ago was by denying lanes to get the puck behind the Mavericks to set up the forecheck, a key to CC’s 200-foot defensive structure. As a result, UNO had CC hemmed in for five of that weekend’s seven periods (including Saturday’s overtime).

“We learned a lot from that series,” Mayotte said. “It is easier to take lessons sometimes when you lose. We didn’t have the right game plan, It’s a different game plan this weekend.”

It may be a different environment too for the first postseason games between the two teams.

The atmosphere for the first home playoff series for CC in 12 years and inaugural postseason games at Ed Robson Arena, which set a record of 3,912 (3,407 capacity) against Denver last Friday, could be electric. That would prove beneficial for the Tigers, who started taking advantage with a 11-6-2 home record this season after a 5-4-1 first half.

“Our guys have a real comfort factor with how our game plays at our rink,” Mayotte said. “It’s a place that can get really loud and that feeds how we play. We are a forechecking team. We are a hard-to-play-against team. It fits the identity of our building. We want to use that energy and apply that and play a style that makes a team feel like they have no time and space. That is crowded and things are happening fast. We have found that in the second half. Now we just have to go out and execute.”

This series also features some of the league’s best at key positions.

This weekend’s best-of-three playoff series features unanimous league first team goalie honoree and sophomore Kaidan Mbereko, a former Team USA netminder at the world junior championships, taking on former Slovakian world juniors and NCHC honorable mention sophomore goalie Simon Latkoczy.

“He’s a tremendous goalie,” Mbereko said. “He has accomplished a lot. You come here to compete against the best and that is the opportunity this weekend.”

“There’s never a dull moment in the NCHC,” he said. “You are going to get everyone’s best. It will be a good challenge for our group. Hopefully we can come out on top.”

Challenging Latkoczy will be the CC forward group, paced by leading scorer Noah Laba, a first-team NCHC honoree like Mbereko.  The NY Rangers draft pick is confident the Tigers will be ready.

“We have been playing playoff hockey here for the last 10 games or so, so not much is going to change this weekend but we have a special opportunity to secure our spot in the NCAA Tournament as well as play for the NCHC (tournament title) so we’re excited and looking forward to it,” Laba said.

The Tiger’s scoring depth, led by the now-experienced underclassmen, is paced by Laba (35 points, 19 goals), sophomores Gleb Veremyev (25, 14 goals) and Ryan Beck (20, team-high 17 assists), freshman Zaccharya Wisdom (18, 10 goals), senior captain Logan Will (18, 11 assists) and freshmen Max Burkholder (16, seven goals) and Evan Werner (16, 10 assists). Eight Tigers have at least 10 assists, the most since the 2018-19 season (eight).

Omaha has its own standout forward in all-rookie teamer Tanner Luedtke, a third-round Coyotes draft pick, who led the Mavs with 25 points (10 goals) in 34 league games, He led a strong supporting cast including graduate forward Jack Randl (24, 12 goals) and juniors Victor Mancini (plus-10 defenseman), Zach Urdahl (20, 10 goals) and Ty Mueller (24, 15 assists). That scoring depth is why Omaha enters this weekend on a 9-1-2 tear since Jan. 26, including a home sweep of NCHC regular-season champion North Dakota last weekend.

“We’re just trying to prepare the same way we have the last 2 1/2 months,” UNO coach Mike Gabinet said. “We have a lot of positivity to build on. The guys have built some confidence going into this weekend.”

The same can be said for the Tigers, who remember dropping five of six possible standings points that weekend in Omaha, making the path to home playoff ice that much more difficult.”

“Our guys are excited,’ Mayotte said “We remember how we felt leaving that place. It is still in our locker room. We are looking forward to the challenge.”

Ice chips

CC leads the nation by winning 55.6 percent of its faceoffs, led by Will’s 59.9 percent, while Omaha is at 54.7 percent, second in the NCHC and fifth in the nation. … The last time CC hosted a home playoff series was in March 2012 when the Tigers were swept by Michigan Tech at the Broadmoor World Arena in the former men’s WCHA. ,,, UNO leads the all-time series 28-14-7 with a 12-9-1 mark in Colorado Springs. … CC’s 11 home wins ties that 2011-12 team while the 9-5-1 road mark matches the nine recorded by the 2007-08 team, the last squad to have multiple first-team league honorees.

NCHC Playoffs 

Best of three series, 7 p.m. Friday, 6 p.m. Saturday, 6 p.m. Sunday (if necessary)

No. 8 seed Miami (7-24-3) at No. 1 North Dakota (24-10-2)

No. 7 Minnesota Duluth (12-18-5) at No. 2 Denver (24-9-3)

No. 6 Western Michigan (20-13-1) at No. 3 St. Cloud State (15-14-5)

No. 5 Omaha (20-10-4) at No. 4 Colorado College (20-11-3)

Kaidan Mbereko garners third NCHC goaltender of the week honor for efforts during three-point weekend at No. 15 Omaha

By Joe Paisley

A good weekend for Colorado College at now-No. 15 Omaha did not go unnoticed by the National Collegiate Hockey Conference.

Freshman goalie Kaidan Mbereko received his third Goaltender of the Week award for his efforts in eastern Nebraska against the Mavericks.

He made a combined 76 saves to help the Tigers (10-16-2, 6-10-2-0-1-2, 23 points) garnered three league standings points and moved into a tie for fifth place with Minnesota Duluth (7-11-0-1-3-0, 23 points).  CC and UMD split the season series 2-2.

On Friday, CC rallied from down 2-0 to the Mavericks before falling 3-2 in overtime. On Saturday, the Aspen resident matched his career high with 40 saves, including 11 on the penalty kill. He made two more stops in the shootout to garner CC two standings points. The result gave CC the season series (2-1-1) over fourth-place Omaha (33 points).

Mbereko (6-12-2, three shutouts) recorded a .938 save percentage with a 2.38 goals against average while leading a penalty kill that went 6 for 8. On the season, his save percentage is .923, third in the NCHC, with a 2.45 GAA.

Other CC nominees were freshman Noah Laba (forward and rookie) and defenseman Bryan Yoon. The full release is here.

The latest weekly poll has league-leading Denver up to No. 3. This weekend’s road foe, Western Michigan, was idle but moved up one spot to No. 8.

Tigers overcome key injuries, defeat third-ranked SCSU to move into tie for second place in National Collegiate Hockey Conference

By Joe Paisley

ST. CLOUD, Minn. — Colorado College picked up an impressive 4-2 road win over No. 3 St. Cloud State but it remains to be seen at what cost.

Freshman goalie Kaidan Mbereko left the National Collegiate Hockey Conference game after taking a shot off his facemask fired by SCSU’s Micah Miller while CC graduate student defenseman Bryan Yoon limped off the ice after blocking a shot late in the opening period. Forward Ray Christy also was injured. at about that time.

Senior goalie Matt Vernon replaced Mbereko with 3:19 left in the second, making 16 saves in relief.

“I have never seen anything like it,” Tigers coach Kris Mayotte told KRDO Radio, referring to three key injuries in a win. “When you consider the roles those three guys play. And how early we lost them, Yoon 10 minutes into the game, Christy 10 minutes in and Mbereko in the second period, (the win) was really, really impressive. I am proud of our guys.”

“We had some incredible individual efforts,” he added. “You can name everyone on the back end. We were down to five D on the big sheet against a big, older, experienced team. It felt like (the Tigers) got better as the game went on.”

While the severity of the injuries were unknown Friday night, the win pushed the Tigers (10-10-1, 6-4-1-0-0-1, 20 points) into a tie for second place with the Huskies (15-6, 7-4-0-1-0-0), who dominated the first period before CC rallied in the second.

“Not bad but not satisfied,” said Tyler Coffey who scored twice, referring to the tie for second. “We can face adversity and the work we put in the past two weeks showed that. It was tough to see those guys go down but we handled it well.”

The victory snapped an 11-game winless skid against SCSU, which is 10-1-1 against CC since 2019.

Colorado College roared back by taking advantage of a 5-on-3 power play by scoring goals one minute apart with Coffey ripping a shot from the right faceoff circle to beat Huskies goalie Jaxon Castor (20 saves) with 13:48 left. That came just eight seconds into the two-man advantage and tied the game at 1-1.

The Tigers sustained that momentum when leading scorer Hunter McKown scored his NCAA-leading 10^th power-play goal with 12:48 remaining for a 2-1 lead.

CC amped its defensive play over the final half of the game, taking away the Huskies’ time and space on the larger Olympic-sized ice sheet. The Tigers defensive corps forced SCSU into taking most of its shots from the outside and blocked a lot of shots.

“To see those guys rise to occasion when they had a lot of reasons to say, ‘Hey it’s not our night,” Mayotte said. “It’s our best win.”

Coffey scored the eventual game-winner just 66 seconds into the third period for his second of the NCHC game. Noah Prokop added an empty-netter with 3:35 left to seal the win before SCSU added an extra-attacker goal in the final minute. Noah Laba recorded two assists in his return to action for CC.

“We’re growing and we are going to keep building and building,” Coffey said. “This year feels a lot different.” 

SCSU took control midway through the first period after drawing two interference penalties to out shoot the visitors by a 17-4 margin. Mbereko kept CC in the game, making 14 of his 20 first-period saves before former CC captain Grant Cruikshank redirected a shot past the Tigers freshman with about two minutes left to break the deadlock. Mbereko finished with 26 stops.

The series finale is at 5 p.m. Mountain Saturday with play-by-play announcer Ken Landau’s pregame show at 4:30 p.m. on KRDO Radio in southern Colorado.

NCHC roundup

No. 4 Denver 7, Miami 0

DENVER – The league-leading Pioneers scored six goals in the second period to blow open a scoreless game and roll past the last-place RedHawks. Denver improved to 18-5 (9-2-0-2-1-0, 26 points). Carter King recorded a hat trick for the final margin early in the third.

Omaha 3, Minnesota-Duluth 2

OMAHA – Jake Pivonka scored the game-winner for fourth-place Omaha less than four minutes after a shorthanded tally by UMD’s Dominic James tied the game at 2-2 midway through the third period. The Man are now 10-10-2, 5-5-1-0-1-1, 18 points). The sixth-place Bulldogs (9-11-1, 4-7-0-1-2-0, 13 points) remain just ahead of North Dakota.

No. 12 Western Michigan 4, North Dakota 0

GRAND FORKS – The fifth-place Broncos were paced by goalie Cameron Rowe’s 25 saves in a road shutout over the seventh-place Hawks (9-9-4, 3-6-2-0-0-1, 12 points). The 13-9-1 Broncos (5-5-1-0-0-0, 16 points) visit Ed Robson Arena next weekend. Jason Polin scored twice.

Ice chips

St. Cloud finished with 44 shots, the most by an opponent this season, while CC attempted 24. … SCSU leads the all-time series against the Tigers by a 62-51-9 margin. The Huskies swept CC 3-1 and 5-0 at Ed Robson Arena earlier this season.  … The team attended the visitation services for Minnesota native Matthew Gleason’s grandmother, who passed away earlier at age 90. … St. Cloud State had one of its best 20-game starts to a season in D-I program history (since 1987-88). The Huskies’ 15 wins through 20 games is its third-most ever, trailing only its 17-1-2 mark in 2001-02 and 16-4-0 mark in 2015-16 while matching its 15-3-2 mark in 2018-19.  … After beginning the season ranked No. 13 in both polls, the Huskies reached No. 2 and are now No. 3 ahead of this weekend’s series. … UConn and Sacred Heart both opened new arenas this weekend, about one week after Princeton celebrated the 100^th year of its Hobey Baker Rink.

Monday reading: Recaps and reactions, updated WCHA standings

Here are recaps of Sunday’s notable games. The rankings will change later today.

No. 18 Wisconsin 3, No. 2 Minnesota 2

CHICAGO — Sophomore goaltender Joel Rumpel made 36 saves while sophomore forward Brendan Woods had two assists to lead Wisconsin to a 3-2 victory against Minnesota on Sunday in the OfficeMax Hockey City Classic at Chicago’s Soldier Field.

“Joel was given the game puck by the team,” Wisconsin coach Mike Eaves said. “His performance in the first period allowed us to get or feet underneath us.”

No. 12 Notre Dame 2, No. 3 Miami 1

CHICAGO — Notre Dame clinched a first-round CCHA playoff bye with a 2-1 win over Miami at the Hockey City Classic at Soldier Field, its first win over the RedHawks since Dec. 3, 2010.

Notre Dame freshman forward Mario Lucia opened the scoring midway through the second period. Junior forward Jeff Costello increased the Irish’s lead, finding the back of the net at the 8:33 mark of the third period.

Miami freshman forward Kevin Morris cut Notre Dame’s lead in half, but that was the only goal the RedHawks would score as Notre Dame held on for the win. Junior goaltender Steven Summerhays made 22 saves for Notre Dame, while Miami freshman goaltender Ryan McKay turned aside 26 shots.

Also, it was a tough week to be a top team as the Gophers beat writer points out.

No. 9 Minnesota State, the only top 10 team to sweep an opponent, is in third place in the WCHA entering a bye week.

2012-2013 WCHA STANDINGS

		WCHA Games								Overall
		GP	W	L	T	Pts	GF	GA		W	L	T	GF	GA
1	St. Cloud State	22	15	6	1	31	74	47		18	11	1	99	72
2	Nebraska Omaha	24	14	8	2	30	83	70		18	12	2	112	88
3	Minnesota State	24	14	9	1	29	77	57		20	9	3	104	71
4	Minnesota	22	12	6	4	28	73	53		20	6	4	110	59
	North Dakota	22	11	5	6	28	72	56		16	8	6	96	74
6	Wisconsin	24	10	7	7	27	54	53		13	10	7	68	62
7	Denver	22	10	7	5	25	70	64		15	9	5	98	77
8	Colorado College	22	8	10	4	20	72	77		11	14	5	100	105
	Minnesota Duluth	24	8	12	4	20	59	72		10	16	4	73	89
10	Bemidji State	24	5	13	6	16	50	72		6	17	7	62	89
	Michigan Tech	24	6	14	4	16	62	82		10	16	4	89	94
12	Alaska Anchorage	26	2	18	6	10	50	93		4	19	7	61	104

WCHA roundup: OT win puts Nebraska-Omaha in second place

From the WCHA …

No. 16 Nebraska-Omaha 6, Alaska-Anchorage 5 OT

ANCHORAGE — Johnnie Searfoss scored with 32 seconds left in overtime to lift Nebraska-Omaha to a 6-5 win at Alaska-Anchorage, which scored four power-play goals.

The win pushes UNO (18-12-2, 14-8-2) into second place in the WCHA.

No. 2 Minnesota could tie UNO with a win over No. 18 Wisconsin in the Windy City Classic outdoor games on Sunday.

No. 9 Minnesota State 6, Michigan Tech 1

MANKATO — Freshman goaltender Stephon Williams tied a career high with 37 saves and five different Mavericks had multiple-point games to lead Minnesota State to Saturday night’s 6-1 win against Michigan Tech at Verizon Wireless Center.

Minnesota-Duluth 1, Bemidji State 1 OT

BEMIDJI – Brady Wacker scored his third goal of the season to break a scoreless deadlock late in the second period, but the Beavers were unable to hold the lead as Cody Danberg scored his first goal since 2010 to help UMD force overtime at Sanford Center.

With one point and the draw, the Beavers earned three points this weekend to garner their first series victory of the season, move to 6-17-7 overall and 5-13-5 in WCHA play to climb into a tie with Michigan Tech for 10th place in the league standings.

Tuesday reading: UND fans, polls, WMU, web media poll

The North Dakota team is back in Grand Forks as I am sure are most of the fans after a winter storm hit North and South Dakota when a few thousand UND fans tried to drive back from Omaha.

Most were stranded in towns all along the highway and did the best they could to entertain themselves as the GF Herald beat writer details here. I want in on the high-stakes rubber duck races too. Photo is courtesy of GF Herald.

Here is a look at the polls, SCSU and the Beanpot Tournament and a look back at the Minnesota-Huskies split.

Western Michigan, a future NCHC foe for CC, picked up a commit.

This week’s WCHA web media poll:

Pts	Previous	Record	High	Low
1)	Minnesota (7)	138	1	19-5-4	1	3
2)	St. Cloud State (5)	136	2	18-11-1	1	3
3)	North Dakota	122	3	16-8-6	2	3
4)	Denver	96	4	15-9-5	4	6
5)	Nebraska Omaha	95	5	16-12-2	4	7
6)	Minnesota State	88	7	18-9-3	4	7
7)	Wisconsin	78	6	12-9-7	4	8
8)	Colorado College	62	9	11-14-5	7	9
9)	Minnesota Duluth	46	8	10-15-3	9	10
10)	Michigan Tech	39	10	9-14-4	8	10
11)	Bemidji State	24	11	5-17-6	11	11
12)	Alaska Anchorage	12	12	4-17-7	12	12

Friday reading: CC, previews, UND video, UAH, outdoor hockey

The Gazette’s David Ramsey talks about CC goalie Josh Thorimbert’s season. Both the Tigers and the visiting Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs know how big this series is for home playoff ice.

The buzz about the No. 6 North Dakota at No. 1 Minnesota series is reaching a fever pitch. Here are links to everything you need to know from the Grand Forks Herald.

The Mankato Free Press provides plenty of links about the other series.

Two future CC players were among the 19 future NCHC student-athletes who made the NHL Draft midterm rankings. Here are short previews on the future NCHC schools in action this weekend.

Here is the Air Force preview for its Saturday-Sunday road series at last-place Sacred Heart.

This news made my Thursday:  Here is more on the Alabama-Huntsville joining the WCHA from the Huntsville paper and details from USCHO which broke the news. There were some concerns that the travel subsidy and the fact that this means one less trip to Alaska each season apparently eased.

It was also a good night for me personally since I got to cover an outdoor club hockey game. Cold but a lot of fun. It was a good reminder what makes hockey such a great sport to be around.

WCHA roundup: UNO, Denver tie keeps both atop WCHA

No. 7 North Dakota 5, Colorado College 3

GRAND FORKS — Senior forward Danny Kristo had two goals and two assists and junior forward Mitch MacMillan added a goal and an assist to lift North Dakota to a 5-3 victory against Colorado College on Saturday night at Engelstad Arena.

CC’s Scott Winkler a nine game goalless streak with two in the first period while Rylan Schwartz scored to tie the game at 3-3 in the third period.

Here is the article on CCTigers.com.

No. 13 Nebraska-Omaha 3, No. 9 Denver 3 OT

DENVER — Junior forward Ryan Walters scored at 17:43 of the second period to lift the Nebraska Omaha Mavericks into a 3-3 tie with the Denver Pioneers on Saturday night at Magness Arena.

No. 1 Minnesota 7, Alaska-Anchorage 1

MINNEAPOLIS — Sophomore Kyle Rau recorded his first career hat trick and Nate Schmidt posted a career-high four assists as No. 1 Minnesota earned a decisive 7-1 win over Alaska-Anchorage on Saturday night, picking up the Gophers’ first Western Collegiate Hockey Association sweep of the season in the process.

With Minnesota’s first hat trick since Nick Bjugstad against St. Cloud State in a 5-0 win on Nov. 19, 2011, Rau ended Bjugstad’s one-day reign as Minnesota’s leading goal scorer on Saturday night against the Seawolves. The sophomore ended the night with 13 scores this season, enough to move into a tie for second in the league this year – one off the WCHA lead.

Here is video of Rau’s third goal.

Minnesota Duluth 5, Michigan Tech 4

DULUTH — Freshman forward Tony Cameranesi posted two goals and an assist and senior forward Mike Seidel added three assists to lead Minnesota Duluth to a 5-4 victory against Michigan Tech on Saturday night at AMSOIL Arena.

Wisconsin 2, No. 11 Minnesota State 1

MANKATO — Senior defenseman John Ramage scored his second overtime goal in as many nights to lift Wisconsin to a 2-1 win against Minnesota State on Saturday night at Verizon Wireless Center.

2012-2013 WCHA STANDINGS

		WCHA Games								Overall
		GP	W	L	T	Pts	GF	GA		W	L	T	GF	GA
1	Denver	16	8	4	4	20	54	44		13	6	4	82	57
	Nebraska Omaha	16	9	5	2	20	59	49		13	9	2	88	67
3	Minnesota	14	8	3	3	19	47	34		16	3	3	84	40
	North Dakota	14	8	3	3	19	52	37		13	6	3	76	55
5	St. Cloud State	14	9	5	0	18	45	33		12	10	0	70	58
6	Minnesota Duluth	16	7	6	3	17	46	44		9	10	3	60	61
	Wisconsin	16	6	5	5	17	35	36		8	7	5	47	43
8	Minnesota State	16	8	8	0	16	48	43		14	8	2	75	57
9	Colorado College	16	6	9	1	13	53	62		9	13	2	81	90
10	Bemidji State	14	4	7	3	11	34	43		5	11	4	46	60
11	Michigan Tech	16	3	10	3	9	38	59		6	12	3	57	69
12	Alaska Anchorage	16	1	12	3	5	28	55		3	13	4	39	6

WCHA roundup: CC snaps winless skid; Denver downs UNO

From CC sports information and the WCHA …

Colorado College 4, No. 7 North Dakota 3
GRAND FORKS, N.D. — Streaks, good or bad, often don’t mean that much.

That certainly played out tonight as Colorado College snapped a 7-game winless streak (0-6-1) and ended North Dakota’s 7-game unbeaten streak (6-0-1) with a 4-3 Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) victory.

“Our shoulders aren’t as slumped as you think they’d be,” Tigers coach Scott Owens said.  “Despite our six or seven weeks, because we have played decent, we come to work every day with a smile on our face and work hard. It’s just nice for the kids to get rewarded a little bit. We’ve been bad some games and pretty good some games that we haven’t won either. So we will take it as a positive, enjoy it for an hour and square ourselves away.”

The loss, just North Dakota’s second in 11 games at Ralph Engelstad Arena this season. deprived North Dakota of a chance to move into a tie for first place in the WCHA, with league-leading Nebraska Omaha losing to Denver tonight.

Instead, Colorado College won it on a goal-mouth deflection by junior wing Jeff Collett at 12:56 of the third period, snapping a 3-3 tie. It was just his second goal of the season. North Dakota had tied it at 2:44 of the final period on a dazzling dash down the right wing by sophomore center Mark MacMillan.

MacMillan used his great speed to go around CC defensemen Aaron Harstad and Eamonn McDermott, then cut across the crease and slid his shot past the stick of sprawling CC goalie Joe Howe. Here is video of that score:

I will post a CC video when available.

No. 9 Denver 7, No. 13 Nebraska Omaha 4
DENVER — With the game tied 4-4, sophomore forward Zac Larraza scored twice in a 1:56 span of the third period to give Denver a lead it would not relinquish as the Pioneers defeated Nebraska Omaha, 7-4, on Friday at Magness Arena.
Wisconsin 4, No. 11 Minnesota State 3 OT
MANKATO — Senior defenseman John Ramage scored at 4:28 of overtime to lift Wisconsin to Friday night’s 4-3 win against Minnesota State in a back-and-forth battle at Verizon Wireless Center.
No. 1 Minnesota 4, Alaska-Anchorage 3
MINNEAPOLIS — Sophomore defenseman Ben Marshall scored Minnesota’s third power-play goal of the game at 19:09 of the third period to propel the Gophers to a 4-3 win against Alaska Anchorage on Friday night at Mariucci Arena.
Minnesota Duluth 1, Michigan Tech 0
DULUTH — Junior forward Joe Basaraba scored the only goal of the game and freshman Matt McNeely earned his first career shutout with 28 saves as Minnesota Duluth topped Michigan Tech, 1-0, on Friday night at AMSOIL Arena.

Friday reading: CC, UND video, J. Schwartz, Rothstein, AFA, WCHA

Gazette columnist David Ramsey opines on the state of the CC team this season. Here are preview notes on the Tigers and on North Dakota.

Here is the Grand Forks Herald video preview concerning this weekend’s home series against CC.

Former Tiger Jaden Schwartz is back in the Blues training camp.

CC commit Sam Rothstein is a big reason (4g, 6a) the Sioux Falls Stampede have won nine of its last 10 in the USHL.

An Air Force player is out for the season with a concussion.

Sophomore goalie Ryan Massa is back for Nebraska Omaha. Western Michigan picked up a commit as did UNO.

Here is a look at the Anchorage at Minnesota series. Minnesota Duluth will be shorthanded for this weekend’s home series against Michigan Tech.

Boston College coach Jerry York will miss the New Hampshire series this weekend to recover from eye surgery.

A little-used Michigan freshman heads to the OHL.