Michigan, North Dakota, Michigan State, and Western Michigan lead the charge as top seeds. Discover every regional matchup and key players to watch.
Selection Sunday has been revealed, with each regional showcasing tons of talent. A look at all four teams, with a breakdown of each regional as well.
Albany Regional: Michigan the overall #1 seed
A team so dominant this season that even with a loss in the Big Ten Championship game, they would still hold the #1 seed no matter what. Still, that didn’t put the brake pedal to their game, steamrolling Ohio State with a 7-3 win on the wings of a strong third-period effort.
Michigan faces AHA Champion Bentley in the first round at 4:30 PM CDT on Friday, March 27, with the star show of Max Plante and the Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs taking on Gavin McKenna and the Penn State Nittany Lions to follow at 8 PM CDT.
Penn State lost to Michigan in the Big Ten Semifinals 5-2, and will seek a chance to win and meet with the Wolverines again. That won’t come easily as they’ll have to get by the Plante brothers and a Bulldogs squadron who came just short of claiming the NCHC title. Their most recent win is against the #2 team in the entire tournament, as you’ll see here.
Sioux Falls Regional: North Dakota the overall #2 seed
The North Dakota Fighting Hawks will take a four-hour drive south to the neighboring state of South Dakota, as they’ll play a host role with major home ice advantage compared to the other competition here.
Providence has the home bench against Quinnipiac to open up play on Thursday, March 26, in Sioux Falls at 4 PM CST, with North Dakota the higher seed against the Cinderella story Merrimack to follow at 7:30 PM.
Merrimack completed its auto bid to the tournament after beating UConn at TD Garden yesterday, becoming the first eight seed to win the Hockey East tournament.
Providence and Quinnipiac will be a battle of whoever can get back on track first. Two teams that were the top tournament seeds of their respective conferences got knocked out in the quarterfinals by eight seeds, as Providence lost to Merrimack in overtime, and Quinnipiac was swept, shockingly by Clarkson.
Worcester Regional: Michigan State the overall #3 seed
The Big Ten regular-season champions will try to recollect their winning ways as they’ll be the top seed in the Worcester regional.
The first opponent for them will not be easy, as Michigan State takes on UConn to open the tournament at 12:30 PM on Thursday to open up the party for the NCAA tournament. UConn snuck into an at-large bid, a third-place regular-season and tournament runner-up in the Hockey East, ending up enough. Dartmouth and Wisconsin will follow at 4 PM.
Dartmouth has been electrifying since the start, winning the ECAC in overtime over Princeton last night and making the NCAA tournament for the first time in 46 years. Wisconsin is glad to be in after a shocking quarterfinal loss to Ohio State to start and end their postseason run in the Big Ten.
Loveland Regional: Western Michigan the overall #1 seed
The state of Michigan holds three of the top four seeds in the NCAA tournament, but Western Michigan is not exactly within the radius of this regional in Loveland, CO.
On Friday, Western Michigan will take on CCHA champion Minnesota State at 1:30 PM CDT, while Denver will practically have home ice advantage against Cornell at 5:00 PM CDT.
There is a likely chance we could get Denver and Western Michigan in the regional final, which means more incredible action between two teams battling at the Frozen Four last year and even as recent as the NCHC semifinal this year, which Denver went on to win alongside the entire conference title.
A look at the full bracket is below for what is an unpredictable tournament to come.