The Top NCAA Hockey Storylines To Follow In 2026-27

College hockey increasingly dominates the non-professional levels of the sport in terms of its clout and impact.

As you might imagine with more than 60 teams and six conferences — plus a handful of independent clubs — there's no shortage of storylines that emerge each season.

From the teams projected to get to the Frozen Four and the players who will guide them there, to the ones that are just starting new eras, here's what to watch for as the season begins:

Last spring, Denver won its NCAA-record 11th national championship, putting even more distance between itself and the next-closest team (Michigan's nine). It was the Pioneers' third title since 2022, but more than that, it extended the run of dominance from Western teams to eight of the last 10 national titles.

There's little reason, at this early stage, to think that won't continue. The top six teams in the preseason U.S. College Hockey Online poll are in the West, as well as 11 of the top 20, and 19 of the 37 that received any votes at all.

Denver is there at No. 1, of course, but so is Michigan (ranked second, with six first-place votes), Michigan State (third with seven), and North Dakota (fourth with two).

The first Eastern team is seventh-ranked Quinnipiac, while teams like Providence, Massachusetts, Dartmouth, Boston College, Cornell, UConn, and Boston University are also in the top 16. Put another way, lots of voters seem to think those teams will be quite good, but not truly great.

It is, of course, not impossible for the Eastern teams to prove the doubters wrong or find some bulletin-board material here, but there will certainly be a lot of hurdles to clear between now and the Frozen Four in April.

Part of the reason those Western schools are seen as so dominant is that many of them have been far more effective when it comes to attracting and retaining top prospects from the OHL and WHL, in particular.

In all, 14 picks from the first round of the 2026 NHL Draft — including nine of the top 15 — are on college rosters this fall, including four at Michigan State, then two each at Denver, North Dakota, and BU.

A total of 29 past first-round picks and 30 second-rounders will play NCAA hockey this season. So, too, will a pair of likely first-round picks in the 2027 draft: presumptive No. 1 Landon DuPont (Michigan) and a potential top-10 guy in Sammy Nelson (Notre Dame).

The reason for this is simple: NHL teams like that these prospects, most of whom played in the CHL at some point in the past two seasons, can now get lots of reps against players that can be as old as 25 or 26.

There was always a lot to like about what major junior offered, but the choice between taking a bus across Saskatchewan in February or playing two games a week on big college campuses where you can get paid a good amount of NIL money isn't really a choice at all for most of these players, especially if the college experience will more effectively prepare them to play pro hockey in the next year or two.

By far the biggest story of the off-season is the fact that 21-year-old Arizona State defenseman and St. Louis Blues prospect Matthew Mayich collapsed at an outdoor team workout on Aug. 20 and has been in a coma ever since.

The club has largely continued to operate as normal since the incident, while reviews and investigations continued around them. 

But it was all overshadowed by Mayich's condition, and the ongoing response (or lack thereof) by the school. It seemed that every week, there was another twist, including Monday's revelation that a number of players on the team sent a letter to ASU's president asking for head coach Greg Powers and the rest of the coaching staff to be put on administrative leave.

They did so anonymously for fear of reprisal from the coaches, and detailed numerous instances of the school's own "initial review" of the events surrounding Mayich's collapse. None of the details, whether agreed upon or not, put the people in charge look especially good.

Powers has since been placed on administrative leave.

The fact that this letter and this decision follows a few weeks of speculation about whether the team's season would take place at all, and comes less than a week before their first scheduled game (on the road against Lindenwood on Oct. 2), all while other investigations are ongoing, leaves more questions than answers.

It's become increasingly common in college hockey for programs to move on from coaches with some frequency.

Last season, a whopping 10 teams got new coaches, and this year, another six step into those roles as well.

These include Eric Rud at Alaska-Anchorage, Top Upton at Brown, Rob Rassey at Harvard, Brett Larson at Minnesota, Nick Oliver at St. Cloud State, and Jeff Hamilton at Yale.

All of these coaches are taking on rebuilding projects, to one extent or another, instead of simply inheriting successful teams from retiring coaches as guys like Cornell's Casey Jones or North Dakota's Dane Jackson did last season.

The fact that 34 of the 64 Div. 1 teams have changed coaches since 2021-22 probably means this isn't a trend that's going to change anytime soon, but it also means more than half of all teams have relatively new coaches who need some runway to reshape the program in their own style. Often, that kind of project takes four or five years, and the success isn't linear, so it'll be interesting to see how all these coaches can do in Year 1.

Finally, one of those new coaches is Maryville's John Hogan, who is helping the Saints begin the process of elevating their program from the club level to Div. 1 over a process of a few years.

The Saints open the season for a pair at St. Lawrence, as part of a mixed schedule that includes some Div. 3 and club opponents, the U.S. National Team Development Program, and 18 games (both exhibition and non-conference) against Div. 1 teams like Bowling Green, Quinnipiac, Yale, Princeton, Holy Cross, Lindenwood, and more.

What they're calling a "transition" season will give way to a full Div. 1 slate starting in 2027-28. The expectation is, and should be, that this team will not do very well in terms of its win-loss record, but this season is just about building positive momentum.

For action-packed issues, access to the entire magazine archive and a free issue, subscribe to The Hockey News at THN.com/free.

See more of The Hockey News on Google and save us as a preferred source. Get the latest news and trending stories by subscribing to our newsletter here. And share your thoughts by commenting below the article on THN.com or creating your own post in our community forum.