It’s the beginning of the year, we’re half way through the season and we all started staring intently at the PWR (and KRACH) last weekend. Last weekend marked the last real “full-fledged” non-conference weekend with a lot of significant interconference matchups in holiday tournaments.

Two teams that everyone will need to keep an eye on for the rest of the season are Bemidji State and Niagara. The Beavers currently rank 14th in the PWR, and currently have series against North Dakota and Michigan Tech upcoming. Games that could not only break the hearts of Sioux and Huskies’ fans, but also teams below the Beavers in the PWR.

How so? Bemidji sits in second in the CHA behind Niagara. If the Purple Eagles can take the conference tournament, and Bemidji plays well the rest of the season someone else from the Big Four may be sitting out. Niagara doesn’t have to face Bemidji again this season after winning one and tying the Beavers in the other three. The Purple Eagles do have a couple of big series coming up themselves facing Denver and Quinnipiac, it’s too tough to tell now if they could move up in the comparisons for an at-large if they won the vast majority of their games, but lets not rule it out.

Tuesday, January 2nd, 2007 - 9:51 pm | Uncategorized