About three seasons ago, to have league teams playing the likes of Miami, St. Cloud State, Michigan and UNH all on the same weekend would have probably been a stretch. This week four of the top programs will visit league rinks. St. Lawrence will host Miami at Appelton, Michigan will travel to Union and RPI, UNH visits Messa rink to play Union and finally two undefeated teams will faceoff in Hamden, as Quinipiac plays host to St. Cloud. The visit from Michigan will mark its first trip to an ECAC rink since, January 3rd 1988.

The highlight of the weekend will be St. Cloud and Quinnipiac. Both teams enter the weekend undefeated, at 4-0. Quinnipiac is in dire need of a team to challenge them in non-conference play, which the Huskies certainly will. While Quinnipiac has played the likes of Holy Cross, Arizona State and Maine, its opponent is coming off a weekend sweep of Minnesota State. Quinnipiac looked the part as a good team on Tuesday against Maine, dominating its opponent on the scoreboard and in shots, but a real challenge is something they have yet to receive.

The Bobcats will need to find a way to beat Charlie Lindgren, who has three shutouts in his three starts. Last weekend against Minnesota State, he sent aside all 54 of the shots that he saw.The two teams split a weekend series last season, with Quinnipiac picking up a 4-1 win against Lindgren in the finale of that series. If anything, Quinnipiac has the confidence that it cant beat the Huskies. Based on how Quinnipiac played against Maine on Tuesday, I feel as though they may again be highly underrated. They have a huge chance to prove me right this weekend.

While it is a stretch to say that this weekend has the chance to be a make or break weekend within the league, it is however a huge weekend in terms of the pairwise. Miami, St. Cloud and Michigan will probably all be tournament teams at the end of the year, while UNH will be midpack in Hockey East. Because the league has six games against the NCHC, the games are magnified because of how little the ECAC plays the preeminent conference in college hockey.  Last season, the NCHC had the best inter-conference record of all the conferences by far. Michigan out of the Big Ten will also provide a challenge to capital region teams and those games will be magnified as well.

Miami at St. Lawrence (Friday and Saturday)

Last year the two teams split in Oxford Ohio, with Kyle Hayton making a huge splash having a huge weekend and saving his team from being routed twice while also stealing a win. The Saints are a much different team this season and were to end last year. SLU dropped a game at Merrimack last weekend, but based on the ECAC’s recent history in that building that is hardly a cause for alarm.

While Hayton hasn’t really been the goaltender he was for a good portion of last season, he really hasn’t had to be because he has more help. I really liked what I saw from them at UNH last Friday. The defensive core is much improved, which I said they would be in preseason, and they are again exploiting a scoring by committee system that has worked for them the last few seasons. This season the Saints have recieved points from 18 different skaters and have goals from 10. It is much like what SLU did last season.

Miami is a perennial NCAA tournament participant, making the tournament nine times in the past decade. SLU and the ECAC need wins against a team with the pedigree of Miami and one has to give them a chance. Miami is 2-1-1 on the young season, after sweeping Ohio State last weekend and picking up a lone tie against Providence on the road. One should expect these teams to play a fast paced, up and down style of game, as both usually play that way.

Pick: Split

Union vs Michigan/UNH (Michigan; Friday. UNH; Saturday)

Union has failed to impress in four games, albeit still being undefeated. A win over BU at home, is an ok win despite the Terriers having some question marks coming into the year. But ties against Maine and Sacred Heart are much more concerning to me than how impressive that one win in the first weekend was. The Dutchmen have scored just five goals in its four games this season, while only scoring a mere four against Sacred Heart and Maine in three games. The loss of Daniel Ciampini is proving to be large, but Union did pick up a win and a tie at home against Maine last weekend.

Jake Kupsky and Alex Sakellaroupoulos have provided a consistent goaltending charge in net but they also have played two of the worst offenses in college hockey, in Maine and Scared Heart. Kupsky picked up a shutout in his first career start against Maine on Saturday.

Michigan enters the weekend undefeated, after a weekend sweep of Mercyhurst at Yost. The Wolverines have a high powered offense, which could give Union some fits. UNH will enter off a bit of a lull after being swept at home against SLU and Clarkson. UNH, like UNH teams of the past few seasons, has talent to put it together for short periods but can’t play 60 minutes. It spotted Clarkson and SLU early 2-0 leads, came back and then lost on the last shot in each game. Tyler Kelleher is a player to watch for UNH, as he can create offense like few players can.

Picks: Union drops both

Michigan at RPI (Friday and Saturday)

RPI dropped a pair against the Alaska schools last weekend and didn’t look good in the process. Jason Kasdorf is going to be the key for them against the Wolverines this weekend and given his home performance against Boston College, one should expect him to have a rockstar performance against Michigan. The question will be is whether it will be enough for RPI to pull the upset of the weekend?

One interesting note on the RPI and Michigan series, is that in 1985 the Engineers defeated the Wolverines 6-4 en route to its national title. The visit will be the first to Troy since Red Berenson’s first year at the helm in Michigan, 1984-1985. RPI leads the all time series, 7-5-1.

Pick: RPI behind Kasdorf gets the upset

Western Michigan at Clarkson (Friday and Saturday)

Clarkson will play WMU for the first time in 20 seasons, as the Broncos will visit Potsdam for a weekend pair. Clarkson picked up a huge win at UNH last Saturday, after it dropped a laugher at Merrimack on Friday. The game was a good rebound and it showed the character of this Golden Knight team. I was most impressed with the skating ability in that game, as the Knights are often known as a beating and banging type of team but against UNH it showed that it has the ability to be an efficient skating team.

For Clarkson to have success against the Broncos, its goaltending needs to be better. Steve Perry had a rough go of it on Friday night, but rebounded a little on Saturday. It is something that had the chance to be the weakness for them this season and it has. The offense is better and its power-play is operating at 33 percent so far this year, a far cry from where it has been in recent seasons. These are winnable games for Clarkson against an NCHC foe and I totally expect them to be better at home than they were last weekend.

WMU picked up an impressive win against Bowling Green last weekend, who looks poised for another breakout season. The Broncos have scored eight goals in its three games and senior Luke Hafner has a 0.96 GAA in two games this season, allowing two goals in that game one of which being in overtime. Tech should be able to pick up some possession against the Broncos, because in three games its opponent has a 43.2 percent corsi for, one of the lowest in the nation.

Picks: Clarkson Sweeps

RIT at Colgate, Colgate at RIT

For the third time this season, RIT will face an ECAC opponent. Earlier this season, the Tigers struggled in two games against the North Country. Gate has unexpectedly struggled in the early going, dropping games to Mercyhurst and Northeastern. Its 1-2-0 record is hardly where I thought it would be but the defense has been a problem. The Raiders have given up 13 goals in three, nine of which being in one game against Mercyhurst. It had last weekend off, while the Tigers picked up a tie against Bowling Green.

Pick: Colgate Sweeps

Thursday, October 22nd, 2015 - 8:20 pm | Blogs, ECAC, Notes, Thoughts, Ramblings