It was an up and down weekend for league teams. St. Lawrence and Clarkson swept UNH, but struggled against Merrimack. RPI dropped two non-conference games to the Alaska teams and Union went 1-0-1 against Maine. Overall, the conference is 13-7-2 against non- league opponents and more importantly in the comparison with Hockey East the two premier eastern conferences are 4-4-1 against each other. Quinnipiac will play a game against Maine on Tuesday night, a game I am looking forward to catching in Hamden.

Next weekend brings about many great non-conference matchups at league rinks.Clarkson hosts Western Michigan for a pair, SLU has Miami for a weekend series, Quinnipiac gets St. Cloud State and Michigan hits the capital region, with games at RPI and Union. This could be a make or break weekend in terms of pairwise and I look forward to seeing where the ECAC is in comparison to the NCHC and BIG. The NCHC has been dominant the last couple of years and it will prove to be a challenge. I feel more confident going into this weekend than I have in the past. I am convinced the league will pick up a few big wins. Read the rest of this entry »

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The results around Hockey East on opening weekend where, in a word, interesting. UMass swept Colorado College, Boston College and Boston University both suffered losses in the Capital Region while Providence impressed at Miami, Lowell beat a good RPI team and Maine picked up two ties in the IceBreaker, including one against North Dakota.

It’s dangerous to make any assumptions about a team — good or bad — based on one or two games, but here goes nothing …

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This is the first full weekend of play for all Big Ten teams. There’s still time until conference contests kicks off, but this weekend features some interesting matchups and in-state rivalries.

A weekend against Minnesota-Duluth will give the Gophers an early chance to show the kind of team they are. Minnesota needs its junior class to lead the team, and the Gophers need to find a goaltender who can be an adequate last line of defense.

The Buckeyes have a tough challenge in Miami, while Michigan will open its season against Mercyhurst. Penn State hosts Notre Dame, while the Badgers travel East to face Boston University and Boston College.

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In what very could go down as one of the most important weeks of the season for ECAC teams, league teams went 9-2-1 in non-conference play. Union and RPI had the most impressive wins of the week with victories over Boston University and Boston College, respectively. Those wins will be huge for the pairwise boost in the future, as both will probably be near the top come the end of the season. The league schedule will kick off in two weeks, as Harvard and Dartmouth will kickoff the slate with a pair on Halloween weekend. I wasn’t going to write this week, but there is a point I wanted to get across that is hardly league related but it is. Without much ado, here are my thoughts of the week. Read the rest of this entry »

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College hockey fully kicked off last week, and it featured five Big Ten teams in action. The Wolverines and their high-powered offense sat out, while Penn State, Ohio State, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan State all participated in out-of-conference contests.

The Spartans narrowly lost the Ice Breaker Tournament after tying Maine and defeated Lake Superior State. Minnesota dropped a contest to Vermont, Penn State defeated Canisius, Bowling Green swept Ohio State and Wisconsin tied Northern Michigan.

It’s still early in the season so there’s no reason to panic. But there were some points of reassurance and some issues of concern in the opening weekend.

(After the jump: Not last year’s Wisconsin, Eric Schierhorn and Minnesota’s struggles)
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Portland, Maine – It seemed as though, Lake Superior State was going to put up the upset of the the early season. The Lakers scored two early goals, off of snipes in the slot by J.T Henke and Mitch Hults.  It also had an early goal that was disallowed because it was hit in by a hand, just 11 seconds into the contest. It was able to escape out of the period with the 2-0 lead, but the second period brought about a much different scenario. UND scored three goals in the first eight minutes, seven

The seeds were able placed at the end of the first period, for UND to take over the game. For much of the second half of the firrst period, North Dakota poured shot after shot onto Laker goalie, Gordon Defiel. UND outshot the Lakers, 12-0 in the remaining moments of the first. The onslaught continued in the second and its opponent wasn’t able to register a shot til about the midway point of the second period.

Lake Superior had chances to tie. Drake Cagguila was assessed a five minute game misconduct late in the second period and North Dakota took two quick penalties early in the third to give its opponent . But a restless, non-existent power play and good kill by North Dakota stymied any opportunity for a comeback. North Dakota added another in the third period, and poured more shots onto Defiel. North Dakota outshot its opponent 45-26 in the game. Read the rest of this entry »

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College hockey is already underway, as Mercyhurst and Colgate opened the action last weekend. This week marks opening competition for Big Ten teams, which features five out-of-conference matchups. Michigan, which defeated Toronto 8-1 in an exhibition game, has a bye.

The Buckeyes will face in-state rival Bowling Green, one of the best teams in the WCHA last season. Michigan State travels to Maine for the IceBreaker tournament to face Maine and Lake Superior State. Minnesota hosts Vermont, Penn State travels to Canisius and Wisconsin hosts Northern Michigan. Read the rest of this entry »

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Practices officially open on Saturday, which means college hockey is back this weekend. In Hockey East, 10 teams will host exhibitions with CIS programs Saturday and Sunday. Let’s take a look at them:

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BOSTON — Hockey East officially announced its agreement with American Sports Network to produce its league television slate. It’s a two-year contract and will consist of 14 games for this upcoming season.

ASN is a production company, and will produce the games for its series of networks. Locally, it’s likely that games will continue to air on NESN, though that portion of the deal was not formally announced by the league on Monday.

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BOSTON — With just two weeks to go before the exhibition season officially kicks off, a trio of Hockey East teams are entering the year with question marks thanks to some injuries to top players.

On Monday at the league’s media day, held at TD Garden, Boston College head coach Jerry York confirmed to WEEI.com’s Scott McLaughlin that goaltender Thatcher Demko could miss the start of the upcoming season. That’s certainly not what the favorited Eagles need heading into the season, though BC doesn’t play a league game until Nov. 3 when it hosts a UMass team that was picked to finish last in Hockey East.

Demko had surgery on his hips in the offseason. It’s the type of surgery that’s becoming more common for players at that position.

Down the road, Boston University defenseman Matt Grzelcyk is also unlikely to be ready for the start of the season after undergoing knee surgery over the summer. The BU captain is a key piece for the Terriers this season, who last Jack Eichel, Evan Rodrigues, Matt O’Connor and others off a team that won the Hockey East Championship last March.

Grzelcyk has been skating, but BU head coach David Quinn said on Monday that the Terriers will likely err on the side of caution and not rush him back into action.

UConn goaltender Rob Nichols had similar surgery to Demko, and according to a report in last week’s Hartford Courant, he might also not be ready for the start of the season. Nichols reportedly just got back on the ice last week and still hasn’t skated in back-to-back days, nor has he been cleared for game action.

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