After seeing his team squander the opportunity to punch a ticket to Detroit for the CCHA Tournament semifinals after being eliminated by Miami (Ohio) this last weekend, Anastos still said his team remains “seriously in the mix” to secure an NCAA Tournament bid.

“We’ve been tested all season long and, for the most part, have answered that bell pretty well,” Anastos said.

“This particular last weekend, we didn’t, but we’re hoping to have an opportunity to play and compete in the national tournament. The unfortunate part is that’s all we can do is wait and see.”

The Spartans currently sit in a tie for 14th in the PairWise Rankings, which is a system that judges teams in four criteria: record against common opponents, head-to-head competition, record against other Teams Under Consideration, or TUC, and if a team has played 10 or more games against TUC and the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI).

As it sits, MSU has an RPI of .5364 — slightly ahead of Western Michigan and Northern Michigan for a spot in the 16-team NCAA Tournament field — before a final weekend of play with the Broncos and others still in the mix to bump the Spartans out.

With the team potentially on the outside looking in, the weekend leaves an opportunity to scoreboard watch and root for wins by Michigan, Miami (Ohio), Union, Boston College, Boston, Maine and/or Minnesota-Duluth while rooting against WMU, Harvard, Cornell, Colgate and Providence, among others.

Even with the possibility of having to pull for U-M in a potential matchup with Western Michigan in the CCHA Tournament final, the likelihood of securing a bid mostly is out of the Spartans’ hands because of their own performance, Krug said.

“You want to watch all the games, and you want to see things go your way,” Krug said. “Sometimes you just gotta turn your head. I don’t know if I want to watch all of the scores, but I guess we’re going to have to.”