No. 2 seed MSU heads into the weekend knowing it needs two wins to claim its fourth CCHA Tournament title in five years.
The Spartans (26-7-5) just don’t know who they’ll have to beat to win the Mason Cup, named after MSUhead coach Ron Mason.
Six teams still are alive as the second weekend of the CCHA Tournament starts today - up from the usual four. That means the top two seeds (MSU and Michigan) receive a quarterfinal bye and await the victors of today’s games at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.
MSU plays in the semifinals at 5:35 p.m. Saturday, following U-M’s 2:05 p.m. game. The CCHA Tournament championship game is at 3:05 p.m. Sunday, and the first 5,000 fans who enter Joe Louis Arena will receive a free Ron Mason bobblehead doll.
“It would be neat to know who it is, but I’ll take the bye,” said Mason. “The teams now are all good teams. We’ve got to play well in every zone, we’ve got to be a little more patient in what we do, we have to take advantage of our power play chances.
“You can’t just assume you’re going to win the game. You have to come out and play hard for 60, 70 minutes, whatever it takes.”
MSU has three possibilities for a semifinal opponent - No. 3 seed Northern Michigan, No. 4 seed Alaska-Fairbanks or No. 5 seed Ohio State. Northern plays No. 6 seed Notre Dame at 4:05 p.m. today and Fairbanks tangles with Ohio State at 7:35 p.m. today.
The Spartans will face the highest-seeded quarterfinal winner, which will be Northern if the Wildcats beat the Fighting Irish. If Notre Dame wins, MSU will play the winner of Fairbanks vs. Ohio State.
Looking strictly at the numbers this season, MSU might want to face Northern on Saturday. The Spartans swept a two-game series from the Wildcats in Marquette in December, while going 1-1 against Fairbanks and 2-0-2 versus Ohio State this season.
“I don’t think it’s going to be too big of a problem to not know who we’re playing, we’ve played all these teams before,” junior goaltender Ryan Miller said. “It shouldn’t take long, after we figure out who we’re playing, to put together a tendency game plan.
“Not much is going to change from our standpoint.”
While MSU will have some familiarity with whomever it plays Saturday, memories are known to fade during the course of a season. MSU hasn’t played Northern or Fairbanks since December, and that worries the Spartan coaching staff a little bit.
During a normal game-preparation week, the Spartans spend a day or two analyzing and planning for their opponent’s power-play and penalty-kill tendencies. MSU assistant coach Dave McAuliffe said he would watch game tapes and develop scouting reports of all three possible opponents, but not necessarily convey them to the team until an opponent is set in stone.
“Our focus this week is just making sure our team is ready to play our game when the puck drops Saturday,” McAuliffe said. “There are certain things we can show videowise through (video coordinator) Joe (Ford), and the rest of the stuff is just reacting to the game.
“As long as we don’t develop any bad habits this week, we will be ready Saturday.”
Saturday will be MSU’s first big challenge since losing junior left wing Brian Maloney to season-ending injuries in the first round last week. Maloney cracked two ribs and lacerated his kidney against Bowling Green on Friday and spent most of the week in the hospital. Before his injury, he ranked second on MSU in goals (17) and points (33), and his absence will heavily tax MSU’s power-play and penalty-killing depth.
On the Spartans’ top line, freshman left wing Brock Radunske is expected to shoulder much of the burden of replacing Maloney. The 6-foot-4, 190-pound Radunske only has four goals and eight assists this season, but he said he thinks he can excel alongside freshman center Jim Slater and senior right wing Adam Hall.
“Of course there’s a little pressure, but I don’t like to think about it that much,” Radunske said. “I played with Hallsy and Slater for four or five games early in the year, so it won’t be that big of an adjustment stepping in.
“I will have to work a lot harder with those guys in practice to get back on track with them. Maloney was a physical presence when he was out there, but it’s still a pretty big line with me, so we should be able to control the puck down low the same as before. I like to play physical myself.”
Comley a candidate?: Multiple published reports in recent weeks have named Northern head coach Rick Comley as a top candidate to replace Mason when he retires after the season. Comley, 55, has coached the Wildcats for 26 seasons and led them to a national championship in 1991.
