After losing to Northern Michigan in overtime of the third game in the best-of-three series last weekend, the Spartans are preparing for the NCAA Tournament next weekend. They will find out their tournament placement Sunday.
After last weekend’s devastating loss to Northern Michigan in the CCHA Quarterfinals, the MSU hockey team took the first few days of this week to regroup.
The team returned to the ice for practice Wednesday, not knowing for sure if it’ll be one of the 16 teams in the NCAA Tournament when the field is announced Sunday morning.
Head coach Rick Comley reflected on the tough loss in his weekly press conference Wednesday.
“I think what it boils down to is that we got beat,” Comley said.
“We couldn’t get the lead, it was always struggle, struggle, struggle … all in all, Northern played very well, we played OK and we just lost.”
As of Thursday afternoon, a tournament berth for the Spartans seemed likely.
“I’m glad we’re not going down to Detroit (for the CCHA championship),” Comley said.
“We could go down there and get hurt, we could go down there, lose the first game and have to play in the consolation game, knowing you’re already in the tournament.”
Comley said he doesn’t think there’s any mathematical way for the Spartans to miss the cut.
“We’re in a much stronger position this year than we were last year,” he said.
“As much as it hurts not to compete for your league playoff championship, the fact that I’m 99 percent sure we’re in the tournament, in the end, this might turn out to be a positive for us.”
Between receiving a bye in the CCHA playoffs and not playing this weekend, MSU will have only played three times between March 2 and when the national tournament begins late next week.
“Now the big question is how do we keep our kids sharp enough that once we do find out where we’re going, that we can then prepare and go forward,” Comley said.
“We played ourselves into the position of having a weekend off, now we have to deal with it.”
Senior forward Chris Mueller said it shouldn’t be tough to stay in game shape with the national tournament in sight.
“We have to get back to having fun this week and competing against each other,” Mueller said, “And then come Sunday, see who we’re playing and start preparing for them.
“We have to find that mentality that we brought into the tournament last year. That’s what we have to find during these two weeks.”
Title time
The CCHA will head to Detroit this weekend for the semifinals and championship games.
Northern Michigan will face Michigan in one semifinal while Miami (Ohio) will battle Notre Dame in the other.
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Comley said he thinks it will boil down to U-M and Miami in the final, but Notre Dame needs wins to remain alive for the national tournament.
Notre Dame, though, faces a major hurdle after losing leading scorer Erik Condra for the season with a left knee injury suffered in Sunday’s win against Ferris State.
“I think it’s going to be a Michigan-Miami final,” senior captain Bryan Lerg said.
“And that’s up in the air, to tell you the truth. It’s going to be a very good game to watch.”
