3/19/2022 – Michigan 4, Minnesota 3 – 29-9-1 (16-0-5-3 B1G) – B1G Tournament Champions

August 20, 2021, was a balmy Friday night in southeast Michigan. The temperature peaked at 86° in the afternoon with little wind, and many spent the day outside. The Tigers were in Toronto that night playing the Blue Jays, and there was little else of note going on live in the sports world, aside from customary non-major golf and tennis tournaments. Most who read this site, those whose DNA is programmed to live and die by Michigan sports, probably were focused on the impending football season that was two weeks away, wondering if this was to be Jim Harbaugh's last season in Ann Arbor, how Mike Macdonald's new-look defense would perform, and how good of a quarterback Cade McNamara would be.

Yet, the most important development of the week in Michigan sports was to be announced that night, and it would have little to do with football, or golf, or tennis. Little did we know during the afternoon, but at 6:47 PM, the official Michigan Hockey account tweeted out final confirmation that Michigan's trio of rising sophomore stars, Owen Power, Matty Beniers, and Kent Johnson, who had been drafted 1st, 2nd, and 5th overall in the NHL Draft a month prior, would be returning for their second season in Ann Arbor. At that moment, the trajectory of Michigan's 2021-22 hockey season was changed significantly. 

Brian spent many years on this site spilling words about the dreaded Michigan Hockey Summer, when Michigan's star players would be ripped away from the roster, and other recruits may or may not decide to show up on campus. The bottom line implication is that after Michigan Hockey Summer, the roster in the fall would be a good bit worse than what our dream scenario was, because reality (and the NHL) delivered a splash of cold water to the face.

However, the summer of 2021 did not bring a typical Michigan Hockey Summer. Cam York announced he would be signing with the Flyers (something that was assumed during the season) and Strauss Mann declared he would be leaving for a pro contract that was eventually consummated in Sweden (something also widely speculated by connected internet scouts), but nobody else of consequence with a coin-flip probability of leaving opted to depart. 

[Marc-Gregor Campredon]

In returning nearly the entire team from the year before, and adding a recruiting class with two more first round picks, Michigan would ice the most talented roster (by NHL Draft status) in NCAA history. That was confirmed the night of August 20. The expectations when you assemble a roster with seven first round picks, plus one second rounder, one third rounder, and two fourth rounders, is a team that should hang banners. Saying that it's National Championship or Bust is cruel and perhaps unreasonable in a sport whose tournament is shaped in a way to dilute team quality and emphasize pure randomness, but that's not to say that such a goal, as well as reaching the Frozen Four, weren't expectations for this team. Perhaps slightly difficult expectations, but expectations nonetheless. Below that, the bare minimum expectation for the team was at least one Big Ten ring and it became that way on August 20. 

This past Saturday night, March 19, 2022, nearly seven months to the day from the moment those titanic expectations were bestowed upon the team, they met the bare minimum. After coming up short on the regular season crown, they went into Minneapolis and defeated a high-end Minnesota team, beating them soundly to win the B1G Tournament title. One expectation down, two more to go. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: We have a bracket!]

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[JD Scott]

A roster with this amount of NHL talent will always have the ability to do one thing better than the opponent. They probably won't be as big and physical, and certainly not as old as other rosters. Therefore, being better on the cycle or at digging pucks out of the corner is unlikely. But the one thing that a roster like Michigan's should be able to do is make skilled plays out of thin air, better than any other team in America. Over the past two weekends, Michigan has played two teams that have pro talent. Two rosters that are laced with veterans, that can play physical, that are well coached defensively. Teams that don't give you much space in the offensive zone or in transition offense to make plays. 

That didn't stop Michigan. 

We saw this back in October when Michigan faced off against Minnesota State, a team not quite as talented as Notre Dame or Minnesota from a professional perspective, but just as well drilled defensively and as good at taking away time and space. With the game tied at two in the late third period, Michigan was given the smallest of windows, and made a play executed by two sought-after NHL prospects to win the game. Not many other teams in the country could pull off that sort of play, and for those teams, it would be a one-in-a-million play. Michigan has the guys to do it again and again. 

There have been times this season where the speed and skill dazzle against inferior opponents. Perhaps the most famous instance of this was at Yost versus Ohio State in February, when Luke Hughes made the Yowza!! play of the year on an end-to-end speed rush goal. Those sort of plays were more commonplace when Michigan put up crooked numbers on the Wisconsin and Michigan State types, but it had been a little bit since Michigan snapped their fingers and conjured a goal in the tiniest of windows against great teams. Until the last two weekends. 

[James Coller]

Last week against Notre Dame it was a rush chance that stood out. Michigan had numbers, but not in a way that suggested a high-danger chance, let alone an easy goal. Add to that the reality that Notre Dame suppresses high danger chances and takes away passing lanes so well, and it seemed improbable that any team could create the chance that Michigan did. But Matty Beniers and Brendan Brisson marvelously pulled off a give-and-go right through the teeth of the Irish defense that few other teams can, creating an easy goal. 

This weekend there were a couple goals that stood out. Perhaps most notable was a 2-on-1 goal by Mackie Samoskevich and Dylan Duke: 

ROOKIES came to play! pic.twitter.com/SILKys73tk

— Michigan Hockey (@umichhockey) March 20, 2022

The play starts with Thomas Bordeleau in the center ice area. He spins on his edges and feathers a perfect pass to Samoskevich, who is barreling with speed through the neutral zone. That pass alone is wicked, setting up a rush chance. But even as it morphs into a nominal 2-on-1, the defensively sound Gophers play it well. Ben Brinkman slides over to challenge Samoskevich and the way goalie Justen Close is playing it, the pass across has to be right on the money to both hit Duke in the tape AND give him the chance to slide it into the empty net in a split second window. The pass is indeed money, like a football thrown into the receiver's arms, over the outstretched fingers of the DB.  Picture. Perfect. Goal. That's skill and talent talking. 

The second instance came not long after: 

Bang-Bang! Kent Johnson from Brendan Brisson and Mark Estapa pic.twitter.com/EIWtIoTfKC

— Michigan Hockey (@umichhockey) March 20, 2022

There is less of a fancy setup on this play, but the combination of two good passes by Mark Estapa and Brendan Brisson gives Kent Johnson a slight window to beat Close, who is sliding across to meet the shot. The puck has to be placed over the shoulder of the undersized goalie but also below the bar. Not the easiest window in the world, but Johnson snipes it like Annie Oakley. A top NHL prospect making an NHL caliber shot. 

Building a roster to garner a top seed in the NCAA Hockey Tournament is not a task with one specific path to achieve it. Some teams go the route of Minnesota State, who recruit older players who can add size and experience to play a heavier, more low-event game. The Mavs' top four scorers were all born in either 1998 or 1997. Other teams go the route of getting the more talented, speedier players to play an open, faster, higher scoring kind of game. That's what Denver, Boston College, and Minnesota do. And what Michigan has done, just on steroids. The Wolverines' top four scorers, for comparison, were born between late 2001 and 2003.

When you build a team this way, you don't expect to wear a team down physically, you expect to have the better players, and thus have the better players make better plays. There have been games this season when that hasn't been the case for Michigan, because single hockey games are highly variable. But thus far, when they've needed a big play in a pinch against top competition, their roster construction has paid its dividends. We'll see if that continues in Allentown, and hopefully, Boston. 

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[James Coller]

HockeyBullets 

- Physicality played a role this weekend as well. We talked about this point in last week's column after a rough and tough semifinal matchup against the Irish, but there were plenty of hits this weekend too. This time it wasn't so much "everyone on the ice is finishing all of their checks" but instead that several massive hits stood out. For the first time in some time, it was the opponent that made unforced errors resulting in five minute majors and not Michigan. The one that was actually deemed a five minute major was a nasty hit from behind on Mike Pastujov. 

Most of the majors Michigan has been hit with this year were deserved based on the way the rule is call, but none I can remember were as dangerous as this hit was. We are very lucky that Michael Pastujov did not have lasting damage from that hit, getting thumped in the back, face-first into the boards at a high rate of speed. And that wasn't the only hit that probably could've deserved it! Pastujov got blasted in the back earlier in the game too, which was only a two minute penalty (the one that the Johnson goal came off of), and Nolan Moyle got clipped in the chin, resulting in a two minute minor for head contact. Minnesota has been one of the nation's most disciplined teams, and they aren't as consistently physical as Notre Dame or Ohio State, so it was a bit of a surprise. I wonder if the frustration in falling down 3-1 and 4-1 in such a big game played a role. 

- Let's talk about the crowd. After the five minute major was called, the crowd at Mariucci proceeded to throw bottles and other items onto the ice in protest. I can't say it was the classiest move of all time, because they were protesting the correct application of a rule in response to a viciously dangerous hit by a player on their own team. There are times to go berserk about poor refereeing, but that was definitely not one of them. That said, I'm not sure how high quality of replays they were able to see, so I may cut them a little bit of slack. Anyone who is mad at a party other than the offending player on that hit is in the wrong, though. 

However, as Brian opined on this week's MGoPodcast hockey segment, it was at least a sign that the fans were into the game, and it was a massive crowd for college hockey. They packed 10,774 fans into that building(!), and it was a raucous crowd early on. They were loud, engaged, and it felt more like an NHL playoff game than college hockey. The horse has already beaten beyond the point of recognition, but that sort of stage is soooooooo much better than the half-empty neutral sites that the NCAA Tournament chooses to host their regionals in. Even if it was filled with opposing fans, the more packed stadiums there are for college hockey, the better off the sport is.  

[James Coller]

- Michigan's forwards have been really good defensively recently. Michigan's strong defensive play as of late has had a lot to do with the efforts of their forwards. The majority of the forwards in the lineup, and all of the centers, are locked in when it comes to positioning and compete in the defensive zone. Thomas Bordeleau and Matty Beniers have dazzled at this, Garrett Van Wyhe remains himself, but I've especially loved the defensive contributions from Jimmy Lambert, Luke Morgan, and Michael Pastujov. These wily veterans have put themselves in great positions to use their active sticks to disrupt the offensive flow of the opposing teams the last couple weeks. It's the sort of team-wide buy-in that is needed to lock teams down, which Michigan has been doing recently. 

- Let's salute Michigan's 5v5 defense for a minute. Over the course of the four games in the B1G Tournament, Michigan allowed two goals at 5v5 total. They didn't surrender one over both MSU games (the lone Spartan goal was a PPG), gave up one to Notre Dame, and then the opening goal on Saturday was at 5v5. That's it. Two goals over 240 minutes of hockey. Hard to beat that! Michigan did give up a few PPGs, but the MSU one was really just a howler from Portillo and the two allowed to Minnesota were funky, one coming at 6v3 and one at 6v4, not really traditional circumstances. 

More importantly, it's worth looking at how Michigan is achieving those results. The Wolverines went up 4-1 on Saturday night but still had over half the game to salt away, and they did it with shocking ease. Over 26 minutes between when there was 8.5 minutes left in the second period and when there were 2.5 minutes left in the game, Michigan allowed eight total shots on goal from Minnesota. Shots over that period were 13-8 in favor of Michigan, completely blunting any efforts by Minnesota to make a push. Michigan gave up a lone odd-man rush in that period and otherwise pushed play to the perimeter, and didn't give up many screened shots on Portillo. The effect was leaving Minnesota far too little time to make a charge at the very end of the game, which did happen. When the Gophers made their push, they just ran out of time. Michigan played four excellent hockey games to win this tournament and are playing as well as any team in the country. 

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Selection Sunday 

Yesterday was Selection Sunday for college hockey, which means we now have a bracket, and a destination for Michigan: 

Michigan is a 1 seed for the first time since 2012, and the 1st overall seed for the first time since 2008. Their first weekend games will be played in Allentown, PA, and take place Friday and Sunday, beginning at 3:00 pm on Friday afternoon. As for the draw, it's hard to complain, and one may go so far as to say that this was the dream bracket for Michigan. Last week it looked increasingly likely that the Wolverines were going to have to see at least one of Duluth, North Dakota, and Notre Dame in their region, and perhaps two of them. Instead, they got none, with Duluth's strong performance in the NCHC Frozen Faceoff bouncing them up to the high two line, while the two NDs got banished to the Albany regional with Minnesota State. 

I will save going in depth on the tournament bracket as a whole, since David and I will have a joint tournament preview going up on the site tomorrow, but I have a couple initial thoughts and will then run through the teams in Michigan's region. First off, the B1G ended up being a three bid conference, as Ohio State's precarious position as 15th in PairWise pushed them out when a bid stealer popped up in the ECAC via Harvard beating Quinnipiac. Secondly, I think Minnesota State got a raw deal. Harvard is a tricky #4 seed, with tons of NHL talent and they come in hot, not to mention a talented North Dakota team and the perpetual thorn in everyone's side known as Notre Dame. Third, if Duluth and Denver meet next weekend, or if Minnesota and Western Michigan meet, those will be bloodbath games. 

Two one seeds in this picture [Bryan Fuller]

As for Michigan's region, a prevailing thought is that the Wolverines are massive favorites to make it out of Allentown and to Boston and the Frozen Four. A quick breakdown on the other teams: 

• (4) American International: Not to bleed too much into the longform preview that will go up on Friday, but the Yellow Jackets are the Atlantic Hockey Association's autobid into the NCAA Tournament. That is the mid-major conference in D1 hockey, and the winner of the conference's tournament is almost always the 16th team in and thus a considerable underdog against the top seed. There are two common opponents between AIC and Michigan: UMass, who Michigan swept decisively and who beat up AIC, and Niagara, who Michigan annihilated and who took AIC to overtime twice. They are not good, and KRACH pegs them as slightly worse than PSU but a tad bit better than Wisconsin, LSSU, and MSU. Michigan went 15-1 against those four teams this season. Not that AIC can't beat Michigan, but the Wolverines are a big favorite and should be through to Sunday. 
• (2) Quinnipiac: QPac has one of the top records in the tournament, but mostly because they ain't played nobody. The Bobcats play in the ECAC, which is not a power conference, and they thoroughly dominated that league. QPac plays a similar style to Notre Dame, trying to limit events and choke the life out of you. Against bad ECAC offenses, they did it with breathtaking efficiency, but against better offenses, it's more murky. They don't score many goals, but goalie Yaniv Perets and his .948 looks decently intimidating. It's hard to know how much of the Quinnipiac defensive machine is real and how much is smoke and mirrors propped up by a weak schedule, but I'd still rather play them than any of the other 2 seeds (Duluth, Minnesota, North Dakota) 
• (3) St. Cloud State: This is the team I'd rather play in the second round, because the Huskies play a style that suits Michigan better. St. Cloud wants to play Run N Gun, boasting a very good offense and the nation's top power play, but they are not as good at preventing goals. Against Duluth in the NCHC Tournament, the Huskies scored five on the hot goalie Ryan Fanti, but gave up nine and were swept by the Bulldogs. While they did have some players dealing with illness in that series, it isn't out of place in terms of results on the season. Michigan will have the better goalie and more talented scorers, and in a game that will hinge on who can score more goals and whose goalie can play better, I will take that matchup every day. 

As you can probably tell from my summary there, Michigan is in very good position against AIC and should feel good about their chances to be playing on Sunday. Moreover, I think it's in the best interest of Michigan fans to cheer for St. Cloud over QPac, something that KRACH sees as essentially a coin flip proposition (SCS is actually favored, 50.2%-49.8%). Either way, Michigan is definitely a better team than all the other teams in Allentown, and if they play their game, the Wolverines will be very difficult to beat. It's the NCAA Tournament, it's a stupid exercise and upsets always happen, but it will still be a sizable surprise if any team besides Michigan is representing the Midwest Regional in Boston.