Will the ECAC get more teams than Hockey East in the NCAA tourney?

This is an interesting article that I found over on UCHCO.COM. In looking at the PWR right now, I know we aren't really supposed to look at it until all of the conference tourney games have been played. The author of the blog post is right, there are three teams from Hockey East (B.C., UNH, MC) in the top 15 of the Pairwise Rankings that would get in today if the NCAA Ice Hockey Selection Committee were picking the NCAA tourney field, barring tourney upsets.

On the flip side of the argument there are four teams (Yale, RPI, UNION, Dartmouth) from the ECAC in the Pairwise rankings, again barring any upsets in the conference tourney there would be four ECAC teams in the NCAA tourney "if the selection was today". I think this discussion is a little early as Dartmouth is sitting on the ledge and could fall out of the top 15 if they lose a few games. Personally, I still see Miami leap frogging over Dartmouth in the end based based on the fact Miami plays a tougher strength of schedule. Also, Maine is sitting on the bubble at 17th and could move up with a few wins. Their sweep of UND would help them a lot. There is a lot of hockey left to be played.

Warning: before you begin to read this blog post, know that it might sound a bit elitist.

And it should. Hockey East is home to the last three national champions. In the last 14 seasons, a Hockey East team has been in the NCAA title game in all but one season (we all remember the infamous all-WCHA Frozen Four in Columbus, don’t we?)

When it comes to the NCAA tournament, Hockey East is likely royalty, a least for the last decade of so.

The antithesis of Hockey East has been the ECAC. It’s been 22 years since an ECAC team won the national title (Harvard, 1989) and 21 years since an ECAC member reached the title game. Heck, the league hasn’t had a team in the Frozen Four since Cornell lost to New Hampshire in Buffalo in 2003.

So what if I told you that there is a decent chance this season that the ECAC could have two times as many entries as Hockey East in this year’s NCAA tournament. A quick look at the current USCHO.com PairWise Rankings indicates that four ECAC teams would qualify for the tournament. Hockey East would get three entries if the season ended today (Boston College, New Hampshire and Merrimack). But the line of demarcation, right now, is very thin.

This isn’t necessarily about Hockey East having a down year, though if the league were to get only two entries to the tournament it would seem that way. It’s equally as much about the ECAC having an excellent season as a whole. [Read the whole article]