College Hockey News Analyses NCAA Field

(left) Joel Maturi, the NCAA Hockey Tournament Selection Committee chairman

Adam Wodon at College Hockey News broke down the NCAA Tournament Selections and interviewed the Tournament Committee Chairman Joel Maturi. Maturi just happens to also be the University of Minnesota Athletic Director and former AD of the University of Denver (1996-98).

"That leaves Denver to get the short straw, so to speak, and be matched up in a 6-3 scenario with North Dakota — which means, of course, that Denver winds up having to play Wisconsin in the first round. A tough matchup, but it also violates the policy on avoiding intra-conference first-round matchups. As we know, however, with five WCHA teams in the 2-3 seed slots, there was going to have to be a first-round all-WCHA matchup.

"If you solve one problem, you create another," Maturi said. "In the end, we feel that we realized there will be some questions, but I welcome anybody to give me the soluition to it."

Like Maturi said, two WCHA teams were going to play each other in the first round. It might as well be Denver — the highest remaining No. 2 seed after CC (which is locked into the West) — against the "lowest" No. 3 seed in Wisconsin.

What has been created, however, is the WCHA Invitational in Madison, with only Princeton spoiling the party." (rest of article)