Twenty teams from around the country to
Wixom,
Michigan last weekend for the first ever
NCRHA Winter Invitational. The
tournament was filled with exciting games and great competition, with the
Eastern Michigan Eagles eventually taking home the championship in an exciting
final game.
The weekend started with everyone in Group B tying, setting
Towson, Missouri ? Saint Louis, Colorado, and Illinois State at a pretty severe
disadvantage with respect to earning a bye in the ?Buffalo 10? scoring system
used for the event.
Later in the morning,
Central Florida
initiated their round-robin dominance, taking down
Texas
?
Dallas who posed a threat to UCF
until late in the game. In one of the
bigger surprises according to the NCRHA power rankings, the Michigan Wolverines
took out Cal Poly SLO 5-1 early on Friday afternoon.
Missouri
?
Saint Louis and
Towson
then took firm control of their Groups with 9-0 and 10-1 wins respectively. By the end of day 1,
Michigan
State,
Michigan,
Eastern
Michigan, and
Central Florida had already
clinched a spot in the elimination round with 2-0 records.
Saturday morning brought key matchups for both seeding and
advancing in the tournament, but most games went according to what would have
probably been expected. The four teams
that had clinched advancement on Friday clinched first round byes on Saturday,
and
Maryland and Drexel were able
to secure the last two spots in the elimination round via wild card berths.
When the field was reduced to the twelve teams who made the
elimination round, the competition level immediately jumped a notch, starting
with the Cal Poly SLO vs.
Rhode Island
contest. The game between the eighth and
ninth seeds was tied at three at the end of regulation, creating the first ever
shootout in NCRHA play. Goaltenders and
shooters continuously rose to the occasion, and the competition went all the
way to the seventh shooter before being decided. SLO was able to pull out the victory in the
shootout, but in a game that close, it?s tough to tell who was the better
squad.
Maryland gave
Missouri
?
Saint Louis a run for their
money, even with only two players on their bench by the playoffs. UMSL prevailed 2-1, and would eventually
advance to the Final Four, but the Terps showed a lot of heart battling
throughout the event. After
Western
Michigan was able to hold off
Florida
in a 3-2 battle, only 8 teams remained for the Saturday night games. The best game of the round of eight was
almost unquestionably the Central Florida/Towson matchup. Although the Tigers trailed 3-0 for most of
the third period, with under
4:00
remaining they were able to score two goals and almost netted a third to send
the game to a shootout. Holding onto
that game may have taken a lot out of UCF, but they certainly earned their
Final Four berth.
So the Final Four consisted of Michigan State, Central
Florida, Eastern Michigan, and surprising Division II standout Missouri ? Saint
Louis. After a challenging period or
more, the Spartans were able to pull away from the Golden Knights and advance
to the finals 9-3.
Missouri
?
Saint Louis played
Eastern
Michigan incredibly close the entire game, but Eastern was able to
prevail with a couple of offensive spurts and advanced with a 4-1 win.
The finals were back-and-forth all game, with Eastern taking
a 2-0 lead early, then the Spartans leading 3-2, before the game was tied at
4. But with just
2:22 remaining in the game, Mike Schultz was able to rip a
slapshot past Jacob Bishop on a pass from his brother John, and put Eastern up
for good.
The NCRHA would formally like to thank all teams for
participating and all fans, family, and friends that were able to attend
throughout the weekend. The NCRHA hopes
to put on more of these types of events in the future, to encourage
cross-regional play and provide good opportunities for teams to compete against
the rest of the best teams in the nation.
