Lots of coverage from this tournament, starting with The Free Press ...
For the Mavericks, they hope they got their postseason jitters out of the way at the Final Five last week, and despite all of the pomp and circumstance in Toledo (Tyler Elbrecht said the team is being treated "like royalty"), they're trying to approach this like any other game. Meanwhile, even before the upsets and near-upsets were taking place in the other regionals, many were thinking the Midwest might be the toughest of the four. That story leads off a regional notebook.
While MSU is making its first NCAA appearance in 10 years, Miami is celebrating the 20th anniversary of its first national-tournament game. St. Cloud State coach Bob Motzko was an assistant coach on that team. Both Miami and Minnesota State will start freshman goalies today, but the Redhawks have two to choose from.
Good coverage from the Toledo Blade today, including an overview of the tournament, the teams' thoughts at the Huntington Center and a look at the two Hobey Baker Award finalists in the field.
Of course, I can't forget the coverage of my friend Mick Hatten at the St. Cloud Times. He found a couple of St. Cloud superfans and also wrote about the Huskies' task of trying to break through Notre Dame's defense.
The tournament got off to a crazy start around the country as Yale stunned Minnesota 3-2 in overtime and UMass-Lowell cooled off red-hot Wisconsin 6-1. Denver was a third WCHA team to fall, as New Hampshire knocked out the Pioneers 5-2. North Dakota fended off an upset attempt by Niagara to win.
Finally, there will be a new coach in the WCHA next season as Alaska-Anchorage's Dave Shyiak was fired on Friday.
Come back to the blog later today for a live chat.
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