Thursday is NCHC Media Day in St. Paul, which I will be attending and doing my radio show from at 10am. Guests include The Great Kevin Falness of the Wild Radio Network, along with Denver defenseman Ian Mitchell and UMD goalie Hunter Shepard.
Anyway, the league's preseason poll is out Wednesday, so it's time to reveal how I voted for this year's annual survey.
As always, opinions are mine and mine alone, and we'll count up from the bottom of the predictions.
8. Miami RedHawks
Chris Bergeron was a really good hire, I believe. He recruited extremely well at Miami previously, carried that work over to Bowling Green, and now returns to Miami to replace longtime coach Rico Blasi, fired after last season.
If Bergeron can get Miami to play — stylistically — the way Bowling Green played last season, it won't take long before this team is a complete pain in the arse for everyone else in the conference. It's a style that has given UMD absolute fits over the years, no matter how talented the Bulldogs are. We saw it again last March in Allentown, when Bowling Green gave UMD the biggest challenge it received on its way to a second straight national title.
There's work to be done here, but senior goalie Ryan Larkin returns after showing improvement last year. Gordie Green and Karch Bachman provide skill and senior leadership up front.
X factor:
A team that scored 87 goals in 38 games last season returns 70 percent of its goal scoring, but it will take newcomer impact and internal improvement to make up the offense needed to move up in the standings.
7. Colorado College Tigers
After fielding some really young teams over the first years of his tenure, Mike Haviland graduates some real impact players out of his lineup for 2019-20. Gone are forwards Trey Bradley, Mason Bergh, and Trevor Gooch via graduation, while Westin Michaud transfer portaled his way to North Dakota.
Also gone is bell-cow goalie Alex Leclerc, who played in all but roughly 115 of the nearly 2,500 minutes last season. Northeastern graduate transfer Ryan Ruck takes over in goal.
The Tigers' 65 returning goals rank seventh out of eight in the league (Miami returned only 61), but expect a big jump in production from sophomore Grant Cruikshank, who scored 11 last year and showed some promise.
X factor:
Senior Nick Halloran returns after missing much of last season with injury. He slipped to 13 points in 20 games, but if healthy can make a gigantic impact in CC's top six.
6. Omaha Mavericks
Two major areas of concern for the Mavericks. Omaha loses top scorers Mason Morelli and Fredrik Olofsson (combined for 29 goals and 68 points), along with goalie Evan Weninger, who played in over 90 percent of available minutes last season.
Forwards Taylor Ward and Zach Jordan should have strong seasons, but can they do enough to make up for the heavy losses to a lineup that was a tad on the top-heavy side last season?
Three freshmen goalies are rostered. Watching that play out this season will be outright fascinating.
X factor:
Forward Teemu Pulkkinen was held to three goals in 31 games last season after showing some promise the previous year. With precious few seniors, Mike Gabinet needs the best out of those he has, and Pulkkinen is a player who could make a jump.
5. Western Michigan Broncos
For a team that developed a reputation as being a stingy defensive outfit, it's pretty scary to think about the skill level Andy Murray has at his disposal for the coming season.
Gone is dynamic forward Colt Conrad, but returning is a staggering 87 percent of Western's goals from last season (112 of them, to be exact). Seniors Hugh McGing and Wade Allison return (Allison hoping to stay healthy after an up-and-down season coming off surgery), as do juniors Josh Passolt (24 career goals), Austin Rueschhoff (23), and Ethan Frank (22).
Team defense should be a strength. Senior Cam Lee is back, along with classmate Luke Bafia, and the two have combined for 209 games at the college level. Talented sophomore Mattias Samuelsson is back to build off a strong start to his WMU career.
X factor:
How will Murray flesh out his goaltending situation? Trevor Gorsuch emerged as the starter last year, but he has graduated. Senior Ben Blacker and junior Austin Cain return, as does redshirt senior Will Massey. Brandon Bussi joins the fray. It's the one question mark on the roster, and it could make a huge difference either way in a stacked conference.
4. St. Cloud State Huskies
It took 60 minutes in Fargo for a dream season to collapse.
Now, how do the Huskies, led by old friend Brett Larson, respond?
Expect captain Jack Ahcan to play a big role in helping steer things. It's a weird dynamic, because it feels like this team doesn't have anything to prove until late March, but if they don't play well throughout the season, they won't make it to late March. It'll be up to Larson and Ahcan and the other leaders to make sure the Huskies indeed make it to late March.
Besides taking over the captaincy from the tremendous Jimmy Schuldt, Ahcan also is SCSU's leading returning scorer (34 points last season). Gone are Schuldt and 40-point forwards Patrick Newell, Blake Lizotte, and Robby Jackson. Also gone is Ryan Poehling, one of the best two-way pivots in college hockey last season.
X factor:
It's not unreasonable to expect progress in goal from David Hrenak. Given how explosive St. Cloud State was last season, you could easily forget how strong Hrenak was at times. If he can put that type of performance together more consistently for a team that probably won't average four goals per game again, SCSU will still be a serious threat.
3. North Dakota Fighting Hawks
No team in the NCHC comes into the season with as much pressure on it as North Dakota does. Its one-of-a-kind passionate but famously-impatient fan base has watched the Hawks miss back-to-back NCAA Tournaments. It was on the road for the NCHC playoffs for the first time ever last season, and UND wasn't at the Frozen Faceoff for the first time after Denver swept it out of the postseason in the first round.
Michaud brings 29 career goals and 62 points from Colorado College, and he immediately takes over at UND's leading returning producer in terms of goals and points, both last season and in his career.
I'm not going to say coach Brad Berry should be feeling any kind of heat. That's ridiculous. But if you think the fans are loud now, wait and see what happens if UND misses the NCAAs again.
(SPOILER: They won't miss the NCAAs again.)
X factor:
Much was made of UND's struggles to score last season (93 goals in 37 games), and that's valid. But the secondary numbers suggest UND was incredibly unlucky last year, probably more so than any other Division I team. It's not a guarantee of a turnaround, but with Michaud back and some talented young forwards joining the program, you can expect more goals from this team.
What can't happen again is an .894 team save percentage for the season. Internal improvement is a must between the pipes, whether it's Adam Scheel or Peter Thome carrying the water.
2. Denver Pioneers
Thanks to tremendous work by first-year head coach David Carle and his staff, combined with great leadership from a strong core of seniors, Denver returned to the Frozen Four despite heavy personnel losses and the fact Jim Montgomery left to coach the Dallas Stars.
Now the foundation is laid, and the Pioneers will seek a return to the Frozen Four with better fortune this time around.
It starts with senior forward Liam Finlay, who doubled his career output with 16 goals and 36 points last season. Junior captain Ian Mitchell spurned the NHL to return to the DU blueline.
That's not all. The uber-talented Emilio Pettersen is back, and he will almost certainly score more than six goals this season. Cole Guttman and Brett Stapley had good freshman seasons.
Carle's roster is stacked.
X factor:
With Filip Larsson departing after one year for the pros, will junior Devin Cooley carry the water in goal, or is he going to face a challenge from Swedish freshman Magnus “My” Chrona?
1. UMD Bulldogs
Obvious biases aside, the two-time defending national champions return over two-thirds of the offensive production from last year.
Justin Richards, Nick Swaney, Noah Cates, and Cole Koepke highlight the returning forwards, but that back line is almost intact and might steal the preseason headlines.
Senior co-captain Nick Wolff is joined by juniors Scott Perunovich, Dylan Samberg (who could be in the NHL right now), Louie Roehl, and Matt Anderson to form one of the stingiest defensive groups in college hockey.
Oh, and Hunter Shepard has 81 straight starts in goal, 15 career shutouts, and has shown no signs of slowing down.
X factor:
As if UMD needs more potentially-explosive talent, freshman forward Quinn Olson should step right into the top six after a strong season for Okotoks of the AJHL. He's a third-round pick of the Boston Bruins.
******
The NCHC Preseason All-Conference Team was announced Tuesday. It includes Richards, Swaney, Perunovich, and Shepard from UMD, McGing and Allison from Western Michigan, and Ahcan from St. Cloud State.
My votes lined up, except I had Mitchell in place of Ahcan.
