Midweek Roundup: Allentown Regional Preview (3.23.22)
What is at stake for the Wolverines as they embark on their NCAA Tournament journey? and a brief overview of what to expect from the Allentown Regional
The University of Michigan men’s hockey team, winners of the 2022 Big Ten Tournament, will return to action Friday afternoon when they take on the American International Yellow Jackets in the Allentown, PA regional of the NCAA Tournament. The region’s other first round game will pit St. Cloud State against Quinnipiac.
On its face, it would seem unnecessary to devote any time at all to unpacking the implications of a do-or-die game as a team vies for a national championship, yet something about this Wolverine team requires it.
At the most basic level, Michigan will take the ice Thursday in pursuit of the program’s tenth national title. To achieve that end, it will need to beat AIC Friday, then take care of the winner of St. Cloud State and Quinnipiac Sunday. Then, it will need to win on Thursday April seventh and Saturday the ninth at the Frozen Four in Boston.
The Wolverines’ result won’t just determine whether space needs to be made for an additional banner in Yost’s crowded rafters; it will dictate to (college) hockey fans across the globe how the 2021-22 Michigan Wolverines ought to be remembered.
You see, unlike just about any other team, that this Wolverines’ outfit would leave a legacy of some kind was beyond doubt before it played even an exhibition game.
Simply put, in terms of NHL pedigree, Michigan is an unprecedented behemoth. When Owen Power and Matty Beniers were the first two prospects to hear their names called in last summer’s NHL Draft, they became the first NCAA teammates to ever go one and two. That was before then-future Wolverine Luke Hughes went third and Kent Johnson fifth.
When the Florida Panthers selected Mackie Samoskevich with the 24th pick, Michigan became the first team to have five (current or future) players selected in the first round of the NHL draft.
Oh, and Brendan Brisson and Johnny Beecher were first round picks the year prior, with Thomas Bordeleau going with just the seventh pick in the second round of the same draft.
It’s not just the total number of NHL selections on this Michigan team; it’s the astonishing volume of projected high-end professional talent.
So, maybe this team would be remembered as an all-talent, no-execution disaster, but it would be remembered nonetheless.
Fortunately, by the time they played an exhibition game against Bowling Green (ok fine, maybe a few games beyond that), Michigan made clear that this wouldn’t be a disaster.
Now, the Wolverines are Big Ten Tournament (and Mariucci/Renfrew Trophy and Ice Breaker Challenge and Duel in the D) champions and the number one overall seed in the NCAA Tournament.
However, despite the hardware it can boast before the puck drops Friday, Michigan’s legacy hangs in the balance until the Frozen Four’s conclusion.
If Michigan wins its next four games and takes the title, it will solidify its place as one of, if not the greatest college hockey teams ever.
If the Wolverines stumble, they will be remembered as an exceptional collection of talent, but nothing more.
This isn’t exactly fair, and it’s not how we at Gulo Gulo will remember them regardless. However, we the sports-watching public share a belief that championships are a prerequisite for greatness. Anyone familiar with these Wolverines’ work will require no convincing as to the team’s aesthetic magnificence.
However, to a broader public that did not or could not take the time to come to appreciate this team, a side with this assemblage of talent must either win a championship or be perceived as a failure.
Anyone blessed with the great good fortune of watching it play knows that this team is more than a photo you will look at in ten years and marvel at how many pros and stars played all together in Ann Arbor, MI.
Michigan is not a disjointed array of blue-chip recruits; this year’s Wolverines are a glorious experiment in modern hockey, eschewing the sport’s ancient wisdom and mysticism by placing their faith in youth and skill.
Michigan brought its fans and viewers a spectacle that exceeded any hockey they had previously known. It took just eighty-eight seconds for the Wolverines to score their first goal of the season, coming off an audacious stretch pass from Matty Beniers to spring Kent Johnson for a breakaway.
However, there can be no doubt. Whether it ends Friday in Allentown, April Ninth in Boston, or somewhere in between, and though we’ve had a full regular season and conference tournament to marvel at them, this season and this team will be judged on whether it lifts one more trophy.
Add in the fact that postseason hockey is equal parts cruel and unpredictable. It is a game whose permissiveness invites more warmly challengers who thrive on brawn than those who depend upon skill and precision.
Nonetheless, the Big Ten Tournament offered undeniable proof of the Wolverines’ postseason viability, with the team conquering three foes who provided unique challenges while looking in utter command at every moment along the way.
This coming task will be arduous, the field more exclusive than the Big Ten’s, the stakes higher, but the Wolverines are worthy challengers.
It must seem unfair that such a legacy should hinge on just four games, but, if you ask this group of players, they would have it no other way.
The Three Factories We Hope Will Be Closing Down In Allentown
Though by most accounts Michigan earned a favorable draw, all four teams in the Allentown regional earned places in the 2021 edition of this. Let’s take a moment to get acquainted with them.
American International clinched its spot in this year’s dance by drubbing Air Force 7-0 in the Atlantic Hockey tournament, a conference where it also earned a regular season crown. Despite their dominance within Atlantic Hockey, the Yellow Jackets needed the victory last weekend to send them into the tournament, as their ranking in the PairWise (20th) would have left them on the outside looking in.
The Yellow Jackets’ strength is their depth. Though the team doesn’t have a player north of a point-a-game pace, it has seven between .75 and 1 points-per-game. At the forefront of that group is junior forward Blake Bennett, whose eighteen goals and fourteen assists in thirty-six games played makes him the team’s top scorer.
In net, American International has two startlingly similar options. First is graduate student Alec Calvaruso, who has posted a .911 save percentage and 2.38 goals against average in fifteen appearances. The alternative is sophomore Jake Kucharski, who has a .910 save percentage and 2.39 GAA in twenty-two appearances.
Calvaruso started throughout the Atlantic Hockey tournament and thus the presumptive starter Friday afternoon. If we are being frank, Calvaruso (or Kucharski should he receive the nod) offers the only possible forward for the over-matched Yellow Jackets. If they are going to have any hope against the top-seeded Wolverines, it will need to begin with a pristine effort in net.
In the regional’s other match-up, we have a rematch of the 2013 national semifinal between Quinnipiac and St. Cloud State. Back in 2013, the Bobcats prevailed by a score of 4-1, only to fall to Yale in a title game that pitted rivals separated by a fifteen minutes on New Haven/Hamden, CT’s Whitney Avenue.
This time around, St. Cloud enters the tournament with plenty of rest, having been swept out of the NCHC tournaments first round while hampered by a few key absences to the flu.
Seniors Kevin Fitzgerald and Nick Perbix shoulder the bulk of the offensive burden for the Huskies. The former, a forward, leads the team in points with seventeen goals and eighteen assists in thirty-six games. The latter, a defenseman, boasts six goals and a sparkling twenty-five assists in thirty games.
The Huskies are backstopped by senior David Hrenak, who has posted a commendable .914 save percentage and 2.26 GAA.
Meanwhile, Quinnipiac enters the tournament having been vanquished by Harvard in the ECAC Tournament Final in Lake Placid. The Bobcats were without fleet-footed forward Ty Smilanic, whose name you may recall from the recent NHL trade that sent Ben Chiarot from Montreal to Florida; Smilanic was part of the Habs’ return in the deal. Smilanic’s availability this weekend is unknown.
The Bobcats, who have spent most of the season flirting with the top ranking nationally, maintained their national relevance on the strength of their exceptional freshman goaltender. Yaniv Perets registered a staggering .948 save percentage and 0.96 GAA during his freshman campaign in Hamden. He has as strong a claim to the Hobey Baker as any player in the country, and, if Quinnipiac wants to advance out of Allentown, he will need to lead the way.