I'm counting down the memorable moments of the Mercyhurst hockey season. Here are links to moment 10, moment 9, moment 8, moment 7, moment 6, moment 5, moment 4, moment 3.
2017-2018 Memorable Moment #2: Mercyhurst takes on #1 Clarkson in the NCAA Quartfinals, Losing 2-1 (OT)
By virture of winning the College Hockey America (CHA) tournament, Mercyhurst earned an auto bid to the NCAA Tournament. The tournament has four autobids, one for the winner of each conference tournament, and the remaining four spots go to the highest ranked teams per the pair wise ranking. This year neither Mercyhurst nor Northeastern (Hockey East) were ranked in the top eight per the pair wise, but each team won their conference tournament, displacing the 7th and 8th ranked team from the NCAA tournament. The other conference championship winners, Minnesota (WCHA) and Clarkson (ECAC) were both ranked in the top 8, so teams weren't further displaced.
No 8 seed has ever beaten a 1 seed, and sadly for Mercyhurst fans, it didn't happen this year either. The game was held in Potsdam, New York, home of the Clarkson Golden Knights. Potsdam is 372 miles northeast of Erie, about a six hour bus ride. I'll cut to the chase: Mercyhurst was a heavy underdog going into the game, and despite playing a great game, lost 2-1 in overtime. You play to win the game, and there is no satisfaction in losing, but Mercyhurst represented itself well that day.
Mercyhurst took the lead in the game at 19:39 of the second. Nuutinen had set up on the half wall and passed to Molly Blasen at the point, who blasted a puck on net, tipped in by Brooke Hartwick. One goal against the 2nd highest rated offense in the nation wouldn't be enough. Pejzlova of Clarkson scored on the power play at 5:30 of the third, and Giguere finished the Lakers off at 16:52 in OT, with her 26th goal of the season.
Shots were 32-28 in favor in Clarkson, Clarkson went 1 for 5 on the power play, and Mercyhurst went 0 for 3.
Some thoughts on the game:
1- It was of course, the seniors last game. Brooke Hartwick (F), Callie Paddock (D) and Jennifer MacAskill (F), finish their four year careers with two NCAA Tournament appearances, two CHA tournament championships, and two regular season CHA championships. The team finished with a top ten ranking in the national polls for the first time all year. They sit ranked at 10th, of the 34 Division I teams.
2- The graduating trio accounted for 23 goals this year out of 94 Mercyhurst goals. Assuming no transfers, Mercyhurst will return 75.5 percent of its scoring in 2018-2019; compared to returning 40.22% of goals in 2017-2018.
3- The improvement of Mercyhurst from the start of the season to the end was noticeable, thinking back to the first series against Wisconsin. Watching that first series, the Finns were very comfortable holding the puck, maybe even too much, and the other Lakers much less so. Meanwhile, Wisconsin seemed to receive passes, protect the puck as they figured out what they wanted to do with it, and then go about doing it. By the end of the year, Mercyhurst had a lot more balance I felt, the Finns distributing the puck, the rest of the team exhibiting patience and execution not seen earlier in the year. Every season is new and different; there are players that regress or break out year to year, but barring any major transfers I'm optimistic about next year.
4- They say if you can't skate, you can't play. Flipping that around, if you CAN skate, you can dominate. I'm thinking about Giguere and Gabel of Clarkson and their ability to score off the rush. Clarkson is not a team that dominated Mercyhurst in time of possession, but the speed that Giguere and Gabel operate at proved costly to the Lakers; their OT goal certainly wasn't their first scary chance of the game either.
After dispatching Mercyhurst, Clarkson beat Ohio State in OT on a Gabel goal off a rush, and they won the tournament vs Colgate after Giguere fought for a puck in the neutral zone, and went one on one, got knocked to her knees, recovered and deked the goalie to win it all, also in OT. While I didn't watch them all season, it was their skating that impressed me more than anything in the NCAA tourney. They are both back at Clarkson next year.There are no USA or Canada Olympians returning to their conference, so I expect those two to tear up the scoresheet once again.
5- Watching Mercyhurst versus Clarkson once again affirmed how close Mercyhurst is after all these years, despite what the numbers told us about this match up before the game. If there is one area to improve it's their power play. With a power play percentage of 12.82%, the Lakers had the 26th ranked power play in the nation this year. The other teams in the NCAA Tournament had power play rankings from 24% to 16% percent. Even getting their percentage to 16%, Mercyhurst would add 5 goals at the rate they draw penalties, not insignificant when you consider they had 4 ties and 9 one goal losses this year.
6- It's worth noting something on the schedules: Of the seven other teams in the NCAA tournament Mercyhurst had played four during the regular season, plus Clarkson in tournament. Northeastern was the only other NCAA Tournament team had played that many. On USCHO, Northeastern is listed as having the toughest strength of schedule for the 17-18 season, and Mercyhurst is all the way down at 29th, but I guess it's because Mercyhurst's weak opponents are deemed weaker than Northeastern's. Regardless, the point is that Mercyhurst played a pretty monster non conference schedule this past year, which is daunting but a pretty fun opportunity for the players, too.
Having played so many teams participating in the NCAA Tourney, it's not surprising then that Mercyhurst had played against every team in the Frozen Four - overtime losses to Colgate and Clarkson, a win and close loss against OSU, and a tough opening series versus Wisconsin. Playing a tough out of conference schedule undoubtedly helped Mercyhurst get better. Their schedule looks similar next year, so it will be a good challenge for Mercyhurst to improve upon their 3-10-1 non conference record, and another great opportunity to prepare them for the NCAA Tourney, should they be so fortunate as to return either with an at large or auto bid.
7- With the loss the Lakers NCAA quarterfinal record goes to 4-8-0. All but two of those appearances were at large bids; the 2016 and 2018 appearances were auto bids. I don't know what to make of it, but 5 of the 8 losses occurred in overtime (as did 1 of the 4 wins). Here's to getting back to the tourney next year.
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