Opponent and other news and results 2025-2026

[andyw2100]

Minnesota-Duluth and St. Cloud now in OT, tied at 1. Have to think we leapfrog Minnesota-Duluth, even if they win.

I've been out, and periodically checking the score on CHN. It looked like Minn-Duluth had tied it with about five minutes to go, but that goal must have been overturned, because I looked later and the goal was gone.

Then they tied it with 31 seconds to go. The app took a long time before it showed them going to OT, so I'm wondering if that goal was also reviewed.

[chimpfood]

Minnesota-Duluth and St. Cloud now in OT, tied at 1. Have to think we leapfrog Minnesota-Duluth, even if they win.

I've been out, and periodically checking the score on CHN. It looked like Minn-Duluth had tied it with about five minutes to go, but that goal must have been overturned, because I looked later and the goal was gone.

Then they tied it with 31 seconds to go. The app took a long time before it showed them going to OT, so I'm wondering if that goal was also reviewed.

OT wins count as 1.0 of a win in the playoffs since it's 5 on 5, plus there's no home/road weightings. If that is why you said we should leapfrog them.

[stereax]

Minnesota-Duluth and St. Cloud now in OT, tied at 1. Have to think we leapfrog Minnesota-Duluth, even if they win.

I've been out, and periodically checking the score on CHN. It looked like Minn-Duluth had tied it with about five minutes to go, but that goal must have been overturned, because I looked later and the goal was gone.

Then they tied it with 31 seconds to go. The app took a long time before it showed them going to OT, so I'm wondering if that goal was also reviewed.

OT wins count as 1.0 of a win in the playoffs since it's 5 on 5, plus there's no home/road weightings. If that is why you said we should leapfrog them.

Yeah they went from .78 to .96.

[andyw2100]

Minnesota-Duluth and St. Cloud now in OT, tied at 1. Have to think we leapfrog Minnesota-Duluth, even if they win.

I've been out, and periodically checking the score on CHN. It looked like Minn-Duluth had tied it with about five minutes to go, but that goal must have been overturned, because I looked later and the goal was gone.

Then they tied it with 31 seconds to go. The app took a long time before it showed them going to OT, so I'm wondering if that goal was also reviewed.

OT wins count as 1.0 of a win in the playoffs since it's 5 on 5, plus there's no home/road weightings. If that is why you said we should leapfrog them.

My thinking it was the same as regular season was why I mistakenly thought that. 31 seconds. Oh well.

[andyw2100]

Minnesota-Duluth and St. Cloud now in OT, tied at 1. Have to think we leapfrog Minnesota-Duluth, even if they win.

I've been out, and periodically checking the score on CHN. It looked like Minn-Duluth had tied it with about five minutes to go, but that goal must have been overturned, because I looked later and the goal was gone.

Then they tied it with 31 seconds to go. The app took a long time before it showed them going to OT, so I'm wondering if that goal was also reviewed.

OT wins count as 1.0 of a win in the playoffs since it's 5 on 5, plus there's no home/road weightings. If that is why you said we should leapfrog them.

Yeah they went from .78 to .96.

And would have dropped to 12th and .31 if they had lost. Wow!

[BearLover]

In terms of just making the NCAAs, I think tonight was pretty good. BC, UConn, and Mankato lost. On the other hand, Augustana won and St. Thomas is winning. But another big development is that chalk advanced in the NCHC, meaning no automatic qualifier from that league can steal a bid.

I'm almost certain that if we don't get swept by Harvard, we're in. And even if we do get swept, it's going to be difficult to find ways for enough teams to pass us. Even if a non-Providence team wins HE, it seems difficult for a second HE team to get an at-large bid. Same for the CCHA—I don't see how a team can pass us without winning the conference tournament. I believe CCHA semis and finals are just a single game, so a team would have to go 1-1 to get an at-large bid and pass us, which doesn't seem possible.

So if we get swept next weekend, the teams likely ahead of us would be
4 NCHC
4 B10
1 HE
2 ECAC
(11 total)

And then you'd need 5 auto-bids to pass us. That's going to happen in Atlantic Hockey and the CCHA, and can't happen in the NCHC, but for the other 3 conferences it's still up in the air.

Conclusion: for us to miss the NCAAs, we'd have to get swept by Harvard, AND each of HE, B10, and ECAC would have to be won by teams that would not otherwise receive an at-large bid. (And then we still have other outs like Dartmouth getting swept by Colgate or Wisconsin/PSU losing to a lower seed.)

Caveat: I didn't check my work.

[BearLover]

In terms of just making the NCAAs, I think tonight was pretty good. BC, UConn, and Mankato lost. On the other hand, Augustana won and St. Thomas is winning. But another big development is that chalk advanced in the NCHC, meaning no automatic qualifier from that league can steal a bid.

I'm almost certain that if we don't get swept by Harvard, we're in. And even if we do get swept, it's going to be difficult to find ways for enough teams to pass us. Even if a non-Providence team wins HE, it seems difficult for a second HE team to get an at-large bid. Same for the CCHA—I don't see how a team can pass us without winning the conference tournament. I believe CCHA semis and finals are just a single game, so a team would have to go 1-1 to get an at-large bid and pass us, which doesn't seem possible.

So if we get swept next weekend, the teams likely ahead of us would be
4 NCHC
4 B10
1 HE
2 ECAC
(11 total)

And then you'd need 5 auto-bids to pass us. That's going to happen in Atlantic Hockey and the CCHA, and can't happen in the NCHC, but for the other 3 conferences it's still up in the air.

Conclusion: for us to miss the NCAAs, we'd have to get swept by Harvard, AND each of HE, B10, and ECAC would have to be won by teams that would not otherwise receive an at-large bid. (And then we still have other outs like Dartmouth getting swept by Colgate or Wisconsin/PSU losing to a lower seed.)

Caveat: I didn't check my work.

Eh, actually it's probably not that hard for a HE school like UMass to pass us if they lose to Prov in the HE final. So that's one fewer spot than in my above hypothetical. There are a lot of permutations.

Conditional on us getting swept, we still have a good shot, but not guaranteed.

[BearLover]

Meanwhile, CHN's NCAA probability matrix now says we have a 100% shot. I've had my disagreements with this model before, and unless it's been fixed I believe it continues to underrate the odds of an upset. Still, if it says 100%, then the odds of an upset should not matter because 100% means we don't care about the outcome of any game.

I'm surprised at 100%, because I would have thought that, as one example, the following combination of results could knock us out:
Harvard sweeps us
UMass loses to Providence in HE final
Someone outside the top 3 seeds win ECAC
Notre Dame beats PSU in B10 final after PSU beats Wisco in semifinal

[BearLover]

Update: now the CHN model gives us a 94% chance of making it 

[stereax]

Update: now the CHN model gives us a 94% chance of making it 

Man, NPI math is painful 😭 I'll run some sims tomorrow on my laptop.

[jeff '84]

https://www.playoffstatus.com/ncaahockey/ncaahockeytournpartprob.html

This one has it at 99% even if we lose out.

[stereax]

IF we get swept by Harvard, we drop to 54.51 and 12th. Split the first two, 55.31 exiting Saturday. Sweep, 56.10. None of this plays with other teams' results, which can mess things around.

I think we have an autobid all but locked at this point. If/when we make Placid I think it's guaranteed.

But win at Placid and none of this matters 😂

[adamw]

Update: now the CHN model gives us a 94% chance of making it 

you likely caught it mid-build. It takes 90 minutes to run the 20,000 simulations. It says at the top how many runs there have been so far. Cornell settled at 99.7%

We actually did make improvements to the underlying KRACH that drives this - smoothing extremes, which should help mitigate the upset stuff. Nevertheless, there is a good reason that teams up to 12 are virtual locks at this point. The gaps in NPI after that, plus the unlikelihood of any outside teams stealing spots. The current gap from 12 to 13 in NPI is wider than the gap from 12 to 7.

[BearLover]

The relevant question is: provided we get swept by Harvard, which teams behind us in the NPI would catch us by losing in their league's championship game? I think UMass and UConn would, but what about Augustana? BC?

[stereax]

The relevant question is: provided we get swept by Harvard, which teams behind us in the NPI would catch us by losing in their league's championship game? I think UMass and UConn would, but what about Augustana? BC?

I seriously doubt we get swept by Harvard. That's an area of hypotheticals that I'm not even thinking about.

(Besides, only one of UMass/UConn/BC can lose the HEA championship.)