Vegoe’s Top 20 – 11/25/2024
1– Michigan State
2– Boston College
3– Maine
4– Minnesota
5– Michigan
6– Western Michigan
7– Denver
8– North Dakota
9– St. Cloud State
10– Colorado College
11– Dartmouth
12– Boston University
13– UMass-Lowell
14– Ohio State
15– Minnesota State
16– Providence
17– Arizona State
18– Quinnipiac
19– Cornell
20– Northeastern
The poll had a big shake up this week as the Sun Devils swept the Pioneers at Magness Arena this past weekend with 3-2 and 5-2 wins. Arizona State handed Denver their first loss since March of last season and the LetsGoDU heaped praise on Greg Powers’ squad for outskating and outworking the Pios. David Carle’s group has two off weeks in a row coming up to recover and then they’ll face a Western Michigan team that’s been climbing up the poll at Lawson Ice Arena. Although the Broncos have a big weekend coming up in between.
Boston College had a split with Northeastern this past weekend during a home and home series. The Eagles first line of Gabe Perreault, James Hagens and Ryan Leonard is making a case for being a top threat in college hockey. They’re all scoring over a point a game through the first dozen games of the season and Leonard is tied as the nation’s leading goal scorer with 11. Greg Brown’s crew goes into Thanksgiving with the top ranking in the Pairwise, the top strength of schedule ranking and comes in second for the KRACH ranking. The BC Hockey Blog did point out that the team has the 53rd ranked power play in the country — certainly seems like the one weakness for that program and probably cost them at Northeastern on Saturday.
It’s this time of year that I think the PWR is worth reviewing as we’ll start to see how many slots in the top 16 each conference can grab. Right now it looks like Hockey East has five teams (BC, Maine, UMass Lowell, BU and Providence), Big Ten has four teams (Michigan State, Michigan, Minnesota and Ohio State), NCHC has four (Western Michigan, Denver, St. Cloud and CC), ECAC has two (Dartmouth and Cornell) and CCHA has one (Minnesota State). The teams from the leagues can shuffle around a little bit as the season goes forward, but it certainly looks like another season where the at-large bids will mainly be coming from three leagues. North Dakota is one team that’s still getting love in the polls, but sits at 20 in the PWR.
The KRACH rankings are now taking shape as well and the strength of schedule for a few top ten teams stand out. Dartmouth is third, but has a 28th SOS. Denver is eighth, but has a 35th ranked SOS. Minnesota is ranked ninth, but has a 39th SOS. All of these teams will be tested in the coming weeks — the Big Green play at BC and Vermont, the Pioneers travel to Western Michigan and the Gophers will welcome Michigan and Michigan State to close out the first half.
The Big Ten now has three teams in my top ten — Michigan State filled their off week with an exhibition against the USNTDP, Minnesota swept Notre Dame and Michigan swept Penn State. It certainly feels like those three teams are the class of the conference so far and all three are in good shape for the PWR and KRACH rankings. The Wolverines offense had a spectacular weekend against the Nittany Lions at Pegula this past weekend. They tallied six power play goals Saturday in a 10-6 win after sneaking away with a 6-5 win on Friday. Now a 27 goal series might be entertaining, but it certainly has to be a concerning way to play going into a home and home with Western Michigan this weekend.
Once again the back of the top 20 is a challenging space to look for consistency. Minnesota State had the best weekend of the bunch by sweeping Michigan Tech. It was a weekend that had Huskies Head Coach Joe Shawhan expressing the concerns about a coach frustrated with the work ahead… I’m guessing he’ll be spending the holidays recruiting.
Minnesota Duluth was another team with a coach frustrated with where they’re at right now. Head Coach Scott Sandelin was lamenting in being swept at home by Western Michigan saying to Matt Wellens, ‘I’m just tired. It’s frustrating. I feel like we gift teams games.’ He then said on Saturday that he’s looking forward to getting on the road. ‘Sooner or later you have got to get sick of losing. We haven’t been good at home at all. Thank God we play a lot of road games in the second half.’