The NCAA News - News and Features

March 23, 1998

Division I Men's Ice Hockey

North Dakota aims for repeat

Event: 1998 Division I Men's Ice Hockey Championship.

Overview: North Dakota seeks to become the first team to win consecutive titles since Boston U. in 1971-72. The Western Collegiate Hockey Association regular-season champions, the Fighting Sioux (27-6-1) are led by Jason Blake (21 goals, 25 assists, 46 points) and Curtis Murphy (7-33-40) .... Challengers to North Dakota's reign include Boston U., Michigan State and Yale. The Hockey East Association regular-season champion, Boston U. (27-5-2), looks to advance to the national finals for the sixth consecutive year. The Terriers are led by Chris Drury (24-27-51) and Tom Poti (14-29-43) .... Michigan State (27-5-5) and coach Ron Mason -- the only coach to win 800-plus games -- earned an automatic berth by claiming the Central Collegiate Hockey Association regular-season crown. Sean Berens (32-17-49) leads the Spartans offensively, while goaltender Chad Alban (20-3-4 record, 1.56 goals-against average) backstops the defensive effort .... Yale (22-6-1), the Eastern College Athletic Conference regular-season champion, will compete in the tournament for the first time since 1952. Yale is led by Jeff Hamilton (25-18-43) and goaltender Alex Westlund (19-6-1 record, 2.24 goals-against average).

Field: Twelve teams, including
the regular-season and postseason champions from each of four conferences -- the Eastern College Athletic Conference and Hockey East, Central Collegiate Hockey and Western Collegiate Hockey Associations. If a regular-season champion also wins the postseason tournament, the committee will select another conference team using established selection criteria. Four teams will be selected at large.

Dates and sites: Regional competition will be March 27-29 at Albany, New York (East region), and Ann Arbor, Michigan (West). The two highest-seeded teams at each regional will receive first-round byes. Two winners from each region will advance to the semifinals (April 2) and final (April 4) at the Fleet Center in Boston.

Media coverage: NCAA Productions will coordinate with ESPN Enterprises to broadcast live all eight regional games via pay-per-view. The pay-per-view plan also will be available on select cable television systems. The April 2 semifinals will be televised live by ESPN2 at 2 and 8 p.m. (Eastern time), respectively. The championship game will be televised live by ESPN at 7:30 p.m (Eastern time) April 4.

Information/results: The fax-on-demand telephone number is 770/399-3060 (passcode 1915); request numbers are 1410 for bracket/schedule, and 5120 (semifinals) and 5121 (championship game) for results. Championship results also will be available on the World Wide Web at www.ncaa.org. Results will be published in the April 13 issue of The NCAA News.