Miami of Ohio and Maine, two teams that have been in the top ten for a while, have dropped down to the lower ten.  Miami of Ohio was swept by Ohio State, dropping from #7 to #12, and Maine was beaten badly by Merrimack, dropping from #9 to #13.  Merrimack rose from #17 to #15 with the win.  Filling in the top ten, Notre Dame rose from #11 to #8 after sweeping Northern Michigan, and Wisconsin rose from #13 to #9 on its sweep of Canisius.

Elsewhere, #1-#4, Yale, North Dakota, Boston College, and New Hampshire all held rankings with their weekend sweeps.  #5 Minnesota Duluth and #6 Denver held rankings after idle weekends.  Michigan is now #7, up from #8 after splitting with Michigan State, and RPI held at #10 after losing to Clarkson, and then beating St. Lawrence.  Nebraska-Omaha moved up from #12 to #11 on an idle weekend.

Union is now #14, up from #15 after beating St. Lawrence and Clarkson, and Boston University dropped from #14 to #16 after beating Vermont.  Colorado College is now #17, up from #18 after an idle weekend, Western Michigan cracked into the top twenty at #18 after a tie and win against Alaska Fairbanks (Alaska dropped to #20 from #16).  And Ferris State is now #19, up from #20, after sweeping Bowling Green.

And thanks to our ace repoter in Minnesota, John McLean, we have a little insight to a great performance that would have gone unnoticed as #24 Mankato took on American International on Friday night: 

“In one of the season’s more impressive performances, sophomore Ben Meisner turned back 51 of 52 shots for American International in a 0-1 loss to Minnesota State at the Alltel Center in Mankato.   AI entered the game versus the 24th ranked Mavericks with a 4-9 record but no one told Meisner who finished with a 98 save %.  A night he will certainly remember.”

What a performance!  Thanks, John.  And a reminder to our readers — if you see a college hockey game in person, or even on broadcast, if you watch the entire game, please take a few minutes and write up a game summary, and I’ll post it.  Nothing as good as a report from a reader.

This weekend there are several top matchups.  #5 Minnesota-Duluth will host  the rocket-rising #9 Wisconsin Badgers for two games, and #3 Boston College will travel to #13 Maine for one game.  #7 Michigan will have a home and home series with #19 Ferris State, and #8 Notre Dame will host #20 Alaska Fairbanks, two games.  #6 Denver will travel to play two against #24 Mankato, and tonight’s match of #15 Merrimack hosting #16 Boston University has been postponed due to weather.

This provides the top twenty teams, rankings, records, and most recent results:

[table id=13/]

That’s all for now.  Stay tuned, and go Terrriers!

 — Tom