Last weekend there were five top twenty matchups, and leading off, Denver flexed some of its #2 ranking muscle and took care of business winning two against #14 Colorado College — a close one, and a rather lopsided one.  #3 New Hampshire took a two goal win over #10 Boston University, and New Hampshire won two on the weekend having beaten UMass-Lowell two days earlier (BU had beaten Vermont two days earlier).  #6 Notre Dame made it look easy as they swept #19 Michigan, and #13 Cornell had its hands full as it lost to #17 Harvard (Harvard went on to lose to Colgate), and then managed a tie against #11 Dartmouth (Dartmouth had lost to Colgate the night before — good weekend for Colgate, eh?).

Elsewhere, #1 Boston College earned a one goal win against Merrimack; and #4 Minnesota earned a tie and a win against Wisconsin.  #5 Miami also earned a tie and a win against Michigan State, and #7 North Dakota joined in with a tie and a win against Minnesota-Duluth.  And #9 Western Michigan split the weekend with Alaska-Fairbanks.  #8 Union College, #12 St. Cloud State, and #15 Nebraska-Omaha were all idle.

A note on #3 New Hampshire — this weekend they displayed great depth, balance and team play as they scored six goals that were accounted for by five different players; the only player to score two goals (Sunday against Boston University) was sophomore forward Kevin Goumas.  In addition, their eight assists were accounted for by eight different players, and the combination of six goals and eight assists came from ten different players.  New Hampshire has been looking like a bit of a machine this season.  23-year coach Dick Umile has lead UNH to some great seasons, notably in 2002-3 when they faced Minnesota in the NCAA Championship game (losing badly), and in 1998-9 when they faced Maine in that year’s NCAA Championship game, losing a very close and fiercly fought game in overtime.  Could this be another big year for UNH in the making?  Time will tell.

This weekend there are a number of really great top twenty inter-conference matchups.  The real scorcher of them all has to be Saturday night’s pairing of #2 Denver hosting #3 New Hampshire.  I’d love to be there for that one.  New Hampshire will arrive in Denver having just played #14 Colorado College Friday night.  Another true zinger is #6 Notre Dame hosting #7 North Dakota for two games Friday and Saturday nights.   #1 Boston College hosts #11 Dartmouth Saturday night, and also on Saturday, #13 Cornell faces #19 Michigan in Madison Square Garden.  In a “don’t get caught looking the other way” game, #10 Boston University will host St. Lawrence, freshly out of the top twenty after just completing a rough weekend — but just barely out.  St. Lawrence received the 23rd most votes, and has a history of playing very well against BU.  And in the possibly-tables-turned department, #12 St. Cloud State will travel to play two at Minnesota-Duluth; while this year Minnesota-Duluth seems to be only a shadow of what it has been over the past few years, it should be an interesting weekend as the Bulldogs have had the upper hand in this “down the road” rivalry, and St. Cloud State has had to settle for the table scraps in this battle of the canines.  It will be interesting to see if the Huskies’ hot year so far can carry over to beating a rival to whom they have taken the back seat for some time now.

This provides the top fifteen teams, rankings, records, and last weekend’s results:

[table id=48 /]

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

— Tom