This weekend, the Quinnipiac men’s ice hockey team enters the NCAA Tournament for the fifth time in the program’s history, including its fourth straight. Waiting for them in Albany to kick off the 16-team tournament are the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) Tigers.
How they got here:
RIT: The Tigers are coming into the tournament with the automatic bid after they won the Atlantic Hockey Championship title, beating Robert Morris with a 7-4 victory.
Quinnipiac: The Bobcats come in riding a ton of momentum after hoisting their first Whitelaw Cup in program history in Lake Placid, New York, last weekend. Quinnipiac took down both Dartmouth and Harvard convincingly in the ECAC Tournament to solidify the committee’s decision to reward them with the overall No. 1 seed.
Previous matchups: This is the first time Quinnipiac and RIT are facing off in the playoffs and just the first time the teams are facing one another since 2007, when RIT defeated the Bobcats 3-2. However, Quinnipiac holds an all-time record of 3-1-0 against the Tigers.
Cloutier’s prediction: This is the NCAA Tournament so a landslide may be out of the question, but this season RIT has given me no reason to believe they are going to win this game.
The Tigers are 0-4 against ECAC opponents this season. Those games may have been early in the season but 6-0 shellacking of Clarkson is something to be noted. Along with the fact that they are going to play the top team in the nation, and the winners of the ECAC regular season and playoff, Albany may be a rough trip for the Tigers.
I believe the Bobcats win 5-2 and move on to Sunday for a matchup against either the University of Massachusetts-Lowell (UMass-Lowell) or Yale.
Brosh’s prediction: RIT hobbled into the postseason, going just 2-4-4 in their final 10 games. But the Tigers have quickly turned their jets on, rattling off four consecutive wins at the most important time of the year.
However, the Bobcats continue to get better with each game, their power play being the difference. Everyone loves to talk about how RIT is undefeated in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. But that was in the past and they don’t have the firepower or the goaltending to skate with Quinnipiac on Saturday at 4 p.m.
Bobcats roll, 6-1.
Cloutier’s player to watch: If RIT wins this game, expect sophomore forward Myles Powell to play the game of his life.
I don’t believe RIT will win this game as you previously saw from my 5-2 prediction, so I am going to take Travis St. Denis for my player to watch. St. Denis has been arguably one of the best players in the country this season. With a potentially injured line mate of Sam Anas, St. Denis is going to have take his game to an entirely new level, a level he is capable of reaching.
A key for him is staying out of the penalty box. It is a lot easier to score goals when you are not feeling some shame in the sin bin. If you are a spectator in this game, expect an aggressive and inspired St. Denis to find the twine twice against RIT.
Brosh’s player(s) to watch: Pretty? Nope. Flashy? Nope. However, Quinnipiac’s Tanner MacMaster is just as dominant as anyone on the ice.
The movement without the puck, forechecking, and grinding down of opponents’ top lines are all aspects of MacMaster’s (and his line mates’ Bo Bieper and Craig Martin) game that should not go unnoticed.
Though the line may not see many flashy goals or kudos from the fans, it has become one of the most dominant lines the team has to offer when it wants to wear down opposing offenses, something the Bobcats continue to use to their advantage.
Expect these three to see significant playing time Saturday as the Bobcats look to advance.
