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#6 Penn State Nittany Lions
Penn State finds itself in the basement once again. Had the Nittany Lions come into this series and picked up two wins, they would have passed Michigan State in the conference standings. Unfortuantely, they were shut out on Friday night and lost a heart-breaker on Saturday. Sparty sweep. Penn State tied the Saturday game at 2-2 early in the third period, again, but lost the game, again.
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This weekend: they scheduled Boston College to come to town this coming Saturday, so they won't lose any conference games this weekend. Sorry, Penn State.
#5 Ohio State Buckeyes
The Buckeyes came into Minneapolis with high hopes for climbing up the conference table and making a move in the Pairwise rankings. When it comes to getting into the NCAA tournament, playing highly-ranked teams on the road has a huge bonus this year, if you can at least earn a split in the series. Well, the Buckeyes only earned a broomstick. The OSU basketball team also lost to the Gophers last week. It's not often that we get to capitalize on the beating the Buckeyes like a three dollar quarter horse, so we need to savor it. GIF ME CONTEMPT!
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CAN YA FEEL IT??? HUH?? HUH??? This weekend: at Wisconsin.
#4 Michigan Wolverines
Michigan has avoided playing B1G teams at all costs so far this year. That will change because they don't have any non-conference games left, and I'm pretty sure they don't have any off weekends left either. They have 4 games-in-hand on the Gophers, but if they win all of those games, they will still be four points short of the Gophers.
This weekend: home and home vs. Sparty (Thursday and Friday).
#3 Michigan State Spartans
Sparty swept Penn State at home, making their weekend a success, technically. The sweep moved them past Michigan on the conference table, but the Wolverines have four games-in-hand to make up the four point deficit. Still, a sweep is a sweep, even if it's against one of the worst teams in the country, so I'll muster all the gif approval I can.
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This weekend: home and home vs. Michigan.
#2 Wisconsin Badgers
Bucky was idle last weekend. Not much to say, except for this.
This weekend: hosting Ohio State, whom they had better sweep if they want to keep pace in the conference standings. These two games represent their games-in-hand. I love cheering for the Buckeyes when they play the Badgers.
#1 Pride On Ice- Minnesota Golden Gophers
The conference sweep of the Buckeyes puts added pressure on both Wisconsin and Michigan to sweep this weekend. Two wins pushed their winning percentage for the season to .841 and further improved their RPI. Great success.
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This weekend: The North Star College Cup of College Hockey Colleges. Most hated and overrated Saint Cloud State University Friday and either the University of Minnesota- Canadian Campus (Duluth) or Mankato State, depending on Friday's games.
Here's what I want to see this weekend. Beat the Huskies: their Strength of Schedule is middle-of-the-road, and it irritates me that a couple of USCHO voters continually vote for them as the #1 team in the country, even though their best win is against a North Dakota team that was playing terribly at the time. Second: UMD beats MSU and then the Gophers drop another 6-spot on the Bulldogs. That will make me feel a lot better about how the early season series against UMD finished.
Dishonorable Mention- Ferris State Hockey Twitter
I have to bring this up. From the official Ferris State Hockey twitter account:
@FerrisHockey down 2-1 Friday night. This goal unnoticed would have made it 2-2 but play went on...Series changer? http://t.co/LDjilIiEjB
— Ferris State Hockey (@FerrisHockey) January 19, 2014
You might want to rethink sending tweets like that. If you watch the video, and don't freeze it, it's obvious this shot gets all iron. You couldn't possibly believe that the puck crossed the line, then made a magical U-turn in mid air and came back out. I really don't understand what they were thinking with this tweet.
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