Wow, have upsets turned the NCAA Men's Hockey Tournament on it's ear. The Air Force upset of Michigan knocked the #1 East regional seed out. This set up a regional final between #4 seed Air Force and #3 seed Vermont which had one of the strangest endings to any hockey game ever, college or pro. The game went to overtime, Vermont took a shot and it APPEARED to have gone in, in fact it looked like the shot went right through the netting. But did it? Play continued for a couple more minutes until they were able to check replays. Super slow motion replays showed in fact the shot did go right through the netting and out at full speed which gave the impression it missed the net.
You can see highlites here:
http://all-access.cbssports.com/player.html?code=ncaa&media=111579
More upsets were found in the Midwest Regional where #4 seed Bemidji State knocked the Irish out of #1 seed Notre Dame in Grand Rapids Michigan. Also Cornell's Big Red the #3 seed dumped #2 seed Northeastern.
#4 Seed Miami Ohio was the winner of the West Regional knocking off #1 seed Denver then # 2 seed Minnesota-Duluth.
There was no wilder game than in the Northeast Regional today in Manchester New Hampshire. #2 seed North Dakota led the host and #3 seed New Hampshire Wildcats 5-3 late in the third. New Hampshire scored to close it to 5-4 in North Dakota's favor. It was then something amazing happened, New Hampshire scored with 3 TENTHS of a second left to tie it. Lesson here, faceoffs matter big time. They went to overtime where the Wildcats scored 45 seconds in sending the Manchester faithful into a frenzy:
http://all-access.cbssports.com/player.html?code=ncaa&media=111566
The NCAA Men's Hockey Tournament is far more unpredictable than the men's hoops tourney, and since it's hockey it's far better than basketball. The greatest hockey game Johnny ever saw was Northern Michigan's incredible 8-7 triple overtime victory over Boston University in 1991 in the National Championship game. Now, granted he's biased as he went to Northern Michigan, but that game was back and forth and to and fro until Darryl Plandowski scored early in the third OT to win it for the Wildcats. The Jersey City Desk makes no claim of ownership of this clip, we're just giving you a link to the greatest ending to the greatest title game:
http://www.thoughtequity.com/video/clip/306076_033.do
Time for Jersey City, After Dark
Yikes - that was quite a night!
ReplyDeleteI'm with you Johnny on the unpredictability and excitement that comes of the NCAA hockey tournament. And dang it, my pick, North Dakota got knocked out.
It's an awesome tournament to be sure!
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