{"id":133279,"date":"2022-03-10T10:00:01","date_gmt":"2022-03-10T16:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/?p=133279"},"modified":"2022-03-10T16:12:47","modified_gmt":"2022-03-10T22:12:47","slug":"this-week-in-nchc-hockey-even-with-no-1-seed-in-conference-tournament-denver-not-taking-miami-lightly-this-weekend-in-opening-round-of-playoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/2022\/03\/10\/this-week-in-nchc-hockey-even-with-no-1-seed-in-conference-tournament-denver-not-taking-miami-lightly-this-weekend-in-opening-round-of-playoffs\/","title":{"rendered":"This Week in NCHC Hockey: Even with No. 1 seed in conference tournament, Denver not taking Miami lightly this weekend in opening round of playoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Denver’s Cameron Wright is one of two players on the Pioneers with 20 goals this season (photo: Ethan Mito\/Clarkson Creative Photography).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For as much as coaches and players talk about how brutal NCHC campaigns are, it comes as a surprise that only now, in Year 9 of its existence, the conference has crowned split regular-season champions.<\/p>\n

That quirk was news to Denver coach David Carle, whose Pioneers earned on Saturday a share of the Penrose Cup after sweeping Colorado College. North Dakota on Friday had put one hand on the trophy, but a UND loss Saturday in Omaha and DU\u2019s clincher against the Tigers meant that both the Fighting Hawks and Pioneers would lay claim to the bulbous metal chalice.<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw a stat about that, co-champions for the first time, and I didn\u2019t even know we did that,\u201d Carle said. \u201cWe didn\u2019t focus very much on (the regular-season title). With our team, we\u2019re trying to prepare for playoff hockey, and we\u2019ve played a lot of really good teams in our last 10 games, and it was just living through the grind of what our league is. We\u2019re just trying to get better at our game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Denver (25-8-1) has been particularly good in its last three games, scoring five in each. After falling 5-1 at Omaha in the teams\u2019 series opener Feb. 25, the Pioneers won 5-2 in the rematch and then swept CC in a home-and-home series last weekend by a combined score of 10-2.<\/p>\n

Five different players scored in Denver\u2019s 5-0 win Friday in Colorado Springs. The following night, on the Pioneers\u2019 home ice inside Magness Arena, two goals and an assist from Carter Savoie helped DU ease past the Tigers, 5-2.<\/p>\n

The Pioneers got to celebrate with the Penrose Cup in their dressing room, whereas UND did so on the road. Fun times were had by all, but there could be more to come.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a nice feather in our cap, something we\u2019ve worked really hard to earn, and it\u2019s a nice trophy to win,\u201d Carle said. \u201cIt\u2019s over a 24-game period, and our reward is that we\u2019re the No. 1 seed, and we have advantage hopefully throughout our conference playoffs here. That\u2019s the reward you get for the work you put in.\u201d<\/p>\n

Top-seeded Denver opens NCHC playoff action this weekend at home against No. 8 Miami (7-25-2). The Pioneers took all four games of the teams\u2019 regular-season series, but Carle knows the possibility is there for Miami to pull off a couple of upsets.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re playing really well right now,\u201d Carle said. \u201cThey swept Omaha at home and beat Duluth, and played Western Michigan very tight in both their games last weekend. For me, it\u2019s a team with a lot of confidence, a team that has improved, and they\u2019re getting healthy right now and have an excellent goaltender. (The series is) no foregone conclusion, and it\u2019s going to be a tough matchup and a good battle this weekend here in our building.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look past people in our league, you get embarrassed. I don\u2019t think our guys are doing that at all. We respect every opponent that we play, particularly in this league, and in playoff hockey, the margin of error goes down and the desperation goes up. You\u2019re trying to advance yourself and end teams\u2019 seasons, and that\u2019s the hardest thing to do in sport.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For as much as coaches and players talk about how brutal NCHC campaigns are, it comes as a surprise that only now, in Year 9 of its existence, the conference has crowned split regular-season champions. That quirk was news to Denver coach David Carle, whose Pioneers earned on Saturday a share of the Penrose Cup […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":89,"featured_media":133280,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[812],"coauthors":[810],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThis Week in NCHC Hockey: Even with No. 1 seed in conference tournament, Denver not taking Miami lightly this weekend in opening round of playoffs - College Hockey | USCHO.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"For as much as coaches and players talk about how brutal NCHC campaigns are, it comes as a surprise that only now, in Year 9 of its existence, the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133279\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"This Week in NCHC Hockey: Even with No. 1 seed in conference tournament, Denver not taking Miami lightly this weekend in opening round of playoffs - 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