Spittin' Chiclets College Hockey Rankings (Week 5)
1.) Minnesota Duluth
2.) Massachusetts
3.) St. Cloud State
4.) Minnesota State
5.) Penn State
6.) Denver
7.) Ohio State
8.) Providence
9.) Notre Dame
10.) Bowling Green
Week 5 of the Spittin’ Chiclets College Hockey Rankings are here. I can honestly say at the beginning of the season I never thought I would have UMass Amherst as the #2 school in the nation for hockey but that I’ll get into that. A bunch of changes this week and once again we added a new school to the rankings, so let’s dive in.
Minnesota Duluth remains the #1 team in the country. They welcomed Colorado College to Duluth this past weekend and it went as expected, Bulldogs swept. Duluth won Friday night 3-0 and Saturday night 5-1. They’ll go to Denver this upcoming weekend for a series with the #7 ranked Pioneers. Denver got their first real test of the season this past weekend against #3 St. Cloud State, where they lost both games 4-3. UMD has rattled off 8 straight wins since their opening weekend against Minnesota and I don’t see them slowing down anytime soon.
Massachusetts comes in as the #2 ranked team in the nation after the weekend sweep over the now #8 ranked Providence. The Minutemen welcomed the Friars into the Mullins Center this past weekend and it certainly wasn’t an enjoyable experience for Providence. Greg Carvel and his boys played some A+ hockey, winning on Thursday night 3-2 and Saturday night 3-2. The road ahead is a bit of a cake walk for the Minutemen as they have Holy Cross, UNH, Princeton and UConn to finish off the month so I don’t see Massachusetts going anywhere anytime soon.
Minnesota State has themselves back on the map coming in at #4 this week after a big home and home with Minnesota this weekend. The Mavs won 5-1 on Friday night and 2-1 on Saturday night and are starting to compile some big wins this season. So far, they have weekend sweeps of BU (who stinks), Minnesota and North Dakota. Looking ahead they have series against Ferris State, Bemidji State, Lake Superior and Alaska Anchorage so the Mavs have the opportunity to go on a bit of a run here going forward.
Penn State makes the jump up to #5 this week after the weekend sweep of Robert Morris. Their only loss this season comes at the hands of Arizona State, who might find themselves in the top 10 by the end season (or even next week) they keep on winning and it will be inevitable. Anyways, the Nittany Lions have a real test in Michigan this upcoming weekend then Ohio State the following weekend. This is Big Ten hockey at its finest and I can’t get enough.
Bowling Green makes their debut this week in the college hockey rankings coming in at #10. I have gotten a ton of shit for not putting the Falcons in the top 10 until this point and let me say this…they are lucky they got in this week. They have played absolutely no one good outside of Ohio State. They even tied Alaska Anchorage this weekend. I gave them the benefit of the doubt being that they had to travel all the way to Alaska so Friday night was probably rough, but still, it’s Alaska Anchorage….that needs to be a weekend sweep. Going forward they have Lake Superior, Alabama Huntsville and Ferris State until they play Minnesota State in the middle of December. So they need to keep piling up the wins if they want to stay in the top 10.
Save of the week:
Shout out to club hockey. Hell of a save from the SHU goalie here.