As we head into the final weekend of regular season NESCAC action, the only thing we know for certain is that Tufts won't make the playoffs and seven teams (Trinity, Amherst, Williams, Bowdoin, Middlebury, Conn College) have clinched playoff spots. What position those seven teams will finish in and who will be the eight seed (Wesleyan has three point edge on Hamilton), is yet to be determined.
So it got us to thinking, how have the ten NESCAC men's hockey member schools (Bates doesn't have hockey) done historically in the all-important final regular season standings? The NESCAC became an official playing conference in 1999 and held its first men's hockey postseason tournament in 2000.
The NESCAC doesn't have the standings listed for 1999-2000 on the conference website, but thanks to William Costello, we have the playoff results from that year, which tell us the top seven seeds. ("What happened to the eighth team," you say incredulously. more on that below). Using the USCHO scoreboard for the final week of the regular season in February 2000 ,we can extrapoalte that Trinity finished eighth and Conn College finished ninth. So, we present below the final regular season standings from 2000-2013.
The NESCAC has gone under considerable changes in the decade and-a-half of conference play. Here are some quick notes:
*The conference only had 9 teams for the first two seasons (1999-2000, '00 -'01) as Tufts played in the ECAC Northeast until 2001-02.
*The first three seasons had a seven team playoff format. The one seed got a buy into the semi-finals (which they hosted) with opening round games of 2 vs 7, 3 vs 6 and 4 vs 5.
*Prior to the 2011-12 season, the conference regular season consisted of the famous "interlock": nineteen total games (nine against the fellow 'Cac schools and ten against the ECAC East schools). The ECAC-E had its own playoffs, as only the ten NESCAC schools were eligible for the eight spots in the 'Cac playoffs. Starting in the 2011-12 season, the NESCAC regular season became eighteen games: a home-and-home with the other nine NESCAC schools.
On to the results. There's a lot to digest here, but here are some quick notes:
* The teams currently in the top five spots (Amherst, Trinity, Williams, Bowdoin, Middlebury) have never missed the playoffs.
* Conn College - who clinched a playoff spot today, has only made the playoffs three other times (2007-09).
* Colby has had the widest variation in finishes, from first in 2008 to tenth in 2009 and 2012. The drop from first in 08 to last in 09 is the largest single season change in conference history.
*Middlebury finished first or second in the first eleven years of conference play. They then finished third in back-to-back seasons, fifth last year and will finish no higher than fourth this season.
*Williams is the only team of the seven highest historical finishers to not win the regular season crown once. The Ephs were the front runners to finish first as late as last week, but an 0-3-1 mark in their last four games has assured they will extend the non-first streak.
| School | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 |
| Amherst | 5 | 2 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 5 | 4 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 1 | 4 |
| Bowdoin | 4 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 6 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 1 |
| Colby | 4 | 3 | 6 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 10 | 7 |
| Conn College | 9 | 9 | 8 | 10 | 10 | 9 | 10 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 |
| Hamilton | 6 | 6 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 7 | 9 | 9 | 7 | 6 | 1 | 8 | 8 |
| Middlebury | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 5 |
| Trinity | 8 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 5 | 7 | 7 | 3 |
| Tufts | * | * | 10 | 8 | 9 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 10 | 8 | 7 | 10 | 4 | 10 |
| Wesleyan | 7 | 8 | 9 | 9 | 7 | 10 | 8 | 4 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 6 |
| Williams | 4 | 7 | 5 | 7 | 5 | 6 | 2 | 7 | 7 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 2 |
| School | Avg. Finish | |||||||||||||
| 1.Middlebury | 1.92 | |||||||||||||
| 2.Bowdoin | 3.14 | |||||||||||||
| 3.Amherst | 4.42 | |||||||||||||
| 4. Williams | 4.64 | |||||||||||||
| 5. Trinity | 4.71 | |||||||||||||
| 6.Colby | 5.14 | |||||||||||||
| 7. Hamilton | 6.28 | |||||||||||||
| 8. Wesleyan | 7.78 | |||||||||||||
| 9. Conn College | 8.35 | |||||||||||||
| 10. Tufts | 8.58 |
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