Trinity and Willliams to host NCAA Tournament First Round games

Williams swept the regular season series against Trinity,
but the Bantams won the conference playoffs. In the end, they'll both
be dancing.

The NCAA held a selection show webcast this morning to announce the bracket for the 11 team NCAA men's ice hockey tournament. Defending NCAA Champion Trinity locked up an automatic bid yesterday by winning the NESCAC tournament, while regular season top finisher Williams waited to see if they would earn an at-large bid after being upset by Tufts in the NESCAC Quarterfinals.

When the bracket was announced, the Ephs got o
ne of the three Pool C bids and both NESCAC schools will be hosting a first round game this Saturday. Williams actually ends up being a higher seed than Trinity and will host the MASCAC champion Salem State Vikings. The Ephs have a chance to host a Quarterfinal game if the lowest seed in the east, ECAC-Northeast champs Salve Regina can upset SUNY Geneseo in the Quarterfinals. If the Knights win, though, the Ephs will be traveling to Geneseo should they defeat the Vikings in the first round. Geneseo and Williams have met already this season with the Knights coming away from Williamstown with a 3-0 victory.

Any animosity Williams has from this game should be softened by the fact that the Knights likely helped get Williams into the tournament. If Geneseo had lost to SUNY-Plattsburgh, the Knights would have likely taken the Ephs at-large bid. Instead, Geneseo gets the SUNYAC automatic bid and the Ephs faced off in the selection room against Platty, a team the Ephs beat this season. It's the first bid to the NCAA D-III MIH tournament for Williams as a program and for 27 year head coach Bill Kangas, who earned NESCAC Coach of The Year honors this season as well as coaching the Williams women's golf team to an NCAA title in the fall.

For Trinity, they will host the NEHC (formerly ECAC-East) champion UMass-Boston Beacons. The Beacons were actually the only non-NESCAC team to defeat Trinity in the 2014-15 campaign with a 5-3 win in Hartford in November 2014. If the Bantams can handle the Beacon, they will travel to "The Cooler" to take on the ECAC-West Champion, Hobart Statesmen, the top seed in the East Region. The Statesmen and Bantams met in Hartford in December and skated to a 1-1 tie. Anthony Sabitsky scored the lone Bants goal and senior Nate Heilbron made 41 saves in net.

If either of the NESCAC schools can make it to and win in the Quarters on March 19th, they'll earn a trip to Lake Placid, NY for the D-III "Phrozen Four" (you don't want to get sued) on March 25th. For the full 11 team bracket, click below:

NCAA D-III Men's Hockey Bracket