Notre Dame Hockey: Irish to play BC in first round of NCAA Tournament

The Notre Dame Hockey team is a big underdog heading into the NCAA Tournament, but anything can happen in these kinds of events.

The Notre Dame hockey team will play Boston College in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Saturday, March 27th. The Irish will be significant underdogs in this matchup, but anything can happen in the NCAA Tournament.

This past Sunday, the Notre Dame hockey team learned that they will be playing in the upcoming NCAA Hockey Tournament. This will be the fifth-straight NCAA Tournament that the Irish will play in.

The news came as a bit of a surprise since Notre Dame was eliminated in the first round of their conference tournament and finished the season with an overall record of 14-13-2.

The Irish did not earn one of the original at-large bids. Instead, they are filling in for St. Lawrence University, whose team had to withdraw from the tournament after their head coach tested positive for COVID-19.

Notre Dame is the four seed in the Albany Region and will play Boston College in the first round on Saturday, March 27th. The Eagles are the second overall seed in the tournament and will be heavily favored over the Irish. However, post-season hockey is an unpredictable beast.

Boston College was ranked second in the latest USCHO.com poll and third in the latest USA Today Poll. They spent a few weeks ranked number one, but dropped after losing in the semifinals of the Hockey East Tournament.

This Boston College team does not have many weaknesses. They are averaging 4.06 goals per game this year, which ranks first in the country. In addition to that, they are only allowing 2.29 goals per game, which ranks thirteenth.

The Eagles’ goaltender, Spencer Knight, has the eighth-best save percentage in college hockey this season. The sophomore has stopped 93.5 percent of the shots he faced.

If Notre Dame is going to pull off the upset on Saturday, they will need strong play at both ends of the ice. They need to find a way to limit the Boston College offense and put points on the board.

The Irish have shown that they have the ability to score in bunches. In the last two months, they scored five or more goals in five different games. That is the type of offensive performance they will need to win games in the NCAA Tournament.

The wildcard for Notre Dame will be their defense and the play of senior goaltender Dylan St. Cyr. Before conceding six goals against Penn State in the Big Ten tournament, the Irish had been playing well defensively.

If St. Cyr gets hot, Notre Dame could potentially make a run all the way to the Frozen Four Pittsburgh.