Boston College is two points behind first place New Hampshire with seven left to play. The Wildcats still have a game-in-hand, though I would argue that UNH has a bit tougher road from here on out with series against Merrimack and Vermont. Compare UNH's remaining series with BC's series with UMass and game with Providence.
In all likelihood, the Hockey East regular season title will come down to the last series of the year, when the Eagles and Wildcats square off in their home-and-home finale.
Will the Eagles catch the Wildcats to win their conference best 11th regular season title, and first since 2005? Or will UNH win yet another Hockey East regular season title, its fourth in the last five years?
You can simulate your own final Hockey East standings using SiouxSports.com's "What-If" Simulator, which allows you to input points for each of the remaining Hockey East contests. The webpage does, however, has a few glitches. For many of the single game weekends, you need to put 4 points for a win (clearly built off of the WCHA scheduling model). That said, the site does a reasonable job of allowing you to predict how this year's Hockey East regular season will play out.
For the Eagles, I'm going with:
- 2 points at Providence (Feb. 11)
- 3 points Northeastern/at Northeastern (Feb. 18/19)
- 4 points at Massachusetts/Massachusetts (Feb. 25/26)
- 2 points New Hampshire/at New Hampshire (Mar. 4/5)
That would leave BC two points behind New Hampshire, who I have picking up 3 points Merrimack/at Merrimack, 2 at Vermont, 4 Northeastern/at Northeastern and 2 at BC/BC.
For my simulated Hockey East standings, I have UNH, BC, BU and Merrimack getting the four home ice spots in the Hockey East tournament, followed by #5 Maine, #6 Northeastern, #7 Vermont and #8 Providence, finishing tied with UMass but winning the head-to-head tiebreaker.
Given these projected standings, the Hockey East Quarterfinals would look like this: #8 Providence at #1 New Hampshire, #7 Vermont at #2 Boston College, #6 Northeastern at #3 Boston University, and #5 Maine at #4 Merrimack. Of course, if the seeds hold serve, we may very well be looking at BC-BU Round 5 in the Hockey East semifinals.