As the season starts to wind down, bracketology is coming all the more into focus across many fanbases across the country.  We saw another wild week in Division III hockey, and we have plenty to discuss in this week’s edition!

Current Projections as of 2/11/26

Automatic Qualifiers (NPI Rank)

• CNE: UNE (7)
• LEC: Norwich (16)
• MAC: Neumann (32)
• MASCAC: Fitchburg State (29)
• MIAC: Saint Mary’s (30)
• NCHA: Adrian (6)
• NESCAC: Bowdoin (3
• SUNYAC: Hobart (1)
• UCHC: Utica (5)
• WIAC: UW-Eau Claire (19)

At-Large (NPI Rank)

• Endicott (3)
• Bowdoin (4)
• Salve Regina (8)
• Aurora (9)

First Four Out (NPI Rank)

• Babson (10)
• St. Norbert (11)
• Middlebury (12)
• UW-Stout (13)

Discussion

New Teams in Field:

• Four new teams into the field this week, continuing the major shakeup, with three of the newbies overtaking their conference lead.
• New Conference Leaders:
  • Norwich won a thriller against Babson, overtaking the lead for the Little East from the Beavers.
    • The Cadets enter the field as the #10 seed, while Babson, despite moving up in the NPI, sits out of the field as the first team out.
  • Neumann won a pair of games against fellow MAC contenders, Wilkes, and Stevenson.  The Knights overtook the MAC lead from the latter of the two.
    • Neumann enters the field as the bottom seed: #14
  • Saint Mary’s swept a massive MIAC weekend against a strong Bethel squad.
    • Fellow MIAC contenders Gustavus and Saint John’s split their weekend series, allowing for the Cardinals to take the conference lead.  SMU enters the field as the #13 seed.
• New At-Large Team:
  • Endicott earned a massive sweep of fellow bubble team Curry to vault up the NPI rankings.  Endicott entered the week as the first team out of the field, but after the sweep, moved all the way up to #3 in the NPI.
    • Endicott’s great weekend was paired from an absolute dud of a weekend from Oswego.  The Lakers were crushed by #1 Hobart, and then suffered another defeat from old rival Geneseo.
      • Oswego fell all the way from #8 back to #14, not even in the first four teams out.
• Other Seed Line Shifts:
  • The Polar Bears of Bowdoin pulled a huge upset over #2 Hamilton, and then earned another win against Amherst to jump all the way from #7 up to the #4 seed.
  • Utica, Adrian, and UNE all sweep their respective conference  opponents.  However, they all fall a spot in the NPI rankings to #5, #6, and #7, respectively.  This is mainly due to Bowdoin and Endicott jumping them.
  • Salve Regina is completely done with countable games for the NPI, as their resume is officially complete, but moves up one more spot to #8 after Oswego’s tumble.
  • Aurora had an absolutely awful weekend, losing and tying an MSOE team who was struggling as of late.  Thus, the Spartans dropped all the way from the #3 seed to the last team in, at the #9 seed.
  • Mainly due to the changing automatic bid leaders, Fitchburg State moves up one seed line from the #13 to the #12.
• The cut line for this projection is #10 being the first spot out.  This gives us 5 auto-bid schools in the projected field ranked lower than the first team out, #10 Babson.
• Multi-bid Leagues:
  • CNE: (2)
  • NCHA: (2)
  • NESCAC: (2)
    • With Oswego falling out of the field, and Endicott taking their place, the SUNYAC is now down to just Hobart.  Salve is still taking a spot from another conference at this moment.

Seeding

1. Hobart
2. Hamilton
3. Endicott
4. Bowdoin
5. Utica
6. Adrian
7. UNE
8. Salve Regina
9. Aurora
10. Norwich
11. UW-Eau Claire
12. Fitchburg State
13. Saint Mary’s
14. Neumann

Projected Bracket

First Round

11) UW-Eau Claire @ 9) Aurora

10) Norwich @ 5) Utica

12) Fitchburg State @ 4) Endicott

8) Salve Regina @ 7) UNE

13) Saint Mary’s @ 6) Adrian

14) Neumann @ 3) Bowdoin

Quarterfinals

11) UWEC/9) Aurora @ 1) Hobart

10) Norwich/5) Utica vs. 12) FSU/4) Bowdoin

8) SRU/7) UNE @ 2) Hamilton

13) SMU/6) Adrian vs. 14) Neumann/3) Endicott

Geographical Breakdown

• Thick black lines indicate first round travel matchups.
• The colored shapes indicate which quadrant of the bracket is which.

Rationale

The Byes

Despite the Hamilton loss, the Continentals and Statesmen look like the clear frontrunners for these byes, so they stay put.

The 10E/4W Split

With Endicott replacing Oswego, we still sit at the 10/4 split, although Aurora is playing with fire, and could quite possible make this a disaster scenario for the west.

While I’ve paired west teams together in the past in a pod, based on this week’s seeding, I do think it makes most sense to partner the west schools in Round 1, but not necessarily Round 2.  If you’ll remember, this is very similar to what the committee did last season.  They put west schools together initially, but allowed for crossover play in the quarterfinals.  Based on these seeds, I’m going to trust the NCAA to keep that integrity we saw in 2025.

Setting the West Matchups

While it was always an option to push Adrian east, Hobart is the only one within driving distance besides fellow NCHA member Aurora.  So, we are going to matchup the four west teams by seed.  Thus, we have #13 Saint Mary’s traveling over the 500 miles to #6 Adrian, and a 2025 tournament rematch, with #11 UW-Eau Claire making the return trip to #9 Aurora, hoping for better luck.

Setting the Rest of the First Round

After taking care of the west teams and the bye teams, we are left with these remaining teams without a first round opponent.

• #3 Endicott
• #4 Bowdoin
• #5 Utica
• #7 UNE
• #8 Salve Regina
• #10 Norwich
• #12 Fitchburg State
• #14 Neumann

If we pair these schools off according to seed, we hare left with the following matchups:  #14 Neumann travels north along the coast to #3 Endicott.  #13 Fitchburg plays at #4 Bowdoin.  #10 Norwich drives south to #5 Utica in an extremely intriguing matchup.  Lastly, we have a “future” CNE battle between #8 Salve and #7 UNE.

Luckily, we have no mileage or conference restrictions to deal with, so these matchups will work just fine!

Setting the Quarterfinals

Like I said, last year, the NCAA allowed for the cross-region quarterfinals, and based on these seeds, I believe they are on the table once again.

If we are to go based on the most advantageous matchup for the #1 seed, we have our first cross-region quarterfinal, as #1 Hobart would get the winner of #11 Eau Claire and #9 Aurora.

Next, #2 Hamilton would get the next “most-middle matchup” between #8 Salve and #7 UNE.  I would sign up for that one in a heartbeat.

With four first-round games remaining, this sets up quite nicely, as just like in any normally-seeded bracket.  We pair up the matchups featuring #4 and #5 together, and the same goes for #3 and #6.

So with that, we have the #4 Bowdoin/#12 Fitchburg winner playing the #5 Utica/#10 Norwich winner and the home of the highest seed remaining.

On the flip side, we have the #3 Endicott/#14 Neumann winner facing off against the #6 Adrian/#13 Saint Mary’s winner, meaning we’ll have two cross-region quarterfinals.

Frozen Four Placement

With #1 being traditionally paired with #4, that means the #1 Hobart pod is placed on the same side of the bracket as the #4 Bowdoin pod.

Conversely, we have the #2 Hamilton pod partnered with the #3 Endicott pod on that side of the bracket.

Dollars & “Sense”

Here’s what flights the NCAA is ponying up for in this bracket projection.

First Round:

• 1 flight from Saint Mary’s to Adrian (if they take it)

Quarterfinals:

• 1 flight for Eau Claire/Aurora winner to Hobart
• 1 flight for EITHER Saint Mary’s/Adrian winner to Endicott OR Neumann (should they win) to Saint Mary’s/Adrian winner

Frozen Four (Host: Utica University: Utica Memorial Auditorium)

• 1 flight if Eau Claire/Aurora advances from top left quadrant of bracket
• 1 flight if Saint Mary’s/Adrian advances from bottom right quadrant of bracket

This bracket results in anywhere from 3-5 flights.

Wrap-Up

With the playoffs growing ever-closer, be sure to keep an eye out for our bubble watch and bracketology articles coming shortly!  The races are heating up!