After a long Christmas break, as the the 2025-26 season has been resumed in Division III hockey.  We’ve seen some major matchups right out of the gate, and a couple big-time moves to boot.  For a refresher, take a look at our last projection from about three weeks back.

Current Projections as of 1/8/26

Automatic Qualifiers (NPI Rank)

  • CNE: Endicott (13)
  • MAC: Wilkes (16)
  • MIAC: Hamline (10)
  • NCHA: Concordia-WI (8)
  • NESCAC: Middlebury (12)
  • SUNYAC: Plattsburgh (19)
  • UCHC: Nazareth (3)

At-Large (NPI Rank)

  • UW-River Falls (1)
  • Amherst (2)
  • UW-Eau Claire (4)
  • Augsburg (5)
  • Norwich (6)
  • Williams (7)

First Four Out (NPI Rank)

  • Bowdoin (9)
  • Colby (11)
  • Gustavus (14)
  • Connecticut College (15)

Discussion

  • New Teams in Field:
    • After a boatload of games, we have two teams in, two teams out.
      • UW-Eau Claire jumps from the first team out at #8, up to #4, after some tough games against Augsburg, improving the strength of schedule.
      • Norwich moves from the second team out at #10, up to #6 after a tournament win, featuring wins against Oswego and Elmira.
    • On the losing side of this swap, we see two NESCAC teams drop out.
      • Colby falls from #4 to #11 after a disappointing loss to Cortland.
      • Conn. College falls from #7 to #15 in the NPI after a home upset at the hands of Wesleyan.
  • Seed Line Shifts:
    • We have a swap at the top of the seeding, as UWRF has overtaken Amherst as the #1 seed.  A 4-0 win over a strong St. Norbert team was likely the cause of this.
    • Williams fell one spot from the #6 seed to the #7 seed, jumped by the likes of Eau Claire and Norwich.
    • Hamline jumps two seed lines from the #11 seed to the #9, mainly fueled by a dominant win over fellow conference leader Endicott.
    • On the other side of the coin, Endicott fell two seed lines from #9 to #11 with the Hamline loss, frustrating considering they sit behind #10 Middlebury despite going 1-0-1 against them.
  • The cut line for this projection is #9 being the first spot out.  This gives us 5 auto-bid schools in the projected field ranked lower than the first team out, #9 Bowdoin.
  • Multi-bid Leagues:
    • NESCAC: (3)
    • MIAC: (3)
    • WIAC: (2)
  • With two WIAC teams (River Falls; Eau Claire) and an LEC team (Norwich) in the field, we have a whopping nine conferences represented in this projection.

Seeding

  1. UW-River Falls
  2. Amherst
  3. Nazareth
  4. UW-Eau Claire
  5. Augsburg
  6. Norwich
  7. Williams
  8. Concordia (WI)
  9. Hamline
  10. Middlebury
  11. Endicott
  12. Wilkes
  13. Plattsburgh

Projected Bracket

First Round

11) Endicott @ 10) Middlebury

9) Hamline @ 4) UW-Eau Claire

8) Concordia (WI) @ 5) Augsburg

12) Wilkes @ 7) Williams

13) Plattsburgh @ 6) Norwich

Quarterfinals

11) Endicott/10) Middlebury @ 1) UW-River Falls

8) CUW/5) Augsburg vs. 9) Hamline/4) UWEC

12) Wilkes/7) Williams @ 2) Amherst

13) Plattsburgh /6) Norwich @ 3) Nazareth

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 #1 seed changing hands, we still have the top 3 teams getting byes, with #1 UWRF, #2 Amherst, and #3 Nazareth.

The 8E/5W Split

For the first projection this season, we have the west gaining a bid, narrowing the split to an 8/5.  With River Falls getting a bye, we have some options for how the other four west teams will match up.

A Clean Bracket?

There are a couple of options here when looking at the seeding of the west teams.  In a traditional bracket, it works great to have a #9 Hamline/#8 Concordia (WI) game feed into the #1 seed, River Falls.

What’s also nice, is that should #4 Eau Claire and #5 Augsburg hold serve in Round 1, we have another western quarterfinal as well.

As clean as this seems, I don’t see the committee doing this.  Paying for two east teams to come west (to Eau Claire and Augsburg) in Round 1 is pricy.  What’s even more spendy is that if one of those east teams does win, there’s another flight coming the following weekend.

West Pod?

Because of this, I think the committee forgets about bracket integrity, putting the west teams at a disadvantage, putting the four non-River Falls teams into one pod.

So, by matching these teams up by seed, we have two cross-state matchups, with #9 Hamline heading east to #4 Eau Claire, and #8 Concordia-WI traveling west to #5 Augsburg.  Then, the winners would play at the highest remaining seed.

All four of these teams get a brutal draw here, but probably none more so than CUW, who loses a home game that, in theory, they earned.

Pairing the East Teams

After ruling out both the west teams and the teams with byes, we’re left with these remaining schools:

  • #6 Norwich
  • #7 Williams
  • #10 Middlebury
  • #11 Endicott
  • #12 Wilkes
  • #13 Plattsburgh

If we pair these teams off according to seed, we have three new matchups with no issues whatsoever.

#13 Plattsburgh heads across the state line to their old rival, #6 Norwich, in what would be a rematch from Plattsburgh’s season-opening victory over the Cadets.  Then, #12 Wilkes would head north to face off against the Ephs of #7 Williams.  Finally, we would see Gulls vs. Panthers: Round 3.  Endicott would travel to Middlebury, despite going 1-0-1 against them this season.

Setting the Quarterfinal Matchups

I already mentioned the west pod playing itself down to one team, so we’ll take that out of the picture.  Next, #1 UW-River Falls gets the “middle matchup” seed-wise, so the #11 Endicott/#10 Middlebury winner would be flown west to Hunt Arena.

Then, #2 Amherst gets the winner of the next matchup, traditionally the matchup involving the #7 seed.  So, the winner of the #12 Wilkes/#7 Williams game would head to Orr Rink, giving us a potential NESCAC rematch in the quarterfinals.

Finally, we have #3 Nazareth getting the winner of the #13 Plattsburgh/#6 Norwich matchup, in a pod that features three big-name programs.

Who gets screwed?

By seed, we mentioned that all four west teams in that pod get a bad draw, while in theory, every other school in this bracket gets an easier draw than seeding would suggest, even #1 UWRF.

Frozen Four Placement

#1 River Falls’ quadrant is paired with the #4 Eau Claire pod, as we mentioned, so all five west teams get shoved to one side of the bracket.  The #2 Amherst and #3 Nazareth quadrants are also matched up.

Dollars & “Cents”

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

First Two Rounds:

  • Quarterfinals:
    • 1 flight for Endicott/Middlebury to River Falls

Frozen Four:

-If UW-River Falls hosts:

  • 2 flights from right side of bracket

If Amherst/Nazareth/Norwich/Williams hosts:

  • 1 flight from bottom left quadrant of bracket

-If UW-Eau Claire/Augsburg/Concordia (WI)/Hamline hosts:

  • 3 flights from all other quadrants of bracket

Depending on results, this bracket results in anywhere from 2-4 flights.  (If I went with the other setup, there would be at minimum 4 flights)

Wrap-Up

Let me know what you all think of this bracket.  This one was a bit frustrating to think about, because I’ve seen this story before.  Here’s hoping for the NCAA to do the right thing, not the least expensive thing.

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