1981 NCAA Division I Men's Ice Hockey Tournament

1981 NCAA Division I Men's
Ice Hockey Tournament
Season 1980–81
Teams 8
Finals Site Duluth Arena
Duluth, Minnesota
Champions Wisconsin (3rd title, 3rd title game,
6th Frozen Four)
Runner-Up Minnesota (8th title game,
9th Frozen Four)
Semifinalists Michigan Tech (10th Frozen Four)
Northern Michigan (2nd Frozen Four)
Winning Coach Bob Johnson (3rd title)
MOP Marc Behrend (Wisconsin)
NCAA Division I Men's Ice Hockey Tournaments
← 1980  1982 →

The 1981 NCAA Men's Division I Ice Hockey Tournament was the culmination of the 1980–81 NCAA Division I men's ice hockey season, the 34th such tournament in NCAA history. It was held between March 19 and 27, 1981, and concluded with Wisconsin defeating Minnesota 6-3. All Quarterfinals matchups were held at home team venues while all succeeding games were played at the Duluth Arena in Duluth, Minnesota.

1981 was the first year that the tournament guaranteed 8 teams to be selected for the championship as opposed the policy put in place in 1977 that gave the selection committee the ability to choose up to 4 additional teams at its discretion (two was the maximum the committee ever choose).

Qualifying teams[1]

The NCAA permitted 8 teams to qualify for the tournament, four from each region (East and West). From the east the ECAC tournament champion and the regular season champions from the two ECAC divisions that did not contain the ECAC champion received automatic bids into the tournament with a fourth at-large bid going to one eastern team. From the west the two WCHA tournament co-champions and the CCHA tournament champion received automatic bids with a fourth at-large bid going to one western team.

East West
Seed School Conference Record Berth type Appearance Last bid Seed School Conference Record Berth type Appearance Last bid
1 Clarkson ECAC Hockey 26–6–3 Division champion 7th 1970 1 Minnesota WCHA 30–11–0 Tournament co-champion 10th 1980
2 Providence ECAC Hockey 17–13–1 Tournament champion 3rd 1978 2 Northern Michigan CCHA 26–11–3 Tournament champion 2nd 1980
3 Cornell ECAC Hockey 18–10–1 Division champion 8th 1980 3 Michigan Tech WCHA 26–13–1 Tournament co-champion 10th 1976
4 Colgate ECAC Hockey 21–10–2 At-large bid 1st Never 4 Wisconsin WCHA 24–14–0 At-large bid 6th 1978

Format

The tournament featured three rounds of play. The two odd-number ranked teams from one region were placed into a bracket with the two even-number ranked teams of the other region. The teams were then seeded according to their ranking. In the Quarterfinals the first and fourth seeds and the second and third seeds played two-game aggregate series to determine which school advanced to the Semifinals. Beginning with the Semifinals all games were played at the Duluth Arena and all series became Single-game eliminations. The winning teams in the semifinals advanced to the National Championship Game with the losers playing in a Third Place game.

Tournament Bracket[2]

  Quarterfinals
March 19–21		 Semifinals
March 25–26		 National Championship
March 27
                                 
E1  Clarkson 2 6 8  
W4  Wisconsin 3 6 9  
  W4  Wisconsin 5  
  W2  Northern Michigan 1  
W2  Northern Michigan 7 3 10
E3  Cornell 3 4 7  
  W4  Wisconsin 6
  W1  Minnesota 3
W1  Minnesota 9 5 14  
E4  Colgate 4 4 8  
  W1  Minnesota 7 Third Place Game
  W3  Michigan Tech 2  
E2  Providence 3 5 8 W2  Northern Michigan 2
W3  Michigan Tech 7 6 13   W3  Michigan Tech 5

Note: * denotes overtime period(s)

Quarterfinals

(E1) Clarkson vs. (W4) Wisconsin

Wisconsin won series 9–8

(E2) Providence vs. (W3) Michigan Tech

Michigan Tech won series 13–8

(W1) Minnesota vs. (E4) Colgate

Minnesota won series 14–8

(W2) Northern Michigan vs. (E3) Cornell

Northern Michigan won series 10–7

Semifinal

(W1) Minnesota vs. (W3) Michigan Tech

(W2) Northern Michigan vs. (W4) Wisconsin

Third Place Game

(W2) Northern Michigan vs. (W3) Michigan Tech

National Championship

(W1) Minnesota vs. (W4) Wisconsin

All-Tournament Team[3]

* Most Outstanding Player(s)[4]

References

  1. ↑ "NCAA Division 1 Tournament". College Hockey Historical Archives. Archived from the original on 2013-06-21. Retrieved 2013-06-19.
  2. ↑ "NCAA Tournament". College Hockey Historical Archives. Retrieved May 19, 2013.
  3. ↑ "NCAA Frozen Four Records" (PDF). NCAA.org. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2013-06-22. Retrieved 2013-06-19.
  4. ↑ "NCAA Division I Awards". College Hockey Historical Archives. Retrieved 2013-07-17.

External links

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