CCHA Playoff Preview and Predictions and All-CCHA Teams

The CCHA wrapped-up its regular season this week. Miami was the regular season champion and gets a bye. The other three teams who got the first round bye are second seed Michigan State, third seed Michigan, and fourth seed Northern Michigan. The rest of the teams seeded 5 through 12 will be in action this week.

Here are the first round matchups:

#5 Nebraska-Omaha vs #12 Bowling Green
#6 Lake Superior vs #11 Western Michigan
#7 Ferris State vs #10 Ohio State
#8 Notre Dame vs #9 Alaska-Fairbanks.

The higher seed will host the three game series. The top seed will play the bottom seed in the first round, second highest seed vs second lowest seed so on and so forth.

Here are my first round picks. The number of games that I think will be played will be in parenthesees.

#5 Nebraska Omaha over #12 Bowling Green (2-0)
#6 Lake Superior over #11 Western Michigan (2-0)
#7 Ferris State over #10 Ohio State (2-1)
#8 Notre Dame over #9 Alaska-Fairbanks(2-1)

Quarterfinal round:

#1 Miami over #8 Notre Dame (2-0)
#2 Michigan State over #7 Ferris State (2-0)
#6 Lake Superior over #3 Michigan (2-1)
#5 Nebraska-Omaha over #4 Northern Michigan (2-0)

Semifinal round:

#1 Miami over #6 Lake Superior
#5 Nebraska-Omaha over #2 Michigan State

Consolation game

#2 Michigan State over #6 Lake Superior

Championship game

#1 Miami over #5 Nebraska-Omaha

Now its time for my all CCHA conference teams and awards.

1st team:

Scott Parse JR. F- Nebraska-Omaha
Bill Thomas SO. F- Nebraska-Omaha
T.J. Hensick JR. F- Michigan
Jack Johnson FR. D- Michigan
Andy Greene SR. D- Miami
Jeff Lerg FR. G- Michigan State

2nd team:

Alex Foster SO. F- Bowling Green
Nathan Davis SO. F- Miami
Brent Walton SR. F- Western Michigan
Mitch Ganzak SO. D- Miami
Nathan Oystrick SR. D- Northern Michigan
Jeff Jakaitis JR. G- Lake Superior

All Freshman Team

Erik Condra F- Notre Dame
Dan Riedel F- Ferris State
Tomas Klempa F- Nebraska-Omaha
Jack Johnson D- Michigan
Tyler Eckford D- Alaska-Fairbanks
Jeff Lerg G- Michigan State

Awards:

Player of the year: Scott Parse JR. F- Nebraska-Omaha
Rookie of the year: Jack Johnson D- Michigan
Coach of the year: Jim Roque- 1st year Lake Superior (15-12-7)