#3 North Dakota (24-7-1 overall, 15-2-1-4 NCHC) squares off against #4 Western Michigan (23-8-1 overall, 13-5-3-1 NCHC) at Lawson Arena in Kalamazoo, Michigan this weekend with the NCHC regular season championship on the line. With six league points up for grabs in the two-game series, the Fighting Hawks need just one point to secure at least a share of the Penrose Cup. In other words, WMU would need to win both games in regulation to repeat as outright league champions; last year, Western Michigan won the program’s first-ever Penrose Cup. For the first time since 2015, two NCHC teams playing head-to-head on the final weekend of the regular season could both hoist the trophy.
In 2024, UND won the Penrose Cup at home against Western Michigan.
In 2025, Western Michigan won the Penrose Cup at home against North Dakota.
This weekend, there is more on the line than the trophy. The NCHC regular-season champion will also have home ice throughout the league playoffs.
UND and Western Michigan have not met this season, so we’ll need to take a look further back to make sense of what fans should expect in this pivotal matchup.
Nearly a year ago, the Broncos ended UND’s season with a 4-2 victory in the semifinals of the last-ever NCHC Frozen Faceff (Xcel Energy Center; St. Paul, Minnesota). The Fighting Hawks drew within one goal on freshman Sacha Boisvert’s eighteenth goal of the season, an extra-attacker tally with just fifty seconds remaining. 26 seconds later, a Broncos’ empty-netter sent the boys in green home early and led to a coaching change in Grand Forks.
After dispatching North Dakota, WMU won a double-overtime thriller over Denver to win the NCHC playoff championship and rode that momentum all the way to the program’s first national title. Incredibly, Western Michigan also won a pair of 2OT games in the NCAA tournament. First it was a 2-1 win over Minnesota State in the regional semifinal. Two games later – after a 2-1 victory against UMass – Western Michigan faced DU in the Frozen Four semifinals; that game went 26 seconds into double overtime before Owen Michaels sent his team to the championship game (a 6-2 Broncos victory over Boston University).
Western Michigan played a total of twelve overtime games in 2024-25 and came out of those contests with an overall record of 8-3-1. One of those overtime losses was WMU’s last loss of last season: a 4-3 home defeat at the hands of North Dakota which saw Sasha Boisvert tie the game with under forty seconds to play and Jake Livanavage score a power play goal in the extra session. Livanavage made sure to celebrate near the Lawson Lunatics (WMU’s student section), since they direct most of their collective attention at whichever opponent wears #4.
It is worth noting that the Broncos won the other three games in the season series a year ago and were the best team North Dakota faced in the entire campaign. WMU won Friday’s opener in Kalamazoo and earned a sweep in Grand Forks two months earlier. The home squad had a chance in Friday’s opener, but it was all Broncos in the rematch. UND drew a penalty late in regulation in game one, but an interference call just 24 seconds later negated the advantage. Early in the extra frame, Western Michigan scored a power play tally to earn the 3-2 victory. On Saturday night, the game was probably closer than the 5-1 final score, but WMU continually frustrated North Dakota in all three zones.
Two seasons ago, in the only series between the teams, North Dakota swept Western Michigan at home (5-3, 3-0) to capture the program’s sixth Penrose Cup. In the in the twelve completed seasons of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference, only UND, Denver, St. Cloud State , and Western Michiganhave hoisted the Penrose.
Three years ago, UND managed to take five of six league points on the road at Kalamazoo (2-2 tie/shootout win; 3-0 win), but the Broncos swept the Fighting Hawks at Ralph Engelstad Arena (4-0, 7-6) to take the season series.
Fifth-year head coach Pat Ferschweiler (WMU ’93) recently earned a contract extension that will keep him behind the Broncos’ bench through April 2030. Ferschweiler, who had previously been the WMU associate head coach under Andy Murray, also spent four seasons as an assistant coach for the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings.
In his rookie campaign four seasons ago, Ferschweiler went 26-12-1 and brought his team within one game of the Frozen Four, falling to Minnesota in the regional final. In September of 2022, the Western Michigan bench boss was extended through the 2025-26 season. Three years ago, he led the Broncos to a 2nd-place finish in the NCHC, an overall record of 23-15-1, and another NCAA tournament appearance. Two seasons ago, Ferschweiler once again led his team to the NCAA tourney with an overall mark of 21-16-1.
Last year was certainly Ferschweiler’s best behind the bench.
After losing seven of his top nine point producers – forwards Luke Grainger (14-34-48 in 2023-24), Dylan Wendt (23-21-44), Sam Colangelo (24-19-43), Chad Hillebrand (7-19-26), and Ethan Phillips (9-14-23) and defensemen Zak Galambos (9-12-21) and Carter Berger (4-16-20) – Ferschweiler saw his team scoring at a HIGHER rate last season (3.98 goals scored per game in 2024-25; 3.58 in 2023-24).
And the scary part for opponents was that last year’s championship team was much better defensively than any we’ve seen in the Ferschweiler era:
2024-25: 2.05 goals allowed/game
2023-24: 2.55 goals allowed/game
2022-23: 2.62 goals allowed/game
2021-22: 2.59 goals allowed/game
Things aren’t quite as impressive this year, but Western is still scoring 3.75 goals per game (6th in the nation) and allowing just 2.34 (11th).
This year’s version of the Fighting Hawks clears both of those:
Goals scored/game: 3.84 (4th in the nation)
Goals allowed/game: 2.25 (7th)
After having the luxury of starting either graduate netminder Cameron Rowe (15-2-0, 2.00 goals-against average, .924 save percentage, one shutout) or freshman Hampton Slukynsky (19-5-1, 1.90 GAA, .922 SV%, 1 SO) between the pipes last season, Slukynsky has played every minute in net for WMU, with a record of 23-8-1, a goals-against average of 2.25, a save percentage of .916 save perctentage, and four shutouts).
After alternating with Rowe for much of the 2024-25 season, Slukynsky, started – and won – the last twelve consecutive games for the Broncos. Slukynsky was slated to attend Northern Michigan University before head coach Ryan Potulny departed the program to become the head coach of the Hartford Wolf Pack (AHL). Slukynsky got out of his NLI and chose to attend WMU along with his brother Grant Slukysnky, who entered the portal after playing one season (6-3-9 in 34 games) under Potulny.
In the Division I era (since 1975), the Broncos have had seventeen twenty-win seasons, with nine of those coming between 1984 and 1996 under head coach Bill Wilkinson. At 23-8-1, Pat Ferschweiler has already led his team to twenty victories for the fifth consecutive year.
As mentioned above, UND is in the driver’s seat for another league title and could clinch the Penrose Cup with a victory tonight.
UND can finish no lower than third place in the league standings and will be at home for the first round of the NCHC playoffs, which will be played from March 6th through March 8th.
Twelve full seasons have come and gone since the college hockey landscape changed forever. With Minnesota and Wisconsin departing the Western Collegiate Hockey Association for the Big Ten after the 2012-13 season, several other conference schools and two members of the former Central Collegiate Hockey Association created the National Collegiate Hockey Conference and left Alaska Anchorage, Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State behind in a watered-down WCHA.
And now, the WCHA is no more, and Bemidji State, Michigan Tech, and Minnesota State find themselves as three of nine programs in the latest version of the CCHA along with Bowling Green, Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Northern Michigan, St. Thomas (fifth season at the Division I level), and Augustana (third season at the Division I level).
Next season, St. Thomas will leave the CCHA to become the tenth member of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC).
So far this season, the NCHC has won nearly seventy percent of its non-conference games (62-29-2, .677) and has four teams (#3 North Dakota, #4 Western Michigan, #8 Denver, and #9 Minnesota Duluth) positioned in the top ten in the latest rankings.
The NCHC has been the premier hockey conference since its inception, and particularly over the past ten seasons. The nine teams in the league have gone 602-310-81 (.647) in non-conference action since the start of the 2014-15 season and sent fifteen teams to the Frozen Four (UND and Omaha in 2015, UND and Denver in 2016, Denver and Duluth in 2017, Duluth in 2018, Denver and Duluth in 2019, Duluth and St. Cloud State in 2021, Denver in 2022 and 2024, and Denver and Western Michigan in 2025 over that nine-year stretch (there was no national tournament in 2020). Conference members North Dakota (2016), Denver (2017, 2022, 2024), Minnesota Duluth (2018, 2019), and Western Michigan (2025) have won seven of the last nine national titles.
Turning our attention to this weekend’s matchup, a half-point per game or better is my benchmark for solid offensive production, and the Broncos boast TEN lineup regulars who meet that threshold: junior forward Grant Slukysnky (8-27-35), senior forward Liam Valente (17-13-30), junior forward William Whitelaw (17-12-29), junior forward Zaccharya Wisdom (15-11-26), junior forward Owen Michaels (10-12-22), sophomore forward Ty Henricks (9-13-22), freshman forward Bobby Cowan (5-16-21), sophomore forward Zach Nehring 5-12-17), senior defenseman Samuel Sjolund (6-16-21), sophomore defenseman Zach Sharp (5-14-19).
Liam Valente spent his first two seasons at Providence, scoring seven goals and adding thirteen assists in 59 games played. Last year, he put up a line of 14-19-33 in 42 games.
William Whitelaw is on his third team in three seasons (Wisconsin in 2023-24, Michigan in 2024-25). Zaccharya Wisdom played the past two seasons at Colorado College.
It is worth noting that WMU’s top two defensemen – sophomore Joona Vaisanen and junior Cole Crusberg-Roseen remain out of the lineup this weekend. Neither has played since the calendar turned to 2026; both are out for the season with lower-body injuries. When they were on the ice, Vaisanen was averaging nearly 22 minutes per game; Crusberg-Roseen, nearly 21 minutes.
North Dakota will also have ten players in the lineup this weekend who have met that same offensive threshold: senior forward Ellis Rickwood (8-23-31), senior forward Ben Strinden (14-16-30), freshman forward Will Zellers (16-10-26), sophomore forward Mac Swanson (7-15-22), freshman forward Cole Reschny (4-24-2), senior forward Dylan James (17-10-27), freshman forward Josh Zakreski (2-2-4 in eight games), junior defenseman Jake Livanavage (5-19-24), junior defenseman Abram Wiebe (5-20-25), and freshman defenseman Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18).
Josh Zakreski returned to the lineup last weekend after a lengthy absence and promptly scored a goal on his first shift.
As mentioned above, sophomore Hampton Slukynsky (23-8-1, 2.25 GAA, .916 SV%, 4 SO) has played every minute in net for the Broncos.
For North Dakota, it’s been the younger netminder with the better of the results. Freshman Jan Spunar was splitting time with graduate transfer Gibson Homer to start this season, but Spunar began to earn more starts as the season went along.
Here’s how the two stack up:
Spunar: 15-3-1, 1.87 goals-against average, .919 save percentage, four shutouts
Homer: 9-4-0, 2.62 goals-against average, .890 save percentage
Gibson Homer did earn a start last Saturday night for Senior Night, but I would expect that it will be Jan Spunar’s net for the remainder of the season.
After this weekend, both teams will be hosting the first round of the NCHC playoffs (best-of-three quarterfinals from March 6th-8th); their opponents remain to be determined.
Western Michigan Team Profile
Head Coach: Pat Ferschweiler (5th season at WMU, 127-58-5, .682)
National Rankings: #4/#4
NPI Ranking: 4th
KRACH Ranking: 437.3 (4th)
This Season: 23-8-1 overall, 13-5-3-1 NCHC (t-2nd of 9 teams)
Last Season: 34-7-1 overall (NCAA Champions), 15-1-4-4 NCHC (1st)
2025-2026 Season Statistics:
Team Offense: 3.75 goals scored/game – 6th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.34 goals allowed/game – 11th of 63 teams
Power Play: 20.5% (25 of 122) – 32nd of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 86.3% (107 of 124) – 7th of 63 teams
Key Players: Junior F Grant Slukysnky (8-27-35), Senior F Liam Valente (17-13-30), Junior F William Whitelaw (17-12-29), Junior F Zaccharya Wisdom (15-11-26), Junior F Owen Michaels (10-12-22), Sophomore F Ty Henricks (9-13-22), Freshman F Bobby Cowan (5-16-21), Sophomore F Zach Nehring 5-12-17), Senior D Samuel Sjolund (6-16-21), Sophomore D Zach Sharp (5-14-19), Sophomore G Hampton Slukynsky (23-8-1, 2.25 GAA, .916 SV%, 4 SO)
North Dakota Team Profile
Head Coach: Dane Jackson (1st season at North Dakota, 24-7-1, .766)
National Rankings: #3/#3
NPI Ranking: 3rd
KRACH Rating: 488.5 (3rd)
This Season: 24-7-1 overall, 15-2-1-4 NCHC (1st)
Last Season: 21-15-2 overall (missed NCAA tournament), 11-8-4-1 NCHC (5th)
2025-26 Season Statistics:
Team Offense: 3.84 goals scored/game – 4th of 63 teams
Team Defense: 2.25 goals allowed/game – 7th of 63 teams
Power Play: 27.6% (32 of 116) – 7th of 63 teams
Penalty Kill: 82.0% (82 of 100) – 20th of 63 teams
Key Players: Freshman F Cole Reschny (4-24-28), Senior F Ben Strinden (14-16-30), Freshman F Will Zellers (16-10-26), Senior F Dylan James (17-10-27), Sophomore F Mac Swanson (7-15-22), Senior F Ellis Rickwood (8-23-31), Junior D Jake Livanavage (5-19-24), Junior D Abram Wiebe (5-20-25), Freshman D Keaton Verhoeff (6-12-18), Freshman G Jan Spunar (15-3-1, 1.87 GAA, .919 SV%, 4 SO)
By The Numbers
Last Meeting in Kalamazoo: March 1, 2025. Western Michigan took a 3-2 lead in the third period thanks to two Ty Hendricks goals just two minutes apart. UND battled back and forced overtime on an extra-attacker tally by Sacha Boisvert with just 36 seconds remaining in the game, and the Fighting Hawks’ Jake Livanavage completed the comeback with a power play marker late in the five-minute overtime session. The Broncos outshot North Dakota 36-18 but were continually stymied by UND netminder T.J. Semptimphelter, who finished with 33 saves.
Most Important Meeting: March 24, 2012 (St. Paul, MN). North Dakota upended Western Michigan 3-1 in the NCAA West Regional semifinal. Brock Nelson had two points, including an empty net goal with 25 seconds remaining that sent UND to the regional finals against Minnesota. Aaron Dell made 24 saves for the Green and White. The Broncos, who have played at the Division I level since 1975-76, have ten NCAA tournament appearances.
A Trip Down Memory Lane: Saturday, March 22, 2014 (Minneapolis, MN). North Dakota faced a must-win situation in the 3rd place game at the inaugural NCHC Frozen Faceoff, and did not disappoint the partisan crowd. The Green and White rolled to a 5-0 victory behind two first-period goals from Conner Gaarder. UND netminder Zane Gothberg made 25 saves for the shutout, and Dave Hakstol’s crew played the waiting game for several more hours before discovering that they had indeed made the NCAA tournament for the twelfth consecutive season.
All-Time Series: In the short history between the schools, UND has won 31 of the 48 games (31-16-1, .656), including a 13-6-1 (.675) record at Lawson Arena. Before the 2016-17 season in which Western Michigan won three of the four meetings, WMU’s lone victory over North Dakota was a 2-1 road win on March 8th, 2014. The teams first met in 1997.
Last Ten: Western Michigan has won six of the past ten between meetings the teams, even though only three of those ten games were played in Kalamazoo. The combined score of the last ten contests? Broncos 35, Fighting Hawks 30.
Game News and Notes
Western Michigan moved up to the Division I ranks beginning with the 1975-76 season and has advanced to the NCAA tournament ten times. Over that same stretch, North Dakota has appeared in the NCAA tourney thirty times, with sixteen Frozen Fours and six national championships (1980, 1982, 1987, 1997, 2000, 2016). The Broncos have made the NCAA tourney five times (2017, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025) in their first twelve seasons in the NCHC after advancing to the national tournament twice (2011, 2012) in the last three seasons in the now-defunct CCHA. North Dakota has outscored opponents 53-16 in third periods this season, including a scoring margin of 41-9 against conference foes. On nine occasions this season, UND has scored at least three goals in the final twenty minutes of regulation. With no trip to Lawson Arena (capacity 3667) scheduled next season and a new Western Michigan rink anticipated for the fall of 2027, this weekend’s games are likely to be UND’s final two appearances in front of the Lawson Lunatics. Since December 5th, WMU has lost just twice (14-2-1), but those two losses were vs. Omaha and at Miami. Since November 15th, UND has lost just three times (17-3-1), with all three losses by the same score (3-2) and two of the three reaching overtime.
The Prediction
Both teams have plenty to play for this weekend, and fans are in for a treat. After these two league games, I fully expect the Fighting Hawks and Broncos to meet at some point in the conference playoffs and in the national tournament. Unlike last year, these squads are very evenly matched, with each side boasting a few small edges. In a series like this, with equal motivation on both benches, a split is the most likely result. Of course, things change if Western wins the opener in regulation and can clinch the Penrose by duplicating that result on Saturday. If North Dakota wins on Friday night, the teams may just go through the motions in the rematch. UND 4-2, WMU 4-2.
Broadcast Information
Both games this weekend will be available via webcast at NCHC.tv. Puck drop is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. Central Time on Friday, with a 5:00 p.m. start time on Saturday night. All UND men’s hockey games can be heard on stations across the UND Fighting Hawks Radio Network as well as through the iHeart Radio app.
Social Media
Keep up with the action live during all UND hockey games by following @UNDmhockey and @UNDInsider on X-Twitter. Fans can also read the action via Brad Schlossman’s live chat on the Grand Forks Herald website.
As always, thank you for reading. I welcome your questions, comments, and suggestions. Follow me on X-Twitter (@DBergerHockey) for more information and insight. Here’s to hockey!