NCAA Hockey Tournament: North Dakota Cools Northeastern and Cruises to Regional Final

Northeastern came into today's afternoon regional semifinal against North Dakota as one of the hottest teams in the country, having won 13 straight games and 21 of their last 25 games. But the surging Huskies ran into a brick wall in the form of the North Dakota Fighting Hawks. North Dakota never looked back after taking a first period lead to blow out Northeastern 6-2 and advance to tomorrow's Midwest Regional final at US Bank Arena in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Northeastern struck first when John Stevens scored his 21st goal of the season at 3:07 of the first period. But that was the high water mark of the day for Northeaster, as North Dakota controlled the game after that. The Fighting Hawks scored three goals in the first period, starting with a grind line goal from Johnny Simonson, followed by the North Dakota's top line setting up Tucker Poolman for a goal, and a power play tally from Luke Johnson.

North Dakota ended any hopes of a Northeastern comeback by adding goals from Bryn Chyzyk and Brock Boeser to make it 5-1 after two periods.

Matt Benning would add a goal in the third period for Northeastern. But the 'CBS' line of Caggiula, Boeser, and Schmaltz tacked on one more goal late when Caggiula finished off a pretty tic-tac-toe passing play, adding an exclamation point on the convincing win.

North Dakota now awaits the winner of the second regional semifinal between #2 Michigan and #3 Notre Dame. They will play at 6pm EST on Saturday evening, in a game that will be televised by ESPN2.