Two years ago, the NCAA women’s hockey selection committee deviated from their directives and set the women’s hockey tournament in a way that would minimize total costs at the expense of bracket integrity — rather than just the number of flights — when they set the bracket.
Sunday night’s bracket reveal on NCAA.com for this year’s tournament marked a return to by-the-book selection as set out in the tournament manual, maintaining bracket integrity while minimizing flights. In doing so, the committee will send Ohio State to Boston College instead of giving the Eagles the Hockey East Champions, Northeastern, which would have shortened a road trip and eliminated the cost of one team’s worth of hotel rooms.