Minnesota opens the NCAA Tournament against UMass on Thursday night
The 2025 NCAA Men’s Hockey brackets were announced Sunday afternoon, and the Minnesota Golden Gophers are staying as close to home as possible. The Gophers are the #5 overall seed and the #2 seed in the Fargo Region. Minnesota will open the NCAA Tournament by facing #3 seed UMass at 7:30 Thursday night with the winner of that game facing the winner of the first region semifinal between #1 Western Michigan and #4 Minnesota State on Saturday for a trip to the Frozen Four.
All the Gophers could do and sit and watch this past weekend as the finals of the various conference tournaments took place. Minnesota knew headed into the weekend they could finish everywhere from the #3 seed to the #6 seed depending on how things played out. Once Maine defeated Northeastern on Thursday, the Gophers could not drop any further than the #5 spot. That was cemented once Western Michigan came back from a 3-0 deficit after two periods to score three goals in the third period and to defeat Denver in Double overtime to win the NCHC Championship Saturday night. That locked them ahead of the Gophers in the #4 and bumped Minnesota down to a #2 seed.
The Gophers will head to their 42nd NCAA Tournament all-time in program history, a NCAA record they now hold by themselves after Michigan did not quality for this season’s tournament. Minnesota all-time has a 62-42 record (.596) in the NCAA Tournament dating back to 1953 with its 62 wins the most in tournament history.
When the brackets were announced, the Gophers must have thought they were back in 2022 again. The Gophers will have a strong chance to face the exact two teams they defeated that season in the Northeast Regional to get to the Frozen Four. Minnesota opened as the #2 seed in Worcester, Mass and defeated the #3 seed UMass 4-3 in overtime on a Ben Meyers goal. Two days later the Gophers took on #1 seed Western Michigan and shut them out 3-0 to advance to the Frozen Four. In that Frozen Four they would lose in the National Semifinals to—-Minnesota State—the third team in this year’s Fargo regional.
We will have a full preview of the UMass game later this week. The full NCAA Tournament bracket is below:
