The Massachusetts hockey team is heading to Las Vegas, Nevada this weekend to take part in the Ice Breaker Tournament, hosted yearly to celebrate the start of the NCAA hockey season. No. 14 UMass will take on No. 15 Omaha in the opening game on Friday, Oct. 11, and will play against either No. 6 Minnesota or Air Force on Saturday, depending on Friday’s results.

With a talent-packed pool of teams playing in the tournament this season, the Minutemen will be put to the test after starting their season 1-0 following a 5-4 win over Bentley in the season opener last Friday. Let’s take a look at what the road trip has in store for UMass and what its potential opponents bring to the table.

UMass vs. Omaha, Friday, Oct. 11 at 7 p.m. EST

UMass is presented with its first chance to take on a ranked opponent in the Omaha Mavericks in game one of the tournament. Omaha is coming off a successful season, in which it was eliminated in the first round of the NCAA tournament by fellow Ice Breaker participant Minnesota. The Mavericks made it to the NCHC Championship and were knocked off by the Denver Pioneers, who, coincidentally, eliminated UMass from the NCAA tournament in their next game.

The Mavericks are an old team, with seven graduate students and 17 total upperclassmen. The Minutemen have a young lineup, which will probably be one of the biggest humps they have to get over to beat Omaha. In its opening game, UMass’ inexperience on the back end showed, something that the Mavericks will likely look to exploit.

Omaha is led offensively by brothers Tanner and Griffin Ludtke. The two led the team in points last season, with 28 and 27 respectively.

The Minutemen’s success will be dictated by their defense, specifically from their three freshmen who are all still in the process of getting adjusted to the speed of college hockey. Linden Alger and Lucas Ölvestad will need to lead by example for the freshmen and keep the defensive zone clean for Michael Hrabal in net.

Other participants: Minnesota and Air Force

Minnesota is ranked No. 6 in the country for a reason, as they have one of the best one-two punches on offense in the country in Jimmy Snuggerud and Oliver Moore. They also have 16 NHL draft picks, four of which are highly touted incoming freshmen. The Golden Gophers have a lineup that is about as close to complete as it could possibly be, with the exception of their goalie situation.

Of the three goalies on the Minnesota roster, two of them have been with the program but neither have more than three games of NCAA experience. The Golden Gophers brought in graduate student Liam Souliere from Penn State, where he was the starter for two seasons, but after a strong junior year, he faltered in 2023-24, posting a GAA of 3.38 and a save percentage of .874.

In spite of their shaky netminder position, Minnesota’s high flying offense shouldn’t have an issue putting up goals on Air Force.

The Falcons’ only true path to success is taking advantage of Minnesota in net, where Souliere will likely be starting. Clayton Cosentino put up three goals in Air Force’s opening series against Arizona State, while Chris Hedden returns 37 points to the roster. The Falcons will look to those two to try and create offensive plays.

Implications for UMass:

A win over Omaha in game one will likely set the Minutemen up for a Championship matchup with Minnesota. Two wins, or even a win and then a loss to the Golden Gophers in the finals would be a huge boost to UMass’ pairwise rankings, which take into account the difficulty of opponent and location of the game to determine at-large tournament bids at the end of the season.

A loss to Omaha isn’t the end of the world for the Minutemen — no loss this early in the season really can be. But a loss to an opponent that is ranked just below UMass would certainly be a missed opportunity to get ahead of the curve before Hockey East play starts.

“I look at all the games on our schedule, there’s probably five or six that are probably going to have major implications on our NCAA [tournament] possibilities, and this is one of them,” UMass head coach Greg Carvel said.

Quick tournament hits:

This is the fifth Ice Breaker Tournament appearance for Air Force, its first since 2022 when it co-hosted the tournament with Denver. Minnesota has appeared in the tournament six times, and this will be the fourth time it is the host team. Omaha hosted the tournament back in 2009 and had appeared in it twice before, while this is UMass’ second time participating in it.

Omaha head coach Mike Gabinet signed a three year extension through the 2027-28 season with the Mavericks on Tuesday Oct. 8, as reported by The Gateway. Gabinet has a 119-98-18 record in his seven seasons as head coach of the program and has led the Mavericks to two NCAA tournament appearances.

Minnesota has 16 NHL draft picks on its roster, the most in the NCAA, ahead of Boston University, Denver and North Dakota, which each have 13.

Matt Skillings can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter at matt_skillings.