1997 WCHA Men's Ice Hockey Tournament

The 1997 WCHA Men's Ice Hockey Tournament was the 38th conference playoff in league history and 45th season where a WCHA champion was crowned. The tournament was played between March 7 and March 15, 1997. First round games were played at home team campus sites while all 'Final Five' matches were held at the Civic Center in St. Paul, Minnesota. By winning the tournament, North Dakota was awarded the Broadmoor Trophy and received the WCHA's automatic bid to the 1997 NCAA Division I Men's Ice Hockey Tournament.
==Format==
The first round of the postseason tournament featured a best-of-three games format. All ten conference teams participated in the tournament and were seeded No. 1 through No. 10 according to their final conference standing, with a tiebreaker system used to seed teams with an identical number of points accumulated. The top five seeded teams each earned home ice and hosted one of the lower seeded teams.
The winners of the first round series advanced to the Civic Center for the WCHA Final Five, the collective name for the quarterfinal, semifinal, and championship rounds. The Final Five uses a single-elimination format. Teams were re-seeded No. 1 through No. 5 according to the final regular season conference standings, with the top three teams automatically advancing to the semifinals and the remaining two playing in a quarterfinal game. The semifinal pitted the top remaining seed against the winner of the quarterfinal game while the two other teams that received byes were matched against one another with the winners advancing to the championship game and the losers meeting in a Third Place contest. The Tournament Champion received an automatic bid to the 1997 NCAA Division I Men's Ice Hockey Tournament.
===Conference Standings===
Note: GP = Games Played; W = Wins; L = Losses; T = Ties; PTS = Points; GF = Goals For; GA = Goals Against
==Bracket==
Teams are reseeded after the first round
Note: * denotes overtime period(s)
===Quarterfinals===
====(1) North Dakota vs. (10) Michigan Tech====
====(2) Minnesota vs. (9) Alaska-Anchorage====
====(3) St. Cloud State vs. (8) Northern Michigan====
====(4) Colorado College vs. (7) Wisconsin====
====(5) Denver vs. (6) Minnesota-Duluth====
===Quarterfinal===
====(4) Colorado College vs. (5) Denver====
===Semifinals===
====(1) North Dakota vs. (4) Colorado College====
====(2) Minnesota vs. (3) St. Cloud State====
===Third Place===
====(3) St. Cloud State vs. (4) Colorado College====
===Championship===
====(1) North Dakota vs. (2) Minnesota====
==Tournament awards==
===All-Tournament Team===
*F Kevin Hoogsteen (North Dakota)
*F Ryan Kraft (North Dakota)
*F Toby Petersen (Colorado College)
*D Curtis Murphy (North Dakota)
*D Brian LaFleur (Minnesota)
*G Aaron Schweitzer (North Dakota)
===MVP===
*David Hoogsteen (North Dakota)
==See also==
*Western Collegiate Hockey Association men's champions
==References==
==External links==
*WCHA.com
*1996–97 WCHA Standings
*1996–97 NCAA Standings
*2012–13 Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves Media Guide
*2013–14 Colorado College Tigers Media Guide
*2013–14 Denver Pioneers Media Guide
*2013–14 Minnesota Golden Gophers Media Guide
*2012–13 Minnesota-Duluth Bulldogs Media Guide
*2013–14 North Dakota Hockey Media Guide
*2006–07 Northern Michigan Wildcats Media Guide
*2011–12 St. Cloud State Huskies Media Guide
*2003–04 Wisconsin Badgers Media Guide
Category:1997 in hockey
Category:Western Collegiate Hockey Association
Category:NCAA Tournaments