The rebirth of the Central Collegiate Hockey Association was highlighted by a controversial playoff championship game that commissioner Don Lucia says no one will ever forget.
"I don't know if you can really explain," said Minnesota State, Mankato coach Mike Hastings. "The biggest thing we talk about is, you just want to get it right at the end. That's what really matters."
It appeared top-ranked Minnesota State Mankato had scored the overtime winner against Bemidji State, the Mason Cup trophy was awarded, and much of the crowd filed out of the Mayo Clinic Health Systems Event Center.
But wait.
A different video angle of the apparent game-winner by Josh Groll showed Bemidji State goaltender Mattias Sholl accidentally lifted up the net, and the puck slid under the ever-so-small opening between the goal support and the ice.
No goal.
The problem was the replay angle that clearly showed that it was not a goal was not available right away.
By the time referees got a look at the video and made the ruling, time was set aside to clean the ice surface and allow the teams to warm up before resuming play.
That took nearly an hour.
"You have to make some difficult decisions, and without question, this is the most difficult decision that I've had in this role," said Lucia, who was the head coach at the University of Minnesota before becoming CCHA commissioner. "Ultimately, I thought the most important things was that we get the call right."
The official statement on the reversal was released 55 minutes after the game had apparently ended.
"It's a fair argument, how long it took," said Lucia. "It was the two on-ice officials that had an opportunity to review it."
A little more than two minutes after the restart came a real, honest-to-goodness goal by Jack McNeely, nothing controversial about it, to give Minnesota State the 2-1 win.
Had Bemidji State pulled out the win, the Beavers would have won the league's automatic berth to the NCAA tournament.
They had finished in third place in the CCHA's regular season.
MSU was likely going to get a tournament bid even with a loss on Saturday night.
"I don’t want to end somebody’s career on a goal that wasn’t a goal. I think most players and coaches would feel the same way,” said Lucia. "It's a decision I can live with."
The home-standing Mavericks instead were awarded the championship trophy, again.
"It was a crazy hockey game," said Bemidji State coach Tom Serratore. "We were given a second life. The call had to be made and it was the right call. It was odd, the time that had elapsed."
This was the first season of the eight-team CCHA, which adopted the name of a long-standing league that had disbanded in 2013 during a massive realignment of the college hockey landscape.
One of the league members is St. Thomas, which was playing in its first season as a Division I team.