While the Michigan hockey team’s third-period collapse against Notre Dame Saturday may have cost it the CCHA Championship, the game meant little to the NCAA Tournament selection committee.

Michigan’s fate was already sealed. There was essentially no chance of playing in Grand Rapids due to the fact the Fighting Irish had already locked up a spot in that regional. The Wolverines were projected to travel east and play in one of the two regionals among the New England states.

And sure enough, when the Wolverines woke up yesterday morning and gathered in the Yost Ice Arena locker room, they got exactly what they predicted.

No. 3 Michigan will play Air Force in the opening round of the East Regional in Bridgeport, Conn. Should the Wolverines win, they would play the winner of Yale vs. Vermont in the second round.

“We knew we’d be a No. 1 seed, and we knew regardless of this weekend we’d probably end up in an eastern regional, and it’d probably be Bridgeport, so it’s as expected,” Michigan coach Red Berenson said. “I’m glad we’re in the tournament again, and when you look back in the fall there were questions whether this team would even be in the tournament, so good for them.”

Air Force’s offense largely depends on Jacques Lamoureux, the nation’s leading goal scorer. But Air Force's résumé boasts little else other than simply winning the weak Atlantic Hockey Conference.

Heading down the stretch, the question for the Wolverines was whether they would earn a coveted seed close to home. Playing in the state of Michigan has been a huge advantage for Michigan in years past. It won the National Championship in 1996 and 1998 after playing in in-state regionals.

If the first round games go according to seeding, Michigan would play Yale in the second round in Bridgeport, which is just 30 minutes from Yale’s campus in New Haven, Conn.

But senior forward Tim Miller thinks there are benefits to getting out of the state too.

“I think it's good to get out there and you don’t have to worry too much about distractions,” Miller said. “It’s just the team out there and you can focus about playing hockey.”

Berenson said the Wolverines are used to hostile circumstances in the tournament.

“I don’t care where we go, and I don’t care who we play, it’s how we play that’s important,” Berenson said. “If we end up playing Yale out there, we had to play Wisconsin in Wisconsin and we had to play (New Hampshire) in Manchester a few years ago.”

Michigan won in Madison in 1995 and in Manchester in 2004.

The biggest controversy in the selection was the pairing of top-ranked Boston University with No. 4 seed Ohio State. Usually, the top seed is protected in the first round by playing the weakest team that made the NCAA Tournament and Bemidji State was considered to be that team. But since rules stipulate that conference teams can’t play each other in the regionals — and both the Buckeyes and Miami (Ohio) are No. 4 seeds and couldn’t play either Notre Dame or Michigan — they had to be matched with Boston University and Denver.

While Michigan is not favored like they were last year and might not have the same pressure as a team like Notre Dame or Boston University has, expectations are still high. But the Wolverines think they can do some damage.

“The best teams we’ve played this year have been (Boston University) and Notre Dame, and if there’s anyone better in the tournament, we’ll find out in the next two weeks,” Berenson said. “But I think we can play with those teams. We’re not as experienced and not as old, but on a given night, we can play with those teams.”