The Storyline
Harvard men's ice hockey returns to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2006 after capturing the automatic berth for the ECAC Hockey conference with a 4-2 triumph over Colgate in the championship game in Lake Placid, New York Saturday, March 21. 

Harvard was selected as the three seed in the Midwest Region of the bracket. Playing at Notre Dame's Compton Family Ice Arena, the Crimson will open the NCAA Tournament with a first round matchup against at-large selection Nebraska Omaha. Minnesota State Mankato is the top seed in the region, as well as the entire bracket, and will open play in South Bend against No. 4 seed Rochester Institute of Technology.

Harvard opens the tournament as one of the hottest teams in college hockey, going 7-3-0 in its last 10, while Omaha has stumbled down the stretch, posting a 2-5-3 record, the worst of any team in the field.

NCAA Tournament History
• Harvard is headed to the NCAA postseason for the 22nd time in the illustrious history of Harvard hockey. The Crimson last competed in the NCAA Tournament in 2006, falling in the first round to Maine in Albany, New York. Harvard's 22 appearances rank ninth among the 16 teams in the field this year, but are the most among the four teams in the Midwest Region. Minnesota State Mankato is making its fourth appearance and third in a row, Omaha is returning for its third appearance and first since 2011, while RIT is making just its second appearance at the Division I level. The Tigers reached the Frozen Four in 2010.

• Harvard's 12 Frozen Four appearances rank seventh in the 2015 field. The Crimson last reached the semifinals round in 1994, falling in overtime to Lake Superior State, 3-2. 

• Ted Donato is one of just three coaches in this year's field to win an NCAA title as a player. Donato, the 1989 tournament MVP, joins RIT's Wayne Wilson (Bowling Green, 1984) and Denver's Jim Montgomery (1993, Maine) on the short list.

• Donato is coaching his third NCAA team in his 11 seasons at the helm of the program. Harvard has now made the NCAA Tournament in 2005, 2006 and 2015 under his watch and in each of those seasons Harvard entered the event with 21 victories, the highest number of wins in a season under Donato.

NCAA Tournament Quick Hits
• Harvard is making its 22nd NCAA Tournament appearance. It has reached the Frozen Four on 12 occasions and has one national title (1989).

• The 1989 NCAA Championship for men's hockey was the first team title ever won at Harvard.

• Harvard enters the tournament with a 6-7-0 record against participating teams.

• Saturday's game is just the third game ever in the state of Indiana for Harvard. The Crimson played at Notre Dame against the Fighting Irish in 1974 and 1975, falling in both games.

• Jimmy Vesey enters the tournament with 55 career goals, fourth among all skaters.

• Steve Michalek's 2,066 saves in his career ranks fourth among all netminders in the field.

• Head coach Ted Donato's three NCAA Tournament appearances is tied for 10th among coaches in this year's field.

• Donato is one of eight coaches in the field to be coaching his alma mater. Donato graduated from Harvard in 1991 and was the tournament MVP during the 1989 NCAA Championship.

• Harvard is making its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2006 that is the second-longest draught among all tournament teams. Michigan Tech has longest stretch, making the field for the first time since 1981.

• Harvard's Tommy O'Regan brother Danny (Boston University) are one of nine sets of brothers competing in the NCAA Tournament.

• The O'Regan brothers are two of nine players in the field that are sons of former NHL players. Tom O'Regan played 61 games with the Pittsburgh Penguins over three seasons, tallying 17 points. Jimmy Vesey's father Jim played 11 games with the St. Louis Blues (1G, 2A) over two seasons and another four with the Boston Bruins (1991-92).

Recapping the ECAC Playoffs
First Round vs. Brown
The Crimson bulldozed past Brown in the first round of the 2015 ECAC playoffs, sweeping the Bears by scores of 6-2 and 4-3. The series win was the first since Harvard beat Yale in three games in the 2012 quarterfinals, and marked the first series sweep since Harvard dispatched of Clarkson in two games of the 2011 ECAC playoffs first round.

Quarterfinals vs. Yale
In a matchup that lived up to the billing of the fierce, historic rivalry that Harvard-Yale is known for, the quarterfinal matchup at Ingalls Rink went a full three games and then some. 

In game one, Harvard snapped a 10-game winless streak to the Bulldogs when Jimmy Vesey potted the game-winner with under three minutes remaining. The 3-2 win was the first at Ingalls since Jan. 29, 2005 for Harvard. Game two went the way of Yale in the form of a 2-0 decision. 

The decisive game three lasted a Harvard record 96:46 before Vesey scored the game-winner again. Alexander Kerfoot won a face-off in the Yale zone, pulled it back to Patrick McNally who fired a long shot off the Yale goaltender. Vesey corralled the rebound and clinched the Crimson's spot in Lake Placid.

Semifinals vs. Quinnipiac
On the 1980 Rink at Herb Brooks Arena Friday, March 20, the Crimson wasted little time taking control of the game. First period goals by Vesey, Colin Blackwell and Tyler Moy set the stage for a 5-2 victory.

Finals vs. Colgate
Jimmy Vesey scored the game's first goal for the second day in a row to give Harvard the lead midway through the first period. Colgate tied the game at 1-1 before the intermission, but Vesey and McNally each scored on the power play in the second to give Harvard the lead it wouldn't look back from. Blackwell tossed in an empty netter for good measure to clinch the title for Harvard.

RELATED ARTICLE: Whitelaw Cup Returns to Cambridge! No. 17/15 Men's Hockey Wins 2015 ECAC Hockey Tournament

Series History: Nebraska Omaha
The only two meetings between the Crimson and Mavericks occurred in the winter of 1998 in Omaha. Traveling to Nebraska, Harvard captured a 4-1 victory in the first-ever meeting on Dec. 18 and then followed it up the next night with a 4-3 win. 

Harvard has never played Mankato or RIT.

Scouting the Mavericks
Jake Guentzel, a Penguins prospect, led the UNO offense this season with 35 points on 12 goals and 23 assists. His points per game mark of 1.06 placed him 30th nationally. One point back of Guentzel is Austin Ortega, who has a team-leading 19 goals to go with 15 assists. Defenseman Brian Cooper has the highest plus/minus on the Mavericks, coming in at +12. Cooper has also spent the most time in the sin bin, taking 22 penalties on the year for a total of 55 minutes.

Senior goaltender Ryan Massa has started 25 games this season, posting a 12-7-6 record. His save percentage of .934 is good for fifth-best in the nation, while his 2.04 goals-against places him 15th.

About Nebraska Omaha
The Mavericks closed the regular season in third place in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference standings behind fellow tournament teams North Dakota and Miami. 

UNO struggled down the stretch, going 2-5-3 in its last 10 games, including two losses to St. Cloud State in the opening round of the NCHC playoffs on March 13-14. 

Whitelaw Returns to Cambridge
The Whitelaw Cup, awarded to the ECAC Tournament champion, was raised by Harvard Saturday, March 21 for the ninth time in the history of Crimson hockey. Harvard last won the ECAC championship in 2006, the second year with head coach Ted Donato behind the bench. 

Records Were Meant to be Broken
Jimmy Vesey racked up nine goals during the ECAC tournament, breaking Doug Marrett's (Cornell) record of eight goals set in 1973. Vesey had the game-winners in both of Harvard's wins at Yale and then scored twice in both the semifinals and finals.

The ECAC's Best
Prior to the semifinal round of the ECAC playoffs, the conference announced that Jimmy Vesey was the 2015 Player of the Year. Vesey is the first Player of the Year from Harvard since Steve Martins in 1994. Kyle Criscuolo was also recognized as the ECAC's Student-Athlete of the Year, which recognizes a key contributor on the ice, as well as a player that excels in the classroom and in the community. Criscuolo and Patrick McNally were named to the all-league second team.

Tournament Standouts
Vesey was named the ECAC Tournament's Most Outstanding Player by the media in attendance following the conclusion of the tournament. He was joined on the all-tournament team by defenseman Patrick McNally and goaltender Steve Michalek. 

New England's Finest North Americans
On Tuesday, March 24, the Gridiron Club of Greater Boston announced that junior forward Jimmy Vesey was the recipient of the 2015 Walter Brown Award. The nation's oldest nationally-recognized college hockey honor, the Walter Brown Award was established in 1953 and is presented annually to the best American-born college hockey player in New England.

Linemate Kyle Criscuolo was also named a semifinalist for the award earlier in the season.

Magnificent Michalek
Goaltender Steve Michalek is putting his name among the elite goalies in Harvard history. With 30 saves in the championship game against Colgate, Michalek brought his season total to 1,004, joining Oliver Jonas '01 as the only two players with over 1,000 saves in a single season. Michalek needs just 18 saves to surpass Jonas' record.  

In his career, he has 2,066 saves, becoming just the seventh player in Harvard history to record 2,000 saves in a career. His six wins in the ECAC playoffs brought his season total to 21, matching James Bailey '57 (1956-57) for the second-most in a season. Grant Blair '86 holds the record for wins in a season with 24 set in in 1985-86. Michalek's 36 starts is a single-season record.

Upper Echelon Scoring
Jimmy Vesey joined the top-10 single-season goal scorers in the ECAC title game. He netted his 30th and 31st of the season, putting him in a tie for 10th place in the Harvard record books for goals in a season with Tim Smith '86 (1984-85) and Lane MacDonald '89 (1988-89). He is the first player to reach 30 goals in a season since Mike Vukonich '91 scored 32 in the 1990-91 campaign. 

Assist Machine
With two assists in the ECAC Championship game, Kyle Criscuolo became the first Crimson player since Tim Pettit in the 2002-03 season to reach the 30 helpers mark in a single season.

Milestone Victory
Ted Donato became just the third head coach in program history to reach 150 victories in his career with Harvard's 3-2 triumph at Clarkson Feb. 21, 2015.