Two weeks after the No. 2 ranked Michigan State Spartans hockey team wrapped up a (shared) second straight Big Ten Championship, they will return to action tonight in East Lansing, hosting the team they played on that night two weeks ago, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.

The Fighting Irish spent last weekend extending their season, and with it the coaching career of retiring head coach Jeff Jackson, by going on the road and upsetting Minnesota in a three game series. The semi-final round of the tournament transitions from a best of three series to a single elimination game, at the higher seeded team's home rink.

While the Spartans are hosting the Fighting Irish tonight in East Lansing, 3-seed Ohio State will be hosting 5-seed Penn State, in Columbus.

The key to the first round upset for the Fighting Irish last weekend was junior goaltender Owen Say, who is in his first season in the Big Ten after transferring from Mercyhurst. Say played the Friday game February 28 against the Spartans, losing a 5-2 decision and surrendering four goals.

In that contest, the Spartans got three goals from defensemen including a goal that bounced off the end boards behind the net and off Say and in. The Fighting Irish went back to Say to begin their series at Minnesota last Friday, and he responded with 30 saves in a 3-2 win that saw the Fighting Irish chase Minnesota's goaltender after just 21 minutes of play.

Say turned in a 31-save performance in a 4-2 loss Saturday, before rebounding with a 38-save elimination game win over the Gophers on Sunday.

The Fighting Irish are limited in their scoring options, and will play a defensive style of play preferred by Coach Jackson. If the Fighting Irish are to extend their season with another upset victory, Say will need his best performance of the season to outplay Trey Augustine in the other crease.

From the preview a few weeks ago, I shared this stat:

"Notre Dame has seen 55% of their goals scored by just four players this season; the aforementioned Danny Nelson, as well as Cole Knuble, Justin Janicke, and Blake Biondi.

The Spartans need to pounce on the Irish with their waves of four lines of players who can contribute offensively. This showed through with 11 different goal scorers last time out; even more impressive is the fact that Isaac Howard was not one of the goal scorers.

If the Spartans are to gain the season sweep, depth will be a large part of it."