WCHA Final Five: St. Cloud State vs Wisconsin Line Charts

After destroying fifth seeded Minnesota State on Thursday afternoon, the fourth seeded Wisconsin Badgers have advanced to the WCHA Final Five semifinals where they will face top seeded St. Cloud State. The Huskies earned the top seed in the tournament by winning a share of the MacNaughton Cup during the regular season.

Wisconsin remains in a do-or-die situation, as it must win to keep its chances of an at-large bid in the NCAA tournament intact. Wisconsin currently sits at No. 16 in the PairWise rankings which mimic the formula used by the NCAA to determine the 16-team tournament field, but a loss today would drop them out of contention. St. Cloud sits at No. 7 in the PWR, and has clinched a birth in the tournament.

Once again the Badgers will be without the services of senior center Derek Lee, who will miss his eighth consecutive game with a knee injury suffered vs Penn State Feb. 25th.

Jake McCabe had been questionable all week, but played on a bad wheel in the quarterfinals yesterday vs Minnesota state. With a big lead late in the game, Eaves sat out his star sophomore defenseman. McCabe is on the pre-game line chart, but the Badgers will suit up extra defenseman Chase Drake in warmups in case McCabe is a late scratch.

What you need to know:

Who: St. Cloud State (20-12-7, 13-8-7 WCHA) vs Wisconsin (20-12-7, 13-8-7 WCHA)
What: WCHA Final Five Semifinals
Where: Xcel Energy Center (St. Paul, Minn.)
Capacity: 18,064
Game Time: 2:07 PM CT
Television: Fox Sports North
Radio: Badger Sports Network

WISCONSIN LINES

Nic Kerdiles-Mark Zengerle-Tyler Barnes
Joseph LaBate-Brendan Woods-Michael Mersch
Ryan Little-Jefferson Dahl-Sean Little
Brad Navin-Keegan Meuer-Matt Paape

Kevin Schulze-John Ramage
Jake McCabe-Frankie Simonelli
Eddie Wittchow-Joe Faust
Chase Drake

Joel Rumpel
Landon Peterson

ST. CLOUD STATE LINES

Kalle Kossila-Drew LeBlanc-Jonny Brodzinski
Ben Hanowski-Nic Dowd-Jimmy Murray
Nick Oliver-Cory Thorson-Brooks Bertsch
Joey Benik-David Morley-Garrett Milan

Andrew Prochno-Nick Jensen
Kevin Gravel-Tim Daly
Taylor Johnson-Ethan Prow

Ryan Faragher
Joseph Phillippi
Rasmus Reijola

For more Wisconsin hockey coverage, follow Andy on Twitter (@AndyJohnsonB5Q)

You can also reach Andy via e-mail (AndyJohnsonB5Q@gmail.com)