NCAA, Michigan Tech Huskies have won a share, along with Minnesota State, of the MacNaughton Cup awarded to the regular season conference champions of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA). This is the first regular season title for Michigan Tech in 40 years. Ex-Smoke Eaters, Jake Lucchini and Brent Baltus are linemates on this year’s championship team. Michigan Tech earned first seed over Minnesota and play Alaska-Anchorage in the quarter-finals.
Baltus played for the Smokies in the 2011/12 and 2012/13 seasons. In 60 games in 2011/12 Brent scored 14 goals along with 16 assists for a total of 30 points. He followed that up in the 2012/13 season with 24 goals and 27 assists for 51 points in 47 games.
Jake Lucchini, a Trail native, played with the Smokies for three seasons. In 2012/13 he scored 5 goals with 3 assists for 8 points in 55 games. In 2013/14 in the same number of games he had 8 goals and 18 assists for 26 points. His best year for the Smoke Eaters was in 2014/15 when in 58 games he had 35 goals and 48 assists for 83 points. This was fourth best in the BCHL.
Baltus has played three seasons with the Huskies and in 81 games has 16 goals and 22 assists for 38 points. In his first season with the Huskies Lucchini has 6 goals and 9 assists for 15 points in 34 games.
In the picture above Baltus and Lucchini pose with the MacNaughton Cup.
