Led by team captain Steve Rohlik and fellow seniors Chris Tancill, Gary Shuchuk and John Byce, The Badgers got off to a quick start.

They did this against both the good (North Dakota, Northern Michigan) and bad (Colorado College, Minnesota–Duluth) and lost the lead their fast start had provided them.

[3] The Badgers attempted to get back on track with their holiday tournament, defeating Notre Dame and eventual Hockey East champion Boston College convincingly but once their conference schedule restarted they continued to split weekends.

The shellacking by the Badgers kicked off a run of 9 straight victories for Wisconsin (though they were mostly against the dregs of the conference) and ended on the penultimate weekend of the regular season.

While the Badgers may have been able to get away with taking the Huskies lightly, once the tournament shifted to Saint Paul they couldn't dismiss defending conference champion Northern Michigan as easily.

Wisconsin's sixth conference championship (2nd Broadmoor Trophy) earned them the WCHA's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, their third consecutive appearance.

In the final, Wisconsin faced a surprising Colgate squad who had ridden the strong play of goaltender Dave Gagnon to 31 wins entering the championship.

Colgate, a team from a small upstate New York school whose total enrollment could have fit inside Wisconsin's home arena more than twice over, got lost in the lights.

All the power play time harmed Colgate, in addition to goals, by keeping them away from the Wisconsin net and not allowing them to generate any kind of pressure on Derksen.

A fourth power play goal by Badgers in the second period all but ended the game and as the third progressed Wisconsin knew they were going to win the national title.

Wisconsin's dominating performance in the championship was typified by having 5 players find their way on the All-Tournament Team; Tancill was joined by Duane Derksen, Rob Andringa, Mark Osiecki and John Byce.