Winning this weekend’s Central Collegiate Hockey Association quarterfinal series would not only send Alaska back to conference’s championship tournament, it would end some misery in Marquette, Mich.

The Nanooks have a 1-12-5 record in the hometown of the fourth-seeded and 19th-ranked Northern Michigan Wildcats, whom Alaska faces in the best-of-three quarterfinal series on Friday and Saturday, and if necessary, Sunday.

The quarterfinal winners advance to the CCHA Championship Tournament at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit on March 19-20. Both teams advanced to last year’s tournament and met in the third-place game, with the Wildcats winning 2-0.

The fifth-seeded Nanooks, 18-9-9 overall and ranked in three national polls, reached this weekend’s quarterfinals after sweeping the 12th-seeded Western Michigan Broncos in a first-round series at the Carlson Center, winning 4-0 Friday and 4-1 Saturday.

Alaska’s last victory on the Olympic-size ice in the Berry Events Center on the Northern Michigan campus was a 2-1 decision on Feb. 5, 2005. Since then, it’s been an 0-3-3 experience there for the Nanooks, who last week were ranked 13th in the USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine Poll, 14th in the USCHO.com Poll and 15th in the Inside College Hockey.com Power Rankings.

The Nanooks went 0-1-3 in the series this season, including 0-1-1 in Marquette.

The teams tied 2-2 there on Jan. 29, with Northern Michigan taking the shootout 2-0, and the Wildcats won 3-2 in the weekend finale.

Alaska tied Northern Michigan at the Carlson Center on Nov. 27-28 by respective scores of 3-3 and 4-4, and the Nanooks won the shootouts by 2-1 outcomes.

Alaska head coach Dallas Ferguson anticipates a good matchup in Marquette this weekend, considering the Nanooks are riding a team-record 10-game unbeaten streak (8-0-2) following their first-round sweep, and the Wildcats ended the regular season with a 13-9-6-3 CCHA record and 17-11-8 overall mark to gain a first-round bye and the quarterfinal series at home.

“They have some guys who can make some plays, and they play a real sound game,” Ferguson said of Northern Michigan. “I know their specialty teams are good and (senior goaltender Brian) Stewart has been good in the second half.

“I think both teams are playing well right now, and I liked the way we played this weekend.”

This weekend’s quarterfinal will mark the fourth postseason encounter between the teams.

Beside’s last year’s third-place game in Detroit, the Nanooks won 6-3 in a quarterfinal of the 2005 CCHA Super Six Tournament at Joe Louis Arena.

The Wildcats swept a first-round series at the Carlson Center in March 2004.

Alaska is 17-25 all-time in CCHA postseason action.

Culhane’s curtain call

The Nanooks’ first-round sweep also marked the end of Jim Culhane’s career as the Western Michigan head coach.

Culhane was relieved of his duties in late February and his termination was effective at the end of the Broncos’ season. He accepted a reassignment to the university’s Office of Development.

“I’m thankful for the opportunity,” Culhane said outside Western Michigan’s locker room after Saturday’s game. “I’m a big believer in college hockey, and I just look back at the decision I made as an 18-year-old to come to Western Michigan (as a student-athlete) and how it impacted my life.”

Culhane finished with a 158-222-48 career record with the Broncos, with whom he was also an assistant coach. He took over as the head coach in the middle of the 1998-99 season after Bill Wilkinson was relieved of his duties.

“I look back on all the players that I’ve coached and the guys that I played with and the guys I coached with,” said Culhane, “and I’ve just got fond memories and I’ve got a lot of respect for the game.

“I know it’s all about wins and losses, but there’s a lot of other things that come with it. The biggest thing, as I go through this personally, is the relationships; that’s what I’ll remember the most.”

Stick tape

• The Nanooks are tied for seventh with St. Cloud State of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association in the latest Pairwise Rankings, which mimics the system used by the NCAA Hockey Tournament Committee to determine the 16 teams for the upcoming Division I Tournament.

Alaska has a .625 winning percentage and .5394 RPI (Ratings Percentage Index).

• Alaska sophomore goaltender Scott Greenham leads the CCHA and the nation in minutes played with 2,119 minutes and 7 seconds.

• Nanooks right wing Andy Taranto leads CCHA rookies and is second in D-I for points per game for freshmen with 1.14 per game. Taranto’s 41 points include 17 goals, the highest among Division I rookies.

• After being the least penalized team in D-I for most of the season, the Nanooks are now second (10.1 minutes per game). New Hampshire of Hockey East averages the least penalty minutes (9.8).