With 1,860 minutes played, 212 goals scored and 24 games won, only 120 minutes and two games stand between the DePaul Hockey Club and a trip to ACHA DII nationals in San Jose, Calif. After splitting a must-sweep series with No. 2 Michigan State on Feb. 11-12, DePaul just missed receiving an automatic bid to nationals and will now play in regionals, which they host at Northshore Ice Arena.

“[Regionals is] definitely going to be tough. It always is,” said Billy Allen, captain. “Every year there’s upsets. Every year you gotta face tough teams both games. So it’s the playoffs. One loss, one game could make or break your entire season. It’s going to be tough. We’ll have to be real ready to play and focused.”

They will play their first game versus No. 10 St. Cloud State University in the single-elimination two-game tournament.

As the highest seed, they will go on to play the lowest remaining seed if they beat St. Cloud.

And with the stakes so high, the impact of special teams is amplified.

“Well, our coach puts it best. The game’s usually won on special teams. So I mean it’s a pretty important part of the game,” said Cody Staehely, forward.

According to Robertino Presta, special teams, which had a positive impact this season, will continue to be key in regionals play.

“If you have a close game and you get a penalty, you really gotta keep it close, so it could come up huge,” Presta said. “And same with our power play unit. We could get an awesome opportunity where we gotta be on our game.”

Senior forward Taylor Paine echoed Presta’s thoughts, adding that during the team’s run at nationals two years ago roughly half of their goals came off the power play. So far this season, DePaul has 33 goals with the man-advantage.

“I think our power play has certainly been one of our best assets by far,” said Paine. “It’s really good to have a good power play in regionals and I think that that’s something we’ll have advantage on pretty much anyone we play, I believe.”

Although Paine describes their power play as being more free-flowing and improvisational, the team does have one main goal on every man-advantage-get the puck to Paine in the slot.

“I mean, [Paine] scores nine times out of 10 when he gets that puck on his stick,” Allen said. “So it’s a lot of puck movement between myself, Kurt [Akers], Cody [Staehely] and Andy [Ritter]. And a lot of times we do just have to get the puck to the net. You know, I’ll take shots from the point, Kurt will take shots. But our main goal is to get [Paine] open in the slot for a one-timer.”

The only set play used often by DePaul involves Ritter taking the puck down into the corner and drawing out the ‘D’ before passing to Paine.

“That’s really the only one we run multiple times,” Paine said. “But for the most part we kind of just improvise and that works out best for us for the guys that we have, I think.”

And when the defense breaks the power play and sends the puck back out of the zone?

“We go through our regroup and our breakout,” Paine said. “Sometimes it doesn’t work, but we have a few plays we run off. And, if all else fails, we just have a guy try to carry it all the way and that works.”

While Allen and Staehely play on both the man-up and man-down teams, Presta’s specialty is the penalty kill.

“Penalty kill you really gotta use your head,” Presta said. “Just real short shifts is really key too. Just get the puck out of our zone and keep it short.”

A penalty-prone team with 635 penalty minutes on the season, DePaul occasionally finds themselves in a 5-on-3 situation.

“I mean, it’s not like you’re expecting [the opponent] to score, but you know it’s a bad situation,” Paine said. “And when they go and kill it off it gives everyone a huge boost.”

Discipline is crucial to a successful 5-on-3 penalty kill because if just one player is caught out of position it becomes a 5-on-2 situation, according to Allen, who added that communication, concentration and knowing where everyone is located are key to preventing any power play goals.

“[Opponents] don’t get very many power play goals on our shorthanded kill,” Presta said. “Just the defensive-minded players that we have makes it a lot easier.”

With six shorthanded goals this season, DePaul looks not only to prevent goals, but also to take advantage of how offensively-minded opponents are when on the power play.

“They’re always looking, pushing forward and sometimes you’ll intercept the pass and your partner will see and he’ll just be bee-lining it up the ice and you get it up to him,” Presta said. “So a lot of times they’re pushing forward and then if we just intercept it, it’s pretty much just like a 2-on-1 or even a breakaway sometimes.”

Executing on special teams might be the difference between moving on or going home.

“Obviously, you want to get to nationals. That’s the goal,” said Allen. “It would’ve been nice to have the autobid, but now we’re going to play our way into it and really show everyone we deserve to be there.”