Four Flames First-Rounders, One Rink in Texas

On Halloween, in an arena outside Austin, Texas, four Calgary Flames first-round picks will play each other, two on one side and two on the other, and none of them will be wearing a Flames sweater.

North Dakota plays Michigan State in the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame Game on Saturday at the H-E-B Center at Cedar Park. Puck drop is 6:07 p.m. Calgary time, about two hours before the Flames face off in Colorado, so you can watch the future first and the present after.

If you have never watched a college hockey game, here is what you need to know.

Wait, why are Flames picks playing college hockey?

Drafting a player gives the Flames his NHL rights. It does not put him in Calgary. Plenty of prospects spend a year or more developing somewhere else first, and for these four that somewhere is an American university. They play for their school, the Flames hold their NHL rights and keep watching.

College players are listed by year, like in school: a freshman is in his first season, a sophomore his second, a junior his third. Teams mostly play in weekend pairs, so a season moves quickly.

Saturday’s game is non-conference. College teams play most of their schedule inside their own league; North Dakota’s is the NCHC. This one counts in both teams’ overall records but not in their league standings.

The four

Cole Reschny

North Dakota, sophomore centre (18th overall, 2025). The one to know first. He is the youngest captain in North Dakota’s history, and a month into the job the Dakota Student’s Anthony Dillett looked at how he is wearing it. Four goals and four assists in six games, with a point in five of them, including two goals in the opener at Bemidji State and one at Minnesota on Oct. 22.

Carson Carels

North Dakota, freshman defenceman (6th overall, 2026). The highest pick of the four, and the one whose numbers say the least so far. Four assists in six games, one in each of the last four, all on the power play. He has played between 18 and 26 minutes a night, and his two biggest nights were the last two, at Minnesota, which is a lot of trust for a first-year defenceman. A season ticket holder at North Dakota’s rink saw more than the stat sheet did.

Jack Hextall

Michigan State, freshman centre (30th overall, 2026). The Hextall who does not live in the penalty box. Two goals and two assists in five college games, both goals on the power play, all of it on the opening weekend, including three points in one afternoon against Northern Michigan on Oct. 11. He has gone three games without a point since.

Cullen Potter

Michigan State, junior forward (32nd overall, 2025). He transferred from Arizona State, where he had 26 points in 24 games last season. One goal and one assist in five games for Michigan State, both on the opening weekend, with 16 shots and close to 19 minutes a night.

Why it matters to Calgary, maybe soon

Half of the top eight picks in Carels’ draft are already in the NHL: Gavin McKenna (first overall, Toronto), Ivar Stenberg (second, San Jose), Alberts Smits (fifth, New York Rangers) and Viggo Björck (eighth, Winnipeg). The other half went to college, and two of them play in this game: Carels, and Michigan State’s Chase Reid, Seattle’s pick at seventh. North Dakota also has San Jose’s ninth pick, Keaton Verhoeff.

The best college players do not stay long. Macklin Celebrini played one season at Boston University before going first overall and straight to San Jose. Artyom Levshunov played one season at Michigan State, went second to Chicago, and turned pro.

And a college season ends before an NHL one. North Dakota’s league finishes its regular season on Feb. 27. The Frozen Four, college hockey’s final weekend, is April 8 to 10. The NHL regular season runs to April 10. When a drafted player’s college season is over, his NHL team can sign him and play him right away. Flames fans have seen it: Johnny Gaudreau signed with Calgary on April 11, 2014, after his last game at Boston College, and two days later scored in his NHL debut in Vancouver.

Nobody is saying any of these four turns pro this spring. It is the reason to start watching them now.

Why it’s a big deal

These are two of college hockey’s heavyweights. Michigan State’s head coach, Adam Nightingale, called it a game between “two storied college hockey programs that combined have won 11 NCAA National Championships” when it was announced in 2024. North Dakota won its first national championship in 1959, in the title game, against Michigan State.

They have done this a lot, just not lately. Saturday is the 105th meeting between the two schools, and North Dakota leads the series 64-37-3. They have not played since 2016.

Both are top-10 teams right now. In this week’s national poll, Michigan State is fourth in the country at 4-1, and North Dakota is eighth at 4-2. North Dakota comes in off two losses at Minnesota last week. Michigan State split two at New Hampshire.

And it is in Texas, which is the strange part. It is North Dakota’s first trip to Texas, and by College Hockey News’s records, the first NCAA hockey game ever played in the state. North Dakota is the host: the game is the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame Game, and this is the 12th time North Dakota has played in it as a regular-season game. It is 8-3 in the first 11.

North Dakota is dressing for it, too. It will wear its NoDak Two Step jerseys, green with “NoDak” across the front, a nod to the ones from the season its rink, the Ralph, opened.

What to watch

The power play. When a player takes a penalty, he sits for two minutes and the other team plays with an extra skater, its best chance to score. North Dakota has scored on 9 of its 26 power plays this season, and Reschny or Carels has a point on six of the nine. All four of Carels’ points have come that way. Michigan State is hard to beat a man short: it has killed 15 of the 18 penalties it has taken.

Reschny in the faceoff circle. Play restarts with a faceoff after every whistle, and the centre who wins it gets his team the puck. Reschny has won 59 of 93 this season, and 29 of 43 in the two games at Minnesota. On the Michigan State side, Potter has taken 85 and won 47. Hextall has taken one.

Goals will be hard to come by. Michigan State has allowed six goals in five games, and last weekend at New Hampshire it lost 1-0 and won 2-1. North Dakota has scored 23 in six, but it gave up ten in its two losses at Minnesota.

Who comes in hot. Reschny has a point in five of his six games, and Carels has an assist in four straight. Neither Michigan State prospect has had a point since Oct. 11.

How to watch (TV and streaming)

Saturday, Oct. 31, 6:07 p.m. in Calgary. The Flames play in Colorado at 8.

On TV, the game is on Midco Sports, a regional channel in the Dakotas and Minnesota that is not carried in Canada.

From Calgary, stream it on NCHC.tv, the conference’s paid streaming service, which North Dakota lists as the video for this game. It takes credit cards from anywhere.

Or listen for free. North Dakota’s radio call, with Nick Hulberg and Mike LaMoine, is on 96.1 The Fox in Grand Forks and streams on the iHeartRadio app. The station’s stream played in Calgary when we tried it on Oct. 29.