Utah M1 debuts at #13 in first ACHA Computer Rankings of the season

November 5, 2025
Salt Lake City, Utah

The first five weeks of the 2025-26 season are in the books, and the first computerized rankings are here.

Your Skatin’ Utes have debuted at #13 in the first “official” ranking of the season.

During the first month of the season, the American Collegiate Hockey Association relies on an informal coaches ranking until sufficient game data is present for the computerized rankings.

The Utah M1 schedule has been extremely travel heavy so far, with eight of their first ten games on the road.

The Utes opened the season at home against Missouri State University for WCHL conference games on September 26 and 27th. Utah earned wins both nights with 7-1 and 1-0 victories.

Utah M1 then headed east to play Liberty University for the first time in team history. Although the team didn’t secure wins, they did leave Lynchburg with a 0-1-1 record with a 8-2 loss on Friday and 3-2 shootout loss on Saturday night. Of note, the ACHA counts games that end in shootouts as ties.

From Lynchburg, the Utes then ventured South to Sin City to take on the defending National Champions UNLV Rebels. Utah lost both games with tight scores of 3-1 on October 10th, and 3-1 on the October 11th.

The very next weekend, Utah traveled to Arizona to play WCHL Rival University of Arizona. The Utes went 1-1 on the weekend with a 6-2 win on Friday, and 6-3 loss on Saturday.

For the final series of the road month, the Utes traveled to San Diego. While in the Golden State, the Utes easily handled the Aztecs an 8-1 win on Friday and an 8-2 win on Saturday, October 25, 2025.

Utah had a bye this weekend.

Utah’s record currently stands at 5 wins, 4 loss, and 1 overtime loss.

Utah Sophomore Brady Schwab leads the team with 14 points (6G, 8A), with rookie Paul Waldhauser close behind at 10 points (5G, 6A). Sophomore Gion Coray is next in the points collumn with 9 points (4G, 6A).

The Western Collegiate Hockey League, of which Utah M1 is a member, had a strong performance with four (of 11) of its member teams ranked. The Great Lakes 6 Hockey Conference leads the way with five (of 7) of its member teams ranked, while Midwest College Hockey has three (of 7) of its member teams ranked, Wolverine Hoosier Athletic Conference has two (of 6) of its member teams ranked, and College Hockey Mid-America has two (of 7) its member teams ranked.

With the ACHA switching to a computer-based ranking from a coaches poll, the ACHA will use the two computer rankings generated by USHSHO.com, Ranking A (Wins with Maximum Goal Differential of 7) and Ranking B (Wins with Maximum Goal Differential of 1), and come up with an average of the two rankings. The ACHA will then use the list generated from the average for its weekly ranking. Ties will be broken using the higher ranked team from Ranking B until the Top 25 teams are listed. All games that go to overtime will be scored as ties in the computer ranking.

Now in its 35th season of action, there have been a total of 15 schools that have won the ACHA Men’s Division 1 National Championship. Over the past 19 seasons, 12 different schools have won the ACHA Men’s Division I National Championship: Penn State (5), Lindenwood (4), Ohio (4), Adrian (3), Minot State (3), Central Oklahoma (2), Illinois (2), Arizona State, Davenport, Iowa State, Oakland, Delaware, Rhode Island, and UNLV.

A total of 81 teams will compete in Men’s Division I this season, including former Men’s Division II members Central Michigan University, North Carolina State University, University of Cincinnati, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, and University of North Carolina, along with former Men’s Division III members Hope College, the reigning ACHA Men’s Division III National Champions, and University of Michigan-Flint. The Concordia University Ann Arbor program, which made the announcement to relocate to Siena Heights University back in April, folded in July before getting to play a game as the Saints.

The computer ranking will for the twelfth time determine the 24 teams that qualify for the 2026 ACHA Men’s Division I National Championships, which will include the following six auto bids:

• (CHMA) College Hockey Mid-America
• (ECHA) Eastern Collegiate Hockey Association
• (GLCHL) Great Lakes Collegiate Hockey League
• (MCH) Midwest College Hockey
• (WCHL) Western Collegiate Hockey League
• (WHAC) Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference

The sixth ranking of the regular season will be released on Wednesday, November 12, 2025.

2025-2026 ACHA MEN’S DIVISION 1 RANKING