MARQUETTE – Onward and upward goes the Northern Michigan University women’s hockey team.

But as a club sport, money may be a bigger issue than most of its opposition on the ice.

After the Wildcats swept through and won the Central Collegiate Women’s Hockey Association playoffs last weekend, team members are now concentrating on raising funds to pay for their trip downstate to compete in the American Collegiate Hockey Association Division 2 national finals.

That tournament takes place over five days in Kalamazoo from Wednesday through Sunday, March 9-13.

Eight teams – four from the Western region that includes NMU and four from the East – will take part, according to defenseman and de facto team spokeswoman Kelsey Weyland.

With its gaudy 23-6 record this season, Northern is the No. 3 seed in the West and will be joined by No. 1 Rainy River Community College of International Falls, Minnesota; No. 2 North Dakota State; and No. 4 Minnesota-Duluth.

The four teams in the East are No. 1 Buffalo, No. 2 California University of Pennsylvania, No. 3 Delaware and No. 4 West Chester, Pennsylvania.

The Wildcats have been placed in Pool A with Rainy River, California and West Chester.

NMU knew the CCWHA playoffs, held in the Flint suburb of Burton, and the automatic bid for the winner were important last weekend. Weyland said she wasn’t overly surprised that tourney runner-up Notre Dame didn’t make the national tourney.

“They kind of came out of nowhere, so they haven’t been ranked as one of the top teams in our region. That’s what they base the ACHA tournament on,” said Weyland, a sophomore at NMU from Shelby Township who is also treasurer of the team’s executive board.

The Wildcats added four wins without a loss at the CCWHA event – a 7-0 win over Notre Dame, 7-3 over Aquinas College, 6-1 over Michigan State and 5-1 over the Fighting Irish again in the finals.

Wildcats freshman center Allison Carlson of Negaunee was named the tournament most valuable player, not a surprise after she led the league in scoring by a fairly wide margin during the regular season. She also led Marquette junior hockey girls teams at national tournaments several times while she was in high school.

Despite that, the team has a lot to prove at nationals.

“Last year was the first time a Northern women’s team ever got to the nationals,” Weyland said. “And then we lost all three games. We know we were a better team than that.

“Now we know what to expect. Our focus has been that now we have a second opportunity, we want to do well at the nationals.”

As far as funding the team’s trip downstate goes, Weyland set up an online GoFundMe site on the bus ride home from the CCHWA event at www.gofundme.com/roadtokzoo, and said the team has already drafted a letter asking area businesses for donations. The team is also setting up bottle and can collection drives and a dinner fund-raiser at the Chocolay River Brewing Company.

If you would like to contribute to the team or have other ideas for fundraisers, you can email Weyland at klweyland@gmail.com, or call her at 1-248-877-4039.

Steve Brownlee can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 252. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.