NORTHFORD, Conn. -- When the Quinnipiac University hockey team arrived at Michigan State for an early January series against the No. 6 Spartans, coach Rand Pecknold's team didn't look anything like a postseason contender.

QU was a game under .500, had lost three straight non-conference games to Providence, RPI and Niagara, and was playing every bit like a team that had more freshmen on its roster (15) than sophomores, juniors and seniors combined (14).

"In the beginning of the season we had our rocky moments," senior co-captain Neil Breen said following practice at the Northford Ice Pavilion. "We were a young team so we made young decisions and that showed early in the season."

Those struggles were highlighted by a 9-0 loss at Maine in November, and it didn't get much better over the next six weeks when Quinnipiac went 1-4-1 heading into its final non-conference series of the season.

So it was no surprise that Michigan State won both games by a combined score of 7-2. The surprise, however, was how Quinnipiac responded to that trip to East Lansing.

	Q Rating
	Schools with four consecutive 20-plus win seasons:
	School	Total wins
	Michigan State	116
	Michigan	105
	New Hampshire	104
	Maine	101
	Quinnipiac	95

"I thought our MSU weekend was a big turning point," Pecknold said. "We lost both games, 4-1 and 3-1. The second night, it was 1-1 late in the second and we missed an empty-netter. We took a lot of confidence out of the weekend in that we knew we were a pretty good hockey team and that if we played with that kind of intensity and desire and commitment, we could do very well within the MAAC.

"We've been off and running ever since that."

Quinnipiac is 13-2-4 since its trip to Munn Ice Arena, and the whole team views the trip to Michigan as the defining point of the season.

"Even though we lost both games, I think the guys really got a lot of confidence out of the whole trip," said sophomore goalie Justin Eddy. "We were playing a big-time team with a big-time goalie, and especially the second night, we played right with them."

"The weekend we went up and played MSU, we had two great showings," Breen added. "I don't know if the score does it justice but we had two great games that gave us a lot of confidence going into the second half of the season."

Quinnipiac rode its new confidence and better play all the way to the MAAC championship game last weekend at Holy Cross. There, it jumped out to a 4-0 lead against Mercyhurst and hung on for the 6-4 win to earn the conference's automatic bid -- not to mention QU's first trip -- to the NCAA Tournament.

Now the small school from southern Connecticut, playing only its fourth season in Division I, finds itself preparing to head back to Worcester, Mass., to face ECAC regular-season champ Cornell (24-7-2) on Saturday in the East Regional (3:30 p.m. ET) at the Centrum Centre. The winner moves on to face New Hampshire, the No. 1 team in the nation, on Sunday.

But getting past Cornell could prove to be a tall order. The Big Red is No. 9 in the latest poll, well ahead of Quinnipiac (20-12-5) at No. 18. The numbers are worse when you look at U.S. College Hockey Online's PairWise rankings, which has Cornell at 10 and QU at 23. And that doesn't take into account that Quinnipiac is the only school in the 12-team tournament not to post a win (0-3) against the rest of the field.

The way Pecknold sees it, his team needs to put aside all the reasons why it shouldn't win and take advantage of the opportunity it's being afforded.

"We're being showcased," he said. "We've got our opportunity to show what we're made of and we need to make sure that we play hard and compete.

"For us to win the hockey game we need to do all the little things well -- we need to outwork Cornell, we need to outcompete them. I'm going to need some heart and desire to kind of be an equalizer."

Another equalizer might be that in each of the last seven years, a No. 5 seed has won a first-round game. Joining Quinnipiac in that slot is West No. 5 St. Cloud State, but considering the Huskies have to face No. 4 Michigan at Yost Ice Arena in Ann Arbor, QU might have the better chance at continuing the trend.

"If we come out like we can as a team, like we did against Mercyhurst, and play hard, good things will happen," Breen said. "We're happy that we're at the national tournament. The draw isn't important, it's just being there."

Especially considering Quinnipiac left East Lansing with a 7-10-1 record just a few short months ago.

David Albright is a senior editor at ESPN.com