Pretend, for just a second, that you haven’t watched any college hockey in the past few years, then you hear that Minnesota is hosting Bemidji State this weekend.

You’re told that one team won its conference and went to the Frozen Four last season, and is undefeated and nationally ranked this season. The other team, you’re told, missed the NCAA tournament last year, is under .500, is still searching for an identity and has a thin bench due to a combination of injuries and an unexpected departure.

Aaron Ness isn't worried about the state of the Gophers' defense corps.

If you knew nothing about the past few college hockey seasons, which description, would you think, describes the Beavers, and which describes the Golden Gophers?

Thankfully for Gopher fans, the players have been watching college hockey for the past few years, and know what they’re facing when the Beavers come to Mariucci.

“I think we’re a little bit of an underdog looking at the numbers and where they were last year,” said Minnesota captain Tony Lucia. “That’s what we need to instill in our minds that we need to play hard and play aggressive, because on paper they’re better than us. We need to go out and prove ourselves.”

After an 0-3-1 start, the Gophers have won three of their last four, so this should be a time of optimism for the team, if it weren’t so hard to keep track of who is still on the team, and in uniform. The trouble started in their Oct. 30 win over Alaska Anchorage, when freshman defenseman Nick Leddy (the Minnesota Wild’s first-round draft pick last summer) suffered a broken jaw and will be out for a few weeks.

In the following Tuesday’s practice there was a fluke collision between forward Jay Barriball and defenseman Sam Lofquist. It would be the last time they’d be on the rink together, as Barriball suffered a season-ending knee injury in the mishap (he had surgery this week) and later it was formally announced that Lofquist has left school at Minnesota and has joined the OHL’s Guelph Storm.

Added to the strangeness were the bad allergic reaction to some trail mix that caused Mike Hoeffel to miss last Friday’s 4-2 loss at Wisconsin, and the pre-emptive press release the school issued on Wednesday to refute rumors that Jordan Schroeder was going to leave the team at mid-season, or sooner, and sign with the Vancouver Canucks (who plucked him in the first round last summer).

Down to just a half-dozen healthy defensemen, the Gophers still express optimism that the worst is in the past, and there is hope for the near future.

“We’ll be fine,” said sophomore defenseman Aaron Ness. “You play with six D during the game anyway. We’ve got a solid core. We’re playing pretty well defensively and I think we’ll continue that.”

And defense may be the rule of the day this weekend with stingy Bemidji State coming to visit.

“They’re an older team and a veteran team, and they’re used to winning this year,” said Gopher coach Don Lucia. “They’re going to defend, wait for us to make mistakes and try to capitalize on those mistakes. They’ve only given up more than one goal in two of their games this year, so we’re going to have to do better than that if we expect to win.”

The elder Lucia is known as an expert on the ways of the computer system that determines who will get into the 16-team NCAA field and who will not. He seemed to already have an eye trained on that Sunday morning in March when he noted that playing a non-conference series versus an undefeated and nationally-ranked opponent like the Beavers is an opportunity for his team to score some national attention of its own.

It’s a potentially dangerous time in Minneapolis as the Gophers search for identity and adjust to new line combinations and defensive pairings out of necessity. One notion upon which both the coach and captain seem to be concentrating is ensuring that Minnesota does not misunderstand what it will face when the Beavers arrive.

“You’ve got to give them a lot of respect, to be in the Frozen Four last year and to start off this year undefeated, that’s no fluke,” said Tony Lucia. “They’re the real deal, so we’re taking them very seriously.”

The elder Lucia is quick to remind visitors that college is about learning and opportunity, and for better or worse, there are opportunities to learn in his lineup right now.

“We touched on the fact that it’s a team game, not an individual game and somebody’s going to get the chance to step in,” said coach Lucia. “The guys did a good job of that on Saturday night (a 5-2 win at Wisconsin) and hopefully that’s a good sign. Now we’ve won three out of four and hopefully we can continue to build on that.”