With 16 returners from last season’s 21-9-6 team and nine NHL prospects on its roster, Denver hockey came in at No. 4 in the USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine preseason poll released Monday.

Three of the top four were National Collegiate Hockey Conference teams. Defending NCHC regular-season champion North Dakota was first and two-time defending national champion Minnesota-Duluth was third. Hockey East’s Boston College rounded out the group.

Denver took 370 points and one first-place vote among participants from coaches and media from each of the six Division I college hockey conferences, as well as officers of the American Hockey Coaches Association and USA Hockey.

The Pioneers were fifth in the USCHO poll last week.

The USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine poll can be found here.

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