ND hockey, until very recently, was actually quite poor. They played in a piece of junk rink, couldn't sell out the 2,800 seats in it, and were never competitive in their own league, of which the bottom half is awful. When they reached the title game in 2008, it was the first time they did anything significant. They do have a quality coach now, new facilities, so they'll probably remain a competitive program, but they really don't have any accomplishments in hockey to hang their hat on.
Didn't they (ND) actually drop hockey for awhile?