| Year: | 1986 |
| Gender: | men's |
| Division: | Division I |
| Teams: | 8 |
| Frozenfourarena: | Providence Civic Center |
| Frozenfourcity: | Providence, Rhode Island |
| Champions: | Michigan State Spartans |
| Titlecount: | 2nd |
| Champgamecount: | 3rd |
| Champffcount: | 5th |
| Runnerup: | Harvard Crimson |
| Gamecount: | 2nd |
| Runnerffcount: | 9th |
| Semifinal1: | Minnesota Golden Gophers |
| Frozenfourcount: | 11th |
| Semifinal2: | Denver Pioneers |
| Frozenfourcount2: | 12th |
| Coach: | Ron Mason |
| Coachcount: | 1st |
| Mop: | Mike Donnelly |
| Mopteam: | Michigan State |
| Attendance: | 24,836 |
The 1986 NCAA Division I men's ice hockey tournament was the culmination of the 1985–86 NCAA Division I men's ice hockey season, the 39th such tournament in NCAA history. It was held between March 21 and 29, 1986, and concluded with Michigan State defeating Harvard 6-5. All Quarterfinals matchups were held at home team venues while all succeeding games were played at the Providence Civic Center in Providence, Rhode Island.
The NCAA permitted 8 teams to qualify for the tournament and divided its qualifiers into two regions (East and West). Each of the tournament champions from the four Division I conferences (CCHA, ECAC, Hockey East and WCHA) received automatic invitations into the tournament with At-large bids making up the remaining 4 teams, 1 from each conference.
| East | West | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seed | School | Conference | Record | Berth type | Appearance | Last bid | Seed | School | Conference | Record | Berth type | Appearance | Last bid | |
| 1 | Boston University | Hockey East | 25–12–4 | Tournament champion | 15th | 1984 | 1 | Denver | WCHA | 33–10–1 | Tournament champion | 12th | 1973 | |
| 2 | Harvard | ECAC Hockey | 22–7–1 | At-large bid | 11th | 1985 | 2 | Michigan State | CCHA | 30–9–2 | At-large bid | 8th | 1985 | |
| 3 | Boston College | Hockey East | 26–11–3 | At-large bid | 14th | 1985 | 3 | Western Michigan | CCHA | 32–10–0 | Tournament champion | 1st | Never | |
| 4 | Cornell | ECAC Hockey | 20–6–4 | Tournament champion | 9th | 1981 | 4 | Minnesota | WCHA | 32–12–0 | At-large bid | 13th | 1985 | |
The tournament featured three rounds of play. The two odd-number ranked teams from one region were placed into a bracket with the two even-number ranked teams of the other region. The teams were then seeded according to their ranking. In the Quarterfinals the first and fourth seeds and the second and third seeds played two-game aggregate series to determine which school advanced to the Semifinals. Beginning with the Semifinals all games were played at the Providence Civic Center and all series became Single-game eliminations. The winning teams in the semifinals advanced to the National Championship Game with the losers playing in a Third Place game.
[2] Note: * denotes overtime period(s)
| Scoring summary | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Period | Team | Goal | Assist(s) | Time | Score | |||
| 1st | align=center style=";" | HAR | Steve Armstrong | Follows and Ohno | align=center | 2:15 | align=center | 1–0 HAR |
| align=center style=";" | HAR | Allen Bourbeau | MacDonald and Smith | align=center | 8:10 | align=center | 2–0 HAR | |
| align=center style="color:white; background:#007A53" | MSU | Mitch Messier | Shibicky | align=center | 17:55 | align=center | 2–1 HAR | |
| 2nd | align=center style=";" | HAR | Allen Bourbeau | Barakett and Pawlowski | align=center | 20:53 | align=center | 3–1 HAR |
| align=center style="color:white; background:#007A53" | MSU | Jeff Parker | Miller and Tilley | align=center | 26:48 | align=center | 3–2 HAR | |
| align=center style=";" | HAR | Allen Bourbeau | Krayer and Benning | align=center | 36:09 | align=center | 4–2 HAR | |
| align=center style="color:white; background:#007A53" | MSU | Mike Donnelly | Miller and Messier | align=center | 38:30 | align=center | 4–3 HAR | |
| 3rd | align=center style="color:white; background:#007A53" | MSU | Brad Hamilton | Messier and Shibicky | align=center | 41:06 | align=center | 4–4 |
| align=center style="color:white; background:#007A53" | MSU | Brian McReynolds | Rendall and Parker | align=center | 42:15 | align=center | 5–4 MSU | |
| align=center style=";" | HAR | Andy Janfaza | Carone and Chiarelli | align=center | 46:46 | align=center | 5–5 | |
| align=center style="color:white; background:#007A53" | MSU | Mike Donnelly – GW | Murphy | align=center | 57:09 | align=center | 6–5 MSU | |
* Most Outstanding Player(s)[3]