University of Massachusets Athletics
Hockey Team Reaches New Heights
December 29, 2003 | Hockey
Dec. 29, 2003
Few people associated with the University of Massachusetts hockey team could have envisioned this three-plus years ago.
When then-athletic director Bob Marcum hired Princeton head coach Don "Toot" Cahoon before the 2000-2001 season, the UMass hockey team had suffered through six straight losing seasons and had finished eighth or lower in Hockey East in five of the six seasons. Inject Cahoon into the mix and the results have been quite different.
The fiery Marblehead native and former Boston University assistant coach seemed like an obvious choice for the job back in 2000. He had just rebuilt a Princeton team that had not had a winning season in over a quarter-century, posting an 18-13-4 record in his fourth year and advancing to the ECAC Finals. During that season, the Tigers defeated unbeaten and top-ranked Maine in Orono, in a sign of things to come.
In 1997-1998, Cahoon took his Princeton squad to the school's first-ever NCAA Tournament and was a finalist for the American Hockey Coaches Association Division I Coach of the Year.
The choice was obvious and in 2000, "Toot" Cahoon was named the 12th head coach in the 71-year history of UMass Hockey.
After two trying years of missing the Hockey East playoffs, the Minutemen made a breakthrough in 2002-2003. Armed with back-to-back recruiting classes that were among the nation's best, the Minutemen posted their highest-ever finish in Hockey East play with a 10-14-0 record and were above .500 for the first time since 1993-1994, a year the squad beat up on Division III foes. It was only a sign of things to come. In the 19-year history of the Hockey East Tournament, only five previous No. 6 seeds had advanced to the Hockey East semifinals, and none had quite the flair of last year's No. 6 seed, the Minutemen.
UMass strolled into Orono, Maine, a confident bunch, having had success against the Black Bears earlier in the year, succumbing to Maine, 1-0, in Orono, on Nov. 9. UMass had also defeated the Bears at the Mullins Center in mid-February, 4-2. However, the numbers were stacked against the Minutemen.
UMass had never won a game at Orono, Maine, posting an 0-20-0 all-time record in the Great North, and Maine had never lost a playoff game at Alfond Arena with an 21-0-0 record.
After Maine jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first period of the first game, it looked like the same old story was starting to unfurl.
However, this UMass team was different and never said never. The Minutemen scored the next three goals in a span of 10 minutes for a 3-1 advantage. Maine answered to tie the game at three, but freshman Stephen Jacobs scored his first career goal, albeit a timely one, just 18 seconds after Maine had tied the game, for a 4-3 lead and a game one victory, 5-3 (UMass would tack on an empty-netter).
Game two of the series resulted in more of the same. Expecting a revved-up crowd and Maine team, the UMass squad took the wind out of its sails, jumping out to a 3-0 lead 16 minutes into the contest. After Maine cut the lead to 3-2 and had the Alfond Center crowd buzzing, Mike Warner scored one of the biggest goals in school history with eight minutes left and a 4-2 victory which punched UMass' ticket to the FleetCenter for the semifinals.
In the semifinals, against eventual national runner-up New Hampshire, the Minutemen climbed back from two different two-goal deficits to tie the game before UNH scored with three minutes left, then held off a late UMass flurry to end the Minutemen's season, 5-4. The game was played in front of the largest crowd in Hockey East Tournament history and ended UMass' run to respectability.
However, the run is not over. This year's team is off to a 9-4-3 record, including a 5-2-2 mark in Hockey East, a record good enough for third place heading into the Holiday break. UMass also climbed as high as seventh in the national polls, and is currently ranked ninth in the most recent ranking. UMass has been in the polls for eight straight weeks, one of seven teams in the polls for that long.
The crowd has responded as six of the top 11 attendance figures have come in the last 14 home games, including a school-record crowd of 7,113 against Boston College on Nov. 14.
Cahoon, the reigning Hockey East Coach of the Year, has several players making waves nationally.
Senior defenseman Thomas P?ck recently became the school's all-time leading-scoring defenseman, passing NHL'er Brad Norton, scoring 56 points in only 48 games. Ironically, P?ck came to UMass as a standout forward, but his scoring picked up last season when he moved to defenseman five games into the season. P?ck's trademark is his powerful slapshot, scoring over half of his points on the power play. He was also named a preseason All-American and is on the preliminary Hobey Baker watch list, given annually to the nation's top college hockey player. He leads the country's defensemen in scoring and goals and leads all players with seven power-play goals.
Several other Minutemen are having fantastic seasons, including Greg Mauldin, Marvin Degon, Chris Capraro, Nick Kuiper, Stephen Werner and Gabe Winer.
This year's team already has taken the season series against Providence and Merrimack and has ties against top-five foes Maine and New Hampshire in its pursuit of home ice for the Hockey East playoffs.
And with the schedule heating up in January after the break, and several high-quality games at home, the Minutemen figure to be there in the end.