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Harvard Crimson 2023-'24

I'm not having much trouble with how they are playing this season. Like the St. Lawrence announcers said, one of Harvard's problems is losing underclassmen before their eligibility ends. I would rather see a core of players that are dedicated to four years of playing for Harvard.

Have been a season ticket holder for over 30 years and that utter debacle in Bridgeport last year changed my feelings about the makeup of the team. It soured me on players who leave early to go on to their AHL careers. The UMass game was bad, but they did not quit, like they did against Ohio State. Donato did not play Wong, who took bad penalties, but always played hard and tough; he did not play Deveaux who went into corners, took hits, a tough player who hustled. Two seniors who played hard and hustled all the time during their Harvard careers, and he doesn't play them in their last game; he played the high-scoring floaters who were protecting their future hockey careers. Enough of them.

Anyway, it was a good 2nd period at St. Lawrence.
 
I don't know this for a fact but I believe that it was the first time in Harvard's long history that they were shut out in back to back games. Maybe not but I can't remember a time even with some truly bad teams that the Crimson failed to score over six periods. Seven if you count the third period against UMass.
 
It's going to be a very long couple of years at the Bright. This year is obviously brutal, and next year, there is not much in the way of reinforcements coming in, outside of St Louis who should come in and play right away. Harvard will likely be a little bit better next year (more experience, etc), but will still be a team that lacks any real ability to score.

This team is slow, can't win a face-off, can't possess the puck.....the list goes on and on. They were absolutely outclassed by UConn who should have won the game 8-2 if not for a stellar performance in net from Aku. The issue with this team is that even though they don't have the talent to play a finesse game, they are also incapable of taking the body and playing a physical game. They are a team that is as poorly constructed and without an identity as I can remember with zero for margin for error. It reminds me of the teams in the post Cleary years before Mazz started to bring in some better quality.

Hopefully the players can stay the course and continue to get better. Harvard will receive a massive in-flux of better talent with the kids coming in for the Fall of 2025, but until then, and I hope that I am wrong, it is going to be a very lean couple of years.
 
The way forward is not too promising for Ivy schools, no portal, limited NIL opportunities and any real talent is out the door after two years. They are an anachronism in today's college sports environment as other the other Ivies. Hard to see a competitive pathway for these schools. Harvard still has the most powerful brand name in higher education and the degree is valuable however you chose to use it but if you are playing a major sport with professional ambitions there are many other schools to attend.
 
DNAEagle said:
The way forward is not too promising for Ivy schools, no portal, limited NIL opportunities and any real talent is out the door after two years. They are an anachronism in today's college sports environment as other the other Ivies. Hard to see a competitive pathway for these schools. Harvard still has the most powerful brand name in higher education and the degree is valuable however you chose to use it but if you are playing a major sport with professional ambitions there are many other schools to attend.
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"No portal" -- yes, but with the end of fifth-year COVID eligibility, the impact of this will be considerably reduced as compared to past years. Also, while the Ivies rarely take players from the portal, they also lose fewer players to the portal than other programs (at least this is true for Cornell and Harvard), perhaps due to the value of the degree.
"Limited NIL opportunities" -- have other NCAA hockey programs seen much of an impact of NIL money? To my knowledge, thus far the impact has been very minor.
"Any real talent is out the door after two years" -- definitely not true historically; it is very rare for even the best Ivy players to leave prior to the end of their third year. Harvard did lose many players last year, but all were rising seniors with the exception of Coronato (rising junior and first round pick). Almost all of Harvard's best players have stayed three or four years (eg. Vesey, Fox, Killorn).

The Ivies will continue to be disadvantaged as they've always been, due to lack of scholarships, a later start to the season, and administrations unwilling to commit resources to athletics (though not true for Harvard, which is extremely wealthy). But I don't think your points hold much water going forward. The Ivy programs were all ravaged by COVID but these effects will lessen over time.
 
The open portal is just a beginning so its impact is still somewhat uncertain but whatever its effect it won't be good for the Ivies. We are in the early stages of the NIL and it is going to affect FB and BB more than hockey but I can imagine that the elite hockey players will be encouraged by NIL opportunities at the Blueblood programs although no one is come out and announce they are going to the school for the NIL money. It is hard to find high draft picks staying for four years these day, there are always exceptions but I am pretty sure coaches are planning their rosters with two or three year timeframes for the high end talent. Vesey stayed largely because he didn't like playing for the team that drafted him and wanted to make his own choices. College sports are going through a sea change and while it will have less of an impact on hockey we are at the very beginning of all of this. It is not going to be for the better.
 
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DNAEagle said:
The open portal is just a beginning so its impact is still somewhat uncertain but whatever its effect it won't be good for the Ivies. We are in the early stages of the NIL and it is going to affect FB and BB more than hockey but I can imagine that the elite hockey players will be encouraged by NIL opportunities at the Blueblood programs although no one is come out and announce they are going to the school for the NIL money. It is hard to find high draft picks staying for four years these day, there are always exceptions but I am pretty sure coaches are planning their rosters with two or three year timeframes for the high end talent. Vesey stayed largely because he didn't like playing for the team that drafted him and wanted to make his own choices. College sports are going through a sea change and while it will have less of an impact on hockey we are at the very beginning of all of this. It is not going to be for the better.
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At BC the top players are maybe staying two years on average, but that hasn't been true at the Ivies, where at least three years is the norm for the top prospects. Over at least the last decade, aside from COVID-related departures, I believe Coronato is the only Harvard player to sign a pro deal before his third year out of the dozens of NHL prospects Harvard has had. At the moment, very few players are transferring into the Ivies, but very few players are transferring out (other than graduating seniors, but that's only allowed because of the temporary fifth year eligibility rule).

I agree that the changes to college sports are extremely bad for competitive balance.
 
bothman said:
It's going to be a very long couple of years at the Bright. This year is obviously brutal, and next year, there is not much in the way of reinforcements coming in, outside of St Louis who should come in and play right away. Harvard will likely be a little bit better next year (more experience, etc), but will still be a team that lacks any real ability to score.

This team is slow, can't win a face-off, can't possess the puck.....the list goes on and on. They were absolutely outclassed by UConn who should have won the game 8-2 if not for a stellar performance in net from Aku. The issue with this team is that even though they don't have the talent to play a finesse game, they are also incapable of taking the body and playing a physical game. They are a team that is as poorly constructed and without an identity as I can remember with zero for margin for error. It reminds me of the teams in the post Cleary years before Mazz started to bring in some better quality.

Hopefully the players can stay the course and continue to get better. Harvard will receive a massive in-flux of better talent with the kids coming in for the Fall of 2025, but until then, and I hope that I am wrong, it is going to be a very lean couple of years.
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Harvard has 9 drafted NHL players....talent is there. What's the issue with the team this year? Time for a new coach? 1-7-3 is awful. The are below Long Island in the Pairwise and are ranked 51st out 60.
 
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bothman said:
It's going to be a very long couple of years at the Bright. This year is obviously brutal, and next year, there is not much in the way of reinforcements coming in, outside of St Louis who should come in and play right away. Harvard will likely be a little bit better next year (more experience, etc), but will still be a team that lacks any real ability to score.

This team is slow, can't win a face-off, can't possess the puck.....the list goes on and on. They were absolutely outclassed by UConn who should have won the game 8-2 if not for a stellar performance in net from Aku. The issue with this team is that even though they don't have the talent to play a finesse game, they are also incapable of taking the body and playing a physical game. They are a team that is as poorly constructed and without an identity as I can remember with zero for margin for error. It reminds me of the teams in the post Cleary years before Mazz started to bring in some better quality.

Hopefully the players can stay the course and continue to get better. Harvard will receive a massive in-flux of better talent with the kids coming in for the Fall of 2025, but until then, and I hope that I am wrong, it is going to be a very lean couple of years.
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I don’t think you are wrong. The team has major problems defending in their own zone, they can’t forecheck, and they have trouble putting the puck in the ocean. That adds to up to their current record. I’m not letting the coaching staff off the hook either. They recruited these kids and they haven’t done a good job getting them assimilated to the college game. my senior year at Harvard we won a total of seven games. I have a hard time seeing this team beating that record.
 
Aku shows some promise but he isn't there just yet. Hopefully, they will go full platoon the rest of the way out to give the kid room to grow so that he is part of what could be a decent year in 2025-2026. The D looked respectable last night against Yale. The third period was not great as Harvard seemed to run out of gas (not sure why there were 11 forwards and 5 D suited). Yale made a nice third period push as well but Aku shut them down with a little luck. The first 40 minutes Harvard were at least winning their share of puck battles.

The skill drop off of the offense not only vs. last year but vs. the rest of the league is striking. This isn't just the top line but everywhere. My two cents is that the powerplay is an exception and seems pretty well coached. They seem to be overachieving relative to their actual talent.

After Healy's goal Harvard had good chances in the first 2 periods to pile on but between a couple of nice saves by Stark and an apparent lack of finishing talent, they couldn't get it done. I wouldn't be surprised to see them do a little better the second time through the league with an upset or two (it couldn't get much worse) but this doesn't look like a team that will win the Beanpot semi or get through a playoff series.
 
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ROMD said:
The skill drop off of the offense not only vs. last year but vs. the rest of the league is striking. This isn't just the top line but everywhere. My two cents is that the powerplay is an exception and seems pretty well coached. They seem to be overachieving relative to their actual talent.
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What?? Harvard has by far the most draft picks in the ECAC and is in last place!
 
CornellFan13 said:
What?? Harvard has by far the most draft picks in the ECAC and is in last place!
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Not all NHL draft picks are created equal. Even assuming the scouts are picking properly, later round draft picks may need time to develop offensively at the college level to match expectations. A 4th or 5th round forward can't be expected to have the same immediate impact as say a Matthew Coronato (13th overall pick). This is a young team and they will certainly get better, hopefully a lot better the next two years. All of that said, this may still be the worst Harvard team since the late 70s.
 
ROMD said:
Not all NHL draft picks are created equal. Even assuming the scouts are picking properly, later round draft picks may need time to develop offensively at the college level to match expectations. A 4th or 5th round forward can't be expected to have the same immediate impact as say a Matthew Coronato (13th overall pick). This is a young team and they will certainly get better, hopefully a lot better the next two years. All of that said, this may still be the worst Harvard team since the late 70s.
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I agree with you. I'm mostly just pushing back on your comment about the "skill drop off of the offense vs the rest of the league." Harvard is still plenty skilled compared to the rest of the ECAC.
 
Their skill isn't the issue. It's youth and inexperience. Their players are younger basically across the board. Average age is 21.1, 3rd youngest in all of college hockey. The freshmen like Fine, MacDonald, Callow, Johnson, etc. are all decently talented players who will be good with time, but they won't be Coronato, Farrell, Laferriere level as freshmen. The bigger issue in my eyes (as someone who isn't a Harvard fan) is that the juniors and seniors haven't developed to take leading roles like their talent and pedigree would indicate they should. Gaffney, Karpa, Moore, Bar, Aucoin, etc. have not really developed. They should be way better than they are.
 
CornellFan13 said:
What?? Harvard has by far the most draft picks in the ECAC and is in last place!
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Colgate had 7 NHL draft picks in the 2010-11 season, and was 3-22-2 in early February, with 0 league wins at the time! They then figured it out, going 8-4-1 in their next 13 games, eliminating RPI and Union both on the road in the playoffs.

Having draft picks doesn't equate to immediate on-ice success.
 
Rainman said:
Colgate had 7 NHL draft picks in the 2010-11 season, and was 3-22-2 in early February, with 0 league wins at the time! They then figured it out, going 8-4-1 in their next 13 games, eliminating RPI and Union both on the road in the playoffs.

Having draft picks doesn't equate to immediate on-ice success.
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Unless of course, you happen to be BC or BU.
 
Having watched a bunch of games now, Harvard is definitely progressing, but still are skating too many guys in a regular slot that are depth guys...especially on defense. I do see progression which is positive, but there are still too many derailers (face-offs, breakouts, and team speed being at the top of the list).

It's a down year for Harvard, but also for the ECAC. I think the ECAC likely only gets 1 team in the tourney this year, unless Quinny loses in the ECAC tourney. And while Quinny is clearly the best team, even this Quinny team is down relative to recent Quinny standards. Cornell, Clarkson, Harvard (Harvard moreso obviously) - these are teams that are definitely down relative to recent precedent. I would be very surprised to see a meaningful run out of any of these teams.

It should make for an interesting ECAC tourney, with such parity relative to prior years where you could almost slot the top 3 to 4 teams in Lake Placid before the tourney started.
 
bothman said:
Having watched a bunch of games now, Harvard is definitely progressing, but still are skating too many guys in a regular slot that are depth guys...especially on defense. I do see progression which is positive, but there are still too many derailers (face-offs, breakouts, and team speed being at the top of the list).

It's a down year for Harvard, but also for the ECAC. I think the ECAC likely only gets 1 team in the tourney this year, unless Quinny loses in the ECAC tourney. And while Quinny is clearly the best team, even this Quinny team is down relative to recent Quinny standards. Cornell, Clarkson, Harvard (Harvard moreso obviously) - these are teams that are definitely down relative to recent precedent. I would be very surprised to see a meaningful run out of any of these teams.

It should make for an interesting ECAC tourney, with such parity relative to prior years where you could almost slot the top 3 to 4 teams in Lake Placid before the tourney started.
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I wish I could agree with you but after watching tonight's Beanpot, I'm of the mind that Harvard hasn't progressed all that much. They are still being badly outplayed especially in their zone. Their D structure is horrendous and there is little in the way of offensive skill. Several if not most of the freshman class should be in D-2. They are not D-1 players. We may be looking at several years of futility before we climb back into the top four of the ECAC. And that's if we can recruit which it appears like we have taken a big step backwards.
 
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