Chase Polacek, junior, forward, Rensselaer - When I sized up the contenders a couple of weeks ago, I listed two ECAC Hockey players as “On Solid Ground.” One was Polacek, the other was Yale’s Broc Little. Well, a couple of things happened since I wrote that. One, Both Polacek and Little saw their teams eliminated from the ECAC Hockey playoffs by Brown. Two, Ben Scrivens solidified his hold on a spot. I don’t think there will be three finalists from ECAC Hockey, so somebody’s got to go, and I think it’s Little. Yale’s quarterfinal loss to Brown made a strong case that the absent Sean Backman, not Little, is the key player for Yale, and given that Backman was injured under circumstances that can be charitably described as “ill-advised,” it’s not like he’ll be picking up the votes. On top of that, Little is one reasonably equal part of a very balanced Yale attack, where Polacek was clearly “the man” for RPI, both in terms of overall scoring and in terms of his clutch performance. You will recall that when I calculated “Campellnomics” averages for the nation’s top skaters last month, Polacek led the field with a 1.10 CPPG average. Essentially, that means he could be counted on for one go-ahead goal per game. Little was also among the leaders, but if only one is going in, I’m thinking it’s Polacek.
