UNH Men's Hockey 2022 Off Season Thread- Goodbye Lake Whitt!

[Chuck Murray]

https://www.grandforksherald.com/spo...erence-preview

Hockey East

Herald predicted standings

1. Northeastern
2. Boston University
3. Providence
4. UMass Lowell
5. UMass
6. Boston College
7. UConn
8. Merrimack
9. Vermont
10. New Hampshire
11. Maine

THE BEST OF…

Best forward: Aidan McDonough, Northeastern
Best defenseman: Domenick Fensore, Boston University
Best goalie: Devon Levi, Northeastern
Best rookie: Jeremy Wilmer, Boston University
Best transfer: Gustavs Grigals, UMass Lowell

NORTH DAKOTA/MINN. SECTION 8

Maine: F Cole Hanson (GF), D Brandon Holt (GF)

Vermont: F Jens Richards (Detroit Lakes)

Five things to know

1. Two of Hockey East’s traditional powers will have new coaches at the helm. Greg Brown is the new coach at Boston College, replacing Jerry York, who was with the Eagles for 28 years. Jay Pandolfo, meanwhile, is the new coach at Boston University. He replaces Albie O’Connell, who was let go in the offseason.

2. UConn will have the youngest player in college hockey this season in 17-year-old forward Matthew Wood, who could be a first-round pick in the 2023 NHL Draft. Wood was a dominant player for Victoria in the BCHL last season.

3. Merrimack will be bringing in one of the best finds of this year’s rookie class in defenseman Zach Bookman. Last season, Bookman dominated the AJHL, racking up 21 goals and 102 points in 55 games for the Brooks Bandits. Other schools were interested in trying to flip his commitment, but Bookman remained loyal.

4. This could be the Year of the Goaltender in Hockey East, which is loaded with high-end puck stoppers. Devon Levi, who won the Mike Richter Award last season, leads the way, but Boston University’s Drew Commesso and UMass Lowell’s Gustavs Grigals enter the season with pretty good pedigree.

5. Three schools dug into the Division-III ranks to grab transfers this summer, including New Hampshire. The Wildcats nabbed Babson’s leading scorer, Ryan Black, who had 39 points last season, while notably not taking a single penalty. The other D-III transfers are Babson’s Mike Egan to Niagara, Wisconsin-Eau Claire’s Ryan Ouellette to Niagara and Skidmore’s Austin Rook to Long Island.

Few random observations and comments on this worthwhile read ...

(1) Good to see someone refusing to drink Luce Canaan's UConn Kool-Aid. 7th looks about right;
(2) To repeat, UMaine will NOT finish in last place. You can deduce the impact of that on UNH;
(3) The lone UNH mention in this article is how the 'Cats poached Babson's leading scorer

Babson

Yup it's shaping up to be another *great* season in Titletown.

At least the traffic here is picking up!!

 

[Felger]

(2) To repeat, UMaine will NOT finish in last place. You can deduce the impact of that on UNH;

Chuck, if you want to take a ride over to Seabrook you can get Maine at +25,000 to win the NC

 

[Chuck Murray]

Chuck, if you want to take a ride over to Seabrook you can get Maine at +25,000 to win the NC

LOL I might just do that, Effingwoods being just a hop skip & a jump away ;-)

To be clear, I'm not THAT bullish on UMaine (yet) ... but looking at the HEA '22/'23 field, I see UMaine likely finishing around 8th or 9th at worst, moving ahead of both UNH and UVM, and possibly picking off someone like Merrimack, too. Coach Barr is a consensus Top Ten recruiter (and arguably WAY better), and it looks like the consensus is, he's bringing in a Top Ten class to Orono this season. So the program has probably bottomed out - just like UMass did after a transitional Carvel/Barr season - and if there is another Top Ten recruiting class coming in behind that (not unreasonable given Barr's history), then UMaine should comfortably slide into the middle of the pack for the '23/'24 season. The hard sledding probably starts then, but Barr-recruited teams have thrived at the highest levels of postseason play in Schenectady, Providence and Amherst, so as they say, "the sky's the limit".

What a shame we didn't beat UMaine to the punch on this one ...

 

[Nifty16]

So Providence can get 2 exhibition games this weekend and UNH can’t even get one together?

 

[Chuck Murray]

So Providence can get 2 exhibition games this weekend and UNH can't even get one together?

Pathetic. The rot in the program runs deep, literally from top to bottom.

Someone wake the new AD, please ...

 

[NCAA watcher]

Pathetic. The rot in the program runs deep, literally from top to bottom.

Someone wake the new AD, please ...

Not sure how this is necessarily a bad thing. Its a coach's decision on how to prepare the team for the first games. Belichik prefers joint practices over pre-season games. I guess less formal structure, able to work with the team without worry about result, etc. may benefit them -- Borek apparently thinks so too. Rather than having an older Canadian team goon it up as we've seen in the past with a young Wildcat team. We'll see on Friday.

 

[Darius]

Seriously. Are y'all pining for a meaningless exhibition game with like 30 skaters, 4 goalies suited up that season ticket holders must pay for whether they attend or not or is this just another chance to b1tch about the program?

 

[Chuck Murray]

Not sure how this is necessarily a bad thing. Its a coach's decision on how to prepare the team for the first games. Belichik prefers joint practices over pre-season games. I guess less formal structure, able to work with the team without worry about result, etc. may benefit them -- Borek apparently thinks so too. Rather than having an older Canadian team goon it up as we've seen in the past with a young Wildcat team. We'll see on Friday.

WWSBD I guess? You mean, the same guy we criticized for a decade for his mediocre recruiting, and now he is somehow the template for future success because he had a winning season last year?? The guy with the .400 career winning percentage in 9 years as a D-1 head coach??? Luce Canaan Lite????

Apathy just oozes out of every single pore of the program. Now its fans have Stockholm Syndrome ...

 

[Chuck Murray]

Seriously. Are y'all pining for a meaningless exhibition game with like 30 skaters, 4 goalies suited up that season ticket holders must pay for whether they attend or not or is this just another chance to b1tch about the program?

Maybe the program's strong suit shouldn't be generating new & exciting reasons to b1tch about it?

 

[HockeyRef]

Not sure how this is necessarily a bad thing. Its a coach's decision on how to prepare the team for the first games. Belichik prefers joint practices over pre-season games. I guess less formal structure, able to work with the team without worry about result, etc. may benefit them -- Borek apparently thinks so too. Rather than having an older Canadian team goon it up as we've seen in the past with a young Wildcat team. We'll see on Friday.

Agree! This coming weekend is a great chance to see what you've got and hopefully both goalies get to play. Sure having the chance to see the team play ahead of the reg season was fun etc but not a deal breaker as to whether or not the program was failing etc because they didn't have a game...IMHO of course.

 

[d.gerry]

Seriously. Are y'all pining for a meaningless exhibition game with like 30 skaters, 4 goalies suited up that season ticket holders must pay for whether they attend or not or is this just another chance to b1tch about the program?

No, I think we're pining for the days of when there was actual excitement surrounding the program as the days of apathy and rudderless leadership (from the AD down to ticket sales) are getting old. Do we not have actual reasons to "b1tch" about the program at this point? If now is not the time to feel frustration please tell me when that time is???

 

[Drew S.]

I think it sends a horrible message to players, fans, etc that administration doesn’t think there is any interest. A dress rehearsal for the real games is a decent idea, although where UNH has struggled with attendance so much in recent times maybe that isn’t as important as it used to be.

 

[Chuck Murray]

I think it sends a horrible message to players, fans, etc. that administration doesn't think there is any interest. A dress rehearsal for the real games is a decent idea, although where UNH has struggled with attendance so much in recent times maybe that isn't as important as it used to be.

"Administration" would be projecting, if that's indeed the case. Hockey is still the biggest draw on campus, even in its current state, but to push it up to its prior levels of interest/success, they would have to do some promoting, and that's something we know UNH administration does not feel is its obligation to pursue. They made that crystal clear for a decade, when the minor league hockey bug bit ManchVegas, and UNH did nothing to compete against the incursion into their previously uncontested territory (i.e. the State of NH). It was almost as if, "How dare they?" or even after some narcissistic retrospection ... "Well, this is a way we can divest ourselves of the rabble that used to foul our pristine campus from the blue-collar working-class demo".

And now that minor league hockey devolved into goon league hockey, and the Friday Night Fights have since left town, UNH is back in its accustomed role as the unchallenged King of NH Hockey. Has UNH done the slightest thing to court the disaffected hockey fans in the State's most populous region, less than an hour away from their campus? Uh, d'oh, heck no.

We were told the new AD might lead to a change of mindset in Durham on issues like this ...

 

[d.gerry]

Has UNH done the slightest thing to court the disaffected hockey fans in the State's most populous region, less than an hour away from their campus? Uh, d'oh, heck no.

We were told the new AD might lead to a change of mindset in Durham on issues like this ...

To be fair she's only been on campus for a few short weeks, probably hard to pass judgement on her at this point however, the clock is ticking (loudly). The disappointing thing so far is her complete silence. Has anyone heard anything from AD Rich since the day of her intro presser? An introduction letter to the season ticket holder base introducing herself, her aspirations, goals, etc. would be nice. Is that too much to ask?

 

[deltabravo62]

Meanwhile I have had more contact with schools where I buy single game tickets (BC, Providence, and Umass) within this league trying to get me interested and buying tickets. I will say UNH did call last week to try to get me back on my season tickets that I apparently didn’t lose even though I was supposed to in July. They said they are “working on” six game flex packs for tickets that they would get info out on once they “finalized everything”. Apparently that will be a last minute thing if at all, I told them to call once they have that figured out as I would use that to fill in what games I go to this year. The ticket office worker who called was nice and did ask my reasoning for not renewing which I told a condensed version of the truth to. I will follow up with the ticket rep I had to give them their market research to do what they will with. Probably a waste of my time but it’s pretty easy to say a declining product both on the ice and in what is being offered with season tix is not inspiring me to continue when there are other options for a hockey fix in the region.

 

[Chuck Murray]

To be fair she's only been on campus for a few short weeks, probably hard to pass judgement on her at this point however, the clock is ticking (loudly). The disappointing thing so far is her complete silence. Has anyone heard anything from AD Rich since the day of her intro presser? An introduction letter to the season ticket holder base introducing herself, her aspirations, goals, etc. would be nice. Is that too much to ask?

No, not really. Tougher decisions on personnel who are leading their respective programs admittedly involves some time to observe, analyze and decide. As much as I'd like to get to the next step with UNH Hockey ASAP ... the day Blue Skies (was) retired, we knew there'd be a time element involved. But there are a lot of other things that can be dealt with quickly, if not immediately ... and outreach to season ticket holders - disaffected or otherwise - is one of those "low hanging fruit" things.

It looks like deltabravo got a phone call (finally) from the ticket office, so maybe they've gotten the memo, and maybe the AD is starting there - which would be another good example of a quick and relatively easy in-house fix. Y'know ... treat others as you would like to be treated yourself? Nothing complicated there. A letter as you've suggested is another easy fix. I don't even care if it includes "aspirations, goals, etc." (which would likely be boilerplate drivel anyway) as long as it acknowledges that (1) UNH values its customers, and (2) UNH strives to provide a quality product for the customer's entertainment dollar. After that, just do your job and "show me". Success in athletics is more measurable than it is in most other college missions.

Unless, of course, you've been hired primarily for your compliance expertise. In which case, just come out and say so, we can understand the priorities, and make our deci$ion$ accordingly. $imple.

 

[HockeyRef]

While there is a lot to do I’m sure to improve things am really glad to read tweets from the new AD that she attended a field hockey game to acknowledge a coaching milestone…and tweet about it. Never saw any of that under the past AD. Social media prowess is hardly an indication of how capable one is at anything but I think it’s refreshing. I mean really she has barely been in the office what a couple, 3 months? Rome wasn’t built in a day or did I miss something?

I doubt seriously that she reads this board…probably working on acclimating to the job and getting out to know her coaches and athletes… This board is hardly the center of the universe and I doubt the posts here are printed out and handed to her each morning.

Thank God the season starts this week…might just give us something constructive to discuss…

 

[d.gerry]

I doubt seriously that she reads this board…probably working on acclimating to the job and getting out to know her coaches and athletes… This board is hardly the center of the universe and I doubt the posts here are printed out and handed to her each morning.

Not sure of your point here? You seem to be referring to posters complaints of the new AD. Isn’t the purpose of this forum to be a place where fans can come together and celebrate, brag, analyze, second guess, critique, vent, and yes complain about “their” team (and others’ teams too!). I don’t think any of us seriously believe this is some type of pipeline leading straight to the AD’s office. We come here to vent our frustrations with the current state of our once proud and respected program, just as we used to express our elation (albeit that was many years ago now which more recent posters would have no experience with). AD Rich is fair game, regardless if she is even aware of this existence of this message board. If I can’t come here to unapologetically express my thoughts (positive or negative) why even have a board?

 

[Drew S.]

I checked last night and tomorrow will make three months since Rich was announced as AD. I’m sure UNH was on her radar for a month or two before that so she has had plenty of time to understand how drastic of fall UNH hockey has had. I can understand why she wouldn’t make tons of changes straightaway but you would think at a minimum she would acknowledge the issues the program faces in a way that isn’t harsh on Souza or the players. I’m not convinced replacing Souza is the best way forward for you guys but there definitely needs to be some changes as far as ticketing and stuff like that.

Maine is going to use the same sort of process you guys did for a new AD and I anticipate a similar result.

 

[NCAA watcher]

you would think at a minimum she would acknowledge the issues the program faces in a way that isn’t harsh on Souza or the players.

How, exactly?

Between the women's program also being horrible, and the flagship football program listing along at 3-2, and the complete stagnation in any publicity/marketing, she has a herculian effort to put her people in place for the backend support, while keeping powder dry on the coaches. At this point, with the dye cast for the season, there's no benefit to doing anything other than giving them complete and unwavering support while they are still in place, while hopefully quietly making "contingency" plans.

I agree with HockeyRef, can't wait for this season to start to we can focus on the product. Opening day lineup chart will be interesting.