Last year after the winter break, the men’s hockey team was the talk of the college hockey world.
They had an 11-4-2 record, were ranked seventh in the nation and were unbeaten in 11 games – and that’s when it all went wrong.
The Huskies crumbled to a 5-12-1 record the rest of the season, falling out of the national rankings and losing home ice advantage in the Hockey East playoffs on the very last day of the season. In fact, it was the second worst collapse in Husky history.
“I don’t think we were used to it, and then one bad thing happened, and we never had to face adversity at the beginning of the year,” said junior forward Chris Donovan. “We started dipping in the standings and the polls and then toward the end of the year we found out what it took again.”
This season, at the break, the team had a 12-4-2 record and is now ranked fourth in the nation, but a long slog of tough conference games awaits them during the next three months.
The question then, for members of the DogHouse and anyone else involved in Husky nation is this: What will make this season different?
One could point to the stellar play of Brad Thiessen and the defensive core. Thiessen currently has a 14-4-2 record with a goals against average of 1.88 placing him in the top ten in the nation. His save percentage of .940 is fifth nationally.
One could look at the balanced attack the Huskies feature on offense, with seven players in double digits in points.
Or perhaps the play of the Dog’s tenacious penalty kill, which has stymied opponents at a 90.5 percent rate, second in Hockey East by just one tenth of a point.
But some of the players think the change last year had more to do with attitude, and knowledge that the team is playing with a target on their back as one of the top squads.
“Teams are going to come out and play hard against us, and we know that now,” said junior defenseman Dennis Chisholm. “We need to be ready to play our best game every night; we play every game like it was our last.”
The other major factor for the Huskies this season is experience, they know that success doesn’t continue by itself.
“We have been here before now,” said senior defenseman and assistant captain Louis Liotti. “We are in the same place we were last year, we have learned a big lesson from last year, we can’t expect we’ll keep winning, we have to keep working hard.”
As these Huskies prepare for their best shot at a conference title since most any NU student was born, we the fans will have to wait and see if the lessons learned and the new feelings around the team are for real, or just smoke and mirrors.
Check out 104.9 FM or at www.wrbbradio.org to hear all the action of your Huskies. Basketball coverage is Thursday at 6:45 p.m. at Delaware and Saturday at 11:45 a.m. at Hofstra. Hockey coverage is 6:45 p.m. Friday and Saturday versus Vermont.
– Pete Martin can be reached
