In October, there wasn’t a NESCAC coach who could predict – with any degree of certainty – what the next five months would bring.
After losing a full season to the pandemic, the league’s 10 teams each took the ice with two new classes of players, less familiarity with their opponents than ever before and questions that could fill a penalty box.
“We went up to play Middlebury (on Feb. 4),” said Trinity coach Matt Greason. “I realized that for 15 or 16 of our guys, it was their first time playing at Middlebury.”
As we arrive at championship weekend, four teams have answered those questions better than the others.
Second-seeded Trinity (15-7-1) will face No. 3 Williams (11-10-1) in Saturday’s first semifinal at 1 p.m., a classic contrast-of-styles clash. Host and top-seeded Colby (16-5-2) will play No. 5 Hamilton (11-9-1) in the 4:30 p.m. semifinal, with the two winners meeting Sunday for the championship and automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
Colby vs. Hamilton
Colby has been one of the best stories in Division 3. The last-place team during the most recent NESCAC season in 2019-20, the Mules have gone 13-3-2 since the holiday break to earn the right to host the semis and final for the first time in 14 years.
They’ve been boosted by a pair of sophomore newcomers: goalie Andy Beran (1.45 GAA, .943 save percentage) and defenseman Jack Sullivan (9-12-21) both garnered All-Conference first-team honors, with Sullivan, the league’s top-scoring defenseman, skating off with Rookie of the Year.
Senior Justin Grillo (9-13-22), one of the few remaining Mules who played on the NESCAC championship team of 2018, shared the conference scoring lead with Player of the Year Lucas Michaud (South Portland, Maine) of Trinity.
The team has also allowed the fewest goals in the league (34) and got through a stretch in January when it was almost comically shorthanded.
“There was no pity party,” said coach Blaise MacDonald (Billerica, Mass.), who was voted NESCAC Coach of the Year by his peers. “It was, ‘Let’s tee it up and let it rip.’”
The last time Colby hosted championship weekend, in 2008, it finished in first place but was knocked out by Trinity in the semifinals.
This time it will face Hamilton, which has been powered up front by Bentley transfer Nick Rutigliano of Upton Mass. (7-4-11) and Jordi Jefferson (6-9-15). Rutigliano’s slap shot was a key goal in Sunday’s 3-2 quarterfinal win at Wesleyan.
Trinity vs. Williams
Trinity vs. Williams is a contrast in styles of the highest order.
The Ephs pride themselves on playing a 200-foot game, slowing down the breakouts, limiting chances and relying on the outstanding play of their junior goalie, Evan Ruschil (1.62 GAA, .943 save percentage). They’re also the least-penalized team in the league, which is something that will keep the goals allowed down.
“We’ve leaned on our team defense and our very, very good goaltending,” said Williams coach Bill Kangas (South Burlington, Vt.). “That’s been a big plus.”
To be sure it’s been an uneven road, with no win streaks longer than two and only one stretch of three straight losses. Kangas credits the leadership of three-year captain Niko Karamanis, a forward and the team’s leading scorer (4-11-15), and a senior class that’s stepped up as the year’s gone along.
In Trinity, the Ephs face an explosive team that seems to be hitting its stride. Since laboring through a four-game losing streak after Thanksgiving, the Bantams have lost just twice, and enter championship weekend on a six-game win streak.
“Some of the darkest days since maybe 2013,” said Greason (North Bridgton, Maine) of that December stretch. “We were a little lost.”
The Bantams managed just five goals in those losses but a good part of the turnaround since then can be credited to an improved defense. Junior Andrew Troy, sophomores Ned Blanchard (West Hartford, Conn.) and John Campomenosi, and first-years Teddy Griffin (Marshfield, Mass.) and Eamon Doheny (Lunenburg, Mass.) have learned on the job, honing the program’s style of breaking out quickly to set up scoring chances.
“When we’re playing well we’re breaking the puck out and getting going in transition,” said Greason. “During that stretch we weren’t breaking the puck out very quickly.”
Up front, the strong-on-his-skates Michaud has teamed with Arizona State transfer Jax Murray and Gerard Maretta to form perhaps the league’s most dynamic top line.
In the broader picture, it hasn’t been a great year for the NESCAC. Too many non-conference games against high-profile teams were canceled, costing teams a chance to prop up their rankings in the PairWise, the formula that often runs parallel to at-large selection for the 12-team NCAA tournament. Colby (No. 19) and Trinity (No. 25) are the highest-ranked NESCAC teams.
But all four teams will arrive in Waterville knowing not just that they have a chance to win a championship, but that they had to overcome obstacles to earn that chance.
“It’s such a joy to get here,” said Kangas. “I think all of us had to persevere, trying to get back to playing hockey after two years.”
@MikeZhe603
mzhe@hockeyjournal.com
