ECAC Hockey Race Still Wide Open

This season's $64,000 question: "Which eight hockey teams are going to make the ECAC Division One playoffs this year, and who is going to get the top four seeds?"

The way things have been going this season, that question is about as easy as a Chem 20 exam. Crimson hockey mentor Bill Cleary echoes the sentiment around the division. "This is the zaniest, daffiest year I can recall. Anyone who would make predictions now would be out of his mind."

There are a lot of new names making it to the top. Yale, University of New Hampshire, Dartmouth and yes, even perennial cellar-dweller Princeton are reaching parity with the rest of the league. When was the last time you saw Cornell drop three Ivy League contests to Brown, Yale and Princeton? Or how about Yale defeating BU?

No longer do Cornell, BU, Harvard and Boston College dominate the east. This season teams like UNH and Dartmouth have forged to the top, while BC, Harvard and Cornell are having their problems. Providence College is supposed to be a basketball power, so how come they have a hot hockey team all of a sudden?

"You can't take anyone for granted anymore" is Cleary's feeling, and you'll find that just about every coach in the division shares that uncertainty. "There's a lot of parity, which is good for hockey," he said, "but not so good for us."

Indeed, for the first half of the season Harvard has not had the run of the division it has enjoyed in the past, when Cornell and BU seemed to be the only obstacles between the Crimson skaters and the division crown. This year Dartmouth, UNH and BC have added to Harvard's woes, dropping the Crimson's record to 6-5.

Heartbreakers

Each of those five losses came by a single goal. No one has yet blown the Crimson out of the rink for 60 minutes in division play, and it is doubtful that anyone will. But the squad just can't seem to put it all together for a full three periods against the big teams.

"We're just a hair from being a really good team" is how Cleary sees it. "All of our problems have come when we've been ahead. There's been a little bit of a letdown," he said.

In all but the BU loss, the let-down has been noticeably evident. At UNH, Harvard saw a 2-1 lead turn into a 3-2 loss. Against the Big Green, Harvard stormed back from a 3-0 deficit to take a 4-3 lead, only to see the one-goal margin evaporate in the third period. At McHugh Forum, BC scored four unanswered second-period goals to overtake Harvard's 4-2 lead.

And finally, the Crimson icemen let Cornell off the hook (a three-goal hook) to allow the Big Red to snatch a 5-4 overtime victory from the jaws of defeat. It was a game of breaks, and Harvard just didn't seem to get them the way Cornell did. "We couldn't have played any better," Cleary said.

Cleary doesn't want to make any excuses about the breaks ("excuses are for losers"). He admits that the team, and especially the defensive corps, is lacking in experience. "We still have a little to learn in our own end," Cleary said.

Marc Noonan is the only experienced defenseman on the team and has played some solid hockey but the coach had plenty of praise for the other four as well. "Not many people notice Levy Byrd, but he's been playing super hockey. And Ed Rossi, Steve Janicek and Dave Hands are really starting to come on."

Cleary plans no major shake-up on defense for the second half of the season. Dave Hands should see more action and Cleary may not continue the regular rotation of sophomore goaltenders John Aiken and Jim Murray. "I'll play each game as it comes, and probably play the goalie with the hot hand," he said.

Offensively, fans should be seeing more of the fourth line. Wiz Wyatt, Paul Hanley and Kevin Burke were impressive against Princeton, Penn and Cornell. The trio hustled and scrapped but just couldn't buy a goal against the Big Red. "They were as good as any line on Cornell," Cleary said.

"The Cornell game shows what kind of team we are--we're a skating team, and to my mind there isn't a team that can outskate us," Cleary asserted. "Everybody who's played us has known they're been in a hockey game."