HAMDEN — Three months ago, this Quinnipiac men’s hockey team was — as head coach Rand Pecknold likes to put it — immature.
A 3-5 start to the regular season, including a reverse weekend sweep at home and these Bobcats looked like anything but what has come to be expected on the ice in Hamden.
“Confidence wasn’t there,” Pecknold said following a 3-0 home loss to Harvard on Nov. 9. “Frustrating, frustrating weekend.”
That was 105 days ago.
Now, this group of Bobcats are playing the best hockey they have all year — just at the right time too.
“We weren’t perfect,” Pecknold said. “We had some immature moments.”
But whatever immature moments Quinnipiac had weren’t as costly as they were four months ago as it rolled to a 4-0 win over Brown Saturday night.
The best example of that growth actually happened Friday night following the Bobcats 4-1 win over Yale. In year’s past, the pomp and circumstance of the Battle of Whitney Avenue has led to letdown performances against Brown.
Not this year.
“We’ve had some struggles in the past when we play Brown on Saturday after we’ve had the Yale home game, because the emotion and the crowd,” Pecknold said. “ I kind of challenged the guys last night to be ready for this game.”
The message was heard loud and clear as 10 minutes into the opening frame, senior forward Jack Ricketts slammed home a one-timer off a feed from freshman forward Chris Pelosi to give Quinnipiac a lead it would never relinquish.
The goal marked Ricketts’ team leading 19th of the season, giving him 65 career goals — more than any other active player in Division I.
The Oakville, Ontario native has been on a heater throughout the second half of the season, potting 15 of his 19 goals since his four-goal performance against AIC on Dec. 29.
What does he attribute to everything starting to click?
Time.
“You always expect an adjustment period coming to a new place,” Ricketts said. “For some it’s a little longer and that’s the way it goes. I think just sort of the mentality in the second half to just keep pushing and focus on the little things.”
Rickett’s goal was enough to give the Bobcats a comfortable lead until the final minutes of the second period when junior forward Anthony Cipollone received a five minute major penalty for touching a Black Bear’s facemask.
The penalty mirrored some of that immaturity from earlier in the season, but instead of caving in, the Bobcats fought it off. Down a man, both Ricketts and Pelosi generated shorthanded opportunities to keep Brown on its heels throughout the power play.
“We had some immature moments with the five minute major, but the guys picked him up and we killed it off,” Pecknold said. “I think it’s just been part of growing the whole year. I think tonight was a nice little example of us growing as a team.”
Heading into the third period, Quinnipiac was on the receiving end of a penalty as Brown’s sophomore defenseman Ethan Mistry was sent off for slashing.
In another sign of maturity, the Bobcats didn’t waste the opportunity, instead they put the game to bed as graduate student forward Travis Treloar — who returned to the game after leaving with a left shoulder injury — fired home a rebound to extend the lead to two.
Forwards, sophomore Mason Marcellus and freshman Tyler Borgula tacked on to the lead with goals of their own to leave no doubt as the final horn sounded.
In total 10 different Bobcats notched a point Saturday, and with guys like graduate student defenseman Aaron Bohlinger — who suffered a lower body injury Friday — and Treloar battling injuries, Quinnipiac is going to need every man it can get.
“You gotta have depth,” Pecknold said. “We had four lines rolling and seven (defensemen) going tonight. I thought we did a good job in terms of having everyone contribute.”
But the most mature moment came with just under a minute to go, when sophomore goaltender Dylan Silverstein gave way to senior goaltender Noah Altman, relinquishing his shutout.
“I did talk to Dylan, and he’s a great kid,” Pecknold said. “I’m like, ‘I need you to be a good teammate.’ It’s rare that you would pull a kid with a shutout. I think that’s the second time that I’ve ever done that.”
Altman — a member of the 2023 national championship team — has been in Hamden for four years now, and even seeing as little ice time as he has in those four years, when given the opportunity to play Saturday — he hesitated. Because — in an ultimate sign of maturity — even in what could very well be his last chance to get on the ice, he wanted to put his teammate first.
“(Pecknold) looked at me kind of weird initially,” Altman said. “I was like, ‘I don’t really know, it’s kind of an unwritten rule, you don’t go in and ruin a goalie shutout.’ So Sylvie was good about it. I talked to him after, obviously he understood.”
It’s guys like Altman, Ricketts and Treloar who have led the turnaround since that Nov. 9 loss, and those guys will also be the reason Quinnipiac sees success coming down the stretch.
And maybe those early season losses cost the Bobcats in the end with the pairwise rankings and a spot in the NCAA Tournament. It doesn’t — and shouldn’t — negate the growth this team has shown in those 105 days.
“We’re fighting for our lives for the NCAA tournament,” Pecknold said. “So we had to win.”
They also know they’ll have a chance to punch their own ticket to the dance — but they’ll have to do it in Lake Placid, New York. A place Pecknold’s group knows — and hates — all too well.
“We’re not having the chat this year about the Lake Placid thing,” Altman said. “We know what’s happened there in the past … there’s no reason to chat about it. Our season relies on those games, and we’re gonna give it everything we have and do exactly what we’ve been doing all year. Just build, build, build for this time.”
Quinnipiac will have a chance to secure the No. 1 seed in the ECAC tournament and win the Cleary Cup Feb. 28 when it travels to North Country to take on Clarkson. Puck drop set for 7:30 p.m.
