ALBANY, N.Y. – Colgate Men’s Hockey is picked to finish fifth in the ECAC regular season standings according to both preseason polls released by the league Tuesday.
The coaches’ poll saw the Raiders receive one first-place vote and 90 total points. In the 17th annual ECAC Hockey Media Poll, Colgate garnered 257 total points.
“We’re excited to get going,” said Colgate Head Coach Don Vaughan, who is entering his 23rd season with the Raiders. “We are a veteran club. We’ve got great leadership in guys like Mike Borkowski, Darcy Murphy and Kevin Lough, who will serve as our captains this season.
“We’re a team that is coming off a 22-win season, so we certainly had some success last year. But, our expectations were to make the NCAA tournament and we basically came up one game short. This is a team that is very focused. They know what it takes to get to the NCAA tournament. We know it’s a process and it’s accomplished doing things on a daily basis, starting in the preseason.”
Colgate returns 18 letterwinners from last season’s squad that posted a 22-12-4 overall mark, an 11-7-4 record in league play and advanced to the ECAC tournament championship game for the second consecutive season.
Tyson Spink, an All-ECAC Third-Team selection, is back to lead the Colgate attack after pacing the team in scoring for a second consecutive season with 31 points (14 G/17 A) in 2014-15. Murphy (11 G/15 A), Borkowski (6 G/14 A) and Tylor Spink (7 G/13 A) also return, giving the Raiders considerable offensive depth.
Defensively, blueliners Lough, Brett Corkey and Jake Kulevich return to anchor a defensive unit that ranked sixth in the nation in scoring defense (2.13).
Goaltender Charlie Finn is between the pipes once again after a sophomore campaign that saw him rank among the nation’s top netminders in shutouts (6/2nd), winning percentage (.657/12th), goals against average (2.03/13th) and save percentage (.924/22nd).
Defending ECAC Tournament champion Harvard was tabbed first in the coaches’ poll, collecting nine first-place votes and 119 total points. St. Lawrence (102) claimed second while 2015 NCAA tournament qualifiers Yale (99) and Quinnipiac (93) were third and fourth, respectively. Union (65) was sixth, followed by Cornell (55), Clarkson (47), Dartmouth (41) and Rensselaer (36). Brown (34) and Princeton (11) completed the poll.
Yale was the favorite in the media poll, receiving 10 first-place votes and 325 total points to edge out 2014-15 Cleary Cup winner Quinnipiac (10/322) for the top spot.
Harvard was third (9/306) and St. Lawrence (1/268) claimed fourth while Union (177), Dartmouth (149), Clarkson (143), Cornell (139), Rensselaer (124), Brown (97) and Princeton (34) completed the poll.
