The Utica College men’s hockey team is receiving votes in the first edition of the USCHO.com National Poll released on Tuesday afternoon. The Pioneers are second in the receiving votes category, with 13 total votes.
Elmira College is the top-ranked ECAC West Conference team in the poll, coming in at No. 15, while Neumann also landed in the receiving votes category with five votes. St. Norbert, the defending NCAA Division III Champions, received all 20 first place votes and heads into the season-opening weekend as the No. 1 ranked team in the country.
The Pioneers open up regular season play on Saturday night when they host Castleton State (also receiving votes in the first USCHO.com national poll) at the Utica Memorial Auditorium at 7 p.m.
Former All-American Louie Educate (Chicago, IL/Aberdeen (NAHL)) returns for his senior campaign for the Pioneers after finishing last season ranked fifth on the team with 18 points (six goals, 12 assists). Educate, a transfer from Nichols College after his freshman year, has played in 96 career games at the Division III level and has 96 career points (51 goals, 45 assists). As a sophomore at Utica in 2012-13, he was named the ECAC West Player of the year and earned All-American honors after leading the team with 36 points on 18 goals and 18 assists, while guiding the Pioneers to the Frozen Four of the NCAA Division III Tournament.
Utica returns 13 players from last year’s squad, and adds 16 newcomers, after a heavy graduating class in the Spring of 2014. The Pioneers are coming off their second straight ECAC West Regular Season title and they advanced as far as the Conference Tournament Championship game, where they hosted Elmira College as the top seed in the tournament.
The Pioneers posted a 16-7-4 overall record last season, including a 10-4-1 mark in the ECAC West.
UC led the nation in home attendance for the eighth consecutive season last year. In 15 home dates, 54,464 fans came through the turnstiles at the Utica Memorial Auditorium. Utica’s average home attendance of 3,631 fans per game last season ranks second all-time for home attendance in division III history, just one spot behind the current single season record average of 3,754 set by the 2012-13 edition of the Pioneers.
