AMHERST — When Kurt Keats arrived at UMass from Winnipeg, Manitoba, the furthest thing from his mind was winning a Hockey East championship.
The senior forward had lofty goals for the Minutemen when he arrived for the 2015-16 season, but they might not have been the most realistic. UMass won eight games during his freshman year and then won five the following year, Greg Carvel’s first at the helm of the Minutemen. Yet only two short years after UMass ended the season on a 17-game losing skid, the second-ranked Minutemen head to Merrimack on Thursday with a chance at clinching the Hockey East regular season championship for the first time in program history.
“Obviously an absolute roller coaster,” Keats said. “If I thought back to freshman year, I’d be lying if I said I ever saw us in this position. Just the transformation and obviously there were a lot of tough days coming to the week, but obviously the way this year has gone for our team and the success we’re having, it makes it so much fun coming to the rink.”
UMass (24-7-0, 16-5-0 Hockey East) is four points clear of second-place Providence and five points up on the third-place tie between UMass Lowell and Northeastern with three games remaining for most teams. If the Minutemen defeat Merrimack (7-22-3, 4-16-2) for a third time this year on Thursday, they would have 34 points, more than any other team could attain over the final two weekends of the regular season.
It would be a historical victory not only for the program, but for the league itself in its 35th anniversary season. Hockey East has only had five different schools win the regular season championship outright in its first 34 seasons, led by 13 individual titles for Boston College.
Brett Boeing won his first game with UMass before losing his next 17 after joining the team midway through the 2016-17 campaign and the senior said the team has not shied away from talking about the magnitude of Thursday’s game. He said it is the natural progression of the goals the Minutemen set for themselves before the season.
“Our first goal was to get some reputation,” Boeing said. “Last year, we made some noise, but didn’t have the year we wanted. This year, we wanted to make some noise and get a big-time reputation. We got that and the next goal is to set ourselves up for a chance to win the Hockey East regular season, and that’s what’s on the line Thursday. Like Carvy’s been saying, this is the biggest game of the year, this team hasn’t done this ever, and you only see five teams that have won the Hockey East regular season championship, so to have that opportunity, the guys are stoked to be able to have a chance.”
Carvel has made it a habit this season of not focusing on the historic milestones UMass has achieved. He downplayed the record for most wins in a season and most Hockey East wins in a season when they were set earlier this month. He barely touched the topic of sweeping traditional powers Boston University and Boston College for the first time this season.
Instead, he has left his focus on the other goals ahead for the Minutemen this season. But one of those goals has a chance to be accomplished Thursday, the final hurdle UMass can pass during the regular season, and he would prefer the celebration not wait any longer.
“It can’t be the main motivation, (that has to be) our standard of play and continuing to get better,” Carvel said. “I really liked our game at Providence and I feel like if we can keep improving upon that standard the rest of it will take care of itself. But winning the regular season championship, that’s a pretty big feat. Our short-term goal right now is to secure that and we put ourselves in a really good position with three games, but we’re absolutely going into it like we have one game. It’s do or die, we want it to be Thursday night.”