When the men's ice hockey team entered the NESCAC this season, players and coaches alike knew that wins would be harder to come by. After all, the league has produced six of the last seven Division III National Champions and houses perennial powerhouses like Middlebury.
This titanic step-up in competition, coupled with the loss of many star players - the nation's leading scorer, Jason Boudrow, all-star defenseman Dan Mahoney, and key contributors like Natan Obed, Scott Hayes, and Justin Picone - did not spell success for the Jumbos' campaign. But despite his team's 4-12 overall mark and a 3-10 record in the new conference, coach Brian Murphy has seen bright spots.
"When you only win four, you can't be happy," Murphy said. "That being said, we've drawn some positives. I think that one of the biggest positives has been the play of the freshmen."
Murphy referred mostly to three of his first-year forwards, Gino Rotondi, John Hurd, and Shawn Sullivan, all of whom rank among the Jumbos' top five scorers. Rotondi, a 5'8" graduate of scholastic hockey factory Andover Academy, has seven goals and eleven assists on the season.
"Gino is a speed guy," Murphy said. "He also has a lot of strength. He has the unique ability to make people miss. I think the fact that he played at such a high level in high school gave him a bit of an advantage coming in."
Junior co-captain and fellow forward Mike Carceo, who leads the team with 26 points, echoed Murphy's sentiments. "Gino fits great into the style of play in the NESCAC," Carceo said. "He's good on the power play and is a really tough kid."
The 6'1", 200-lb. Hurd, a product of local high school Arlington Catholic, has netted 9 goals and tallied 7 assists on the season so far, which ranks him third in scoring.
"John is the prototypical power forward," Murphy said. "He has one of the best shots on the team. He's big and strong, he comes from a great hockey family, and he's a nice compliment to Mike on the first line."
Defenseman Chris Martin, a junior co-captain, also had praise for Hurd. "I think the strength of John's game is that he really sees the ice well," Martin said. "He's a strong player and plays really physical."
Another product of a Massachusetts high school is Sullivan, a three-time all-scholastic recipient and the all-time leading scorer at Saugus High. He has 15 points so far this season and is a player with a huge upside.
"Shawn has the biggest adjustment to the program because he's a center," Murphy said. "The center has a special emphasis in our system, especially relating to defensive responsibilities. He has the potential to be one of the best players in the league, but this season is a big step up for him as far as competition goes."
"Shawn is a true playmaker," Martin said. "He's so aggressive, he plays hard and has great hands."
All three new Jumbos had their best games in the season's opening contests. Rotondi had a four-point outing in Tufts' second game of the year, a 6-4 win over St. Mt. Michael's, while Sullivan and Hurd tallied three points each in November games against Framingham State and Connecticut College respectively. Such early season success from freshmen, according to Murphy, is typical.
"What you usually see with freshmen is great play in the first six or eight games," Murphy said. "Then there's a big drop in the middle of the year. It's a huge adjustment for first year players, not just the hockey, but the life here at Tufts. There are big changes in diet, in time management and in travel. It's not easy, but by the end of the season the freshmen usually end up playing a lot better."
In his years of playing and coaching at Tufts, Murphy has never had a squad so dependent on the production of its first year players. He further attributes the team's mid-season lull to the reaction of his players, especially the freshmen, to losing on a regular basis.
"Losing is tough for everyone, nobody likes to lose. But I think in a lot of ways, the losses this season have been tougher on the freshmen. The older guys won a lot; they know we'd still be a top team in the ECAC. The older guys understand where we've been and where we're trying to go. I think they have more perspective. I think the rookies got down a bit. Luckily they're starting to come out of it."
As the Jumbos enter the final third of their season, the goals are quite simple. "We can win any of these last seven games," Carceo said. "We have Babson and UMass this weekend, those are both games we could grab. We basically just want to get going on the right track, the future is bright."
Murphy agreed. "We like where we're going," Murphy said. "We've taken some knocks, but our entering this league is what allowed us to successfully recruit these types of freshmen."
And with an experienced core of sophomores on his roster next year - namely Rotondi, Hurd, and Sullivan - another crop of freshman should provide an even bigger boost as the Jumbos climb the rungs of the NESCAC.
