The Hamilton men's ice hockey team entered the season having lost seven seniors, including NESCAC Player of the Year Gus Katsuras, to graduation. Its roster featured 13 freshmen who would be thrown into the fire of a brutal NESCAC schedule. And so when United States College Hockey Online (USCHO) projected in its season preview that Hamilton would finish eighth in the NESCAC, the Continentals stepped into to underdog role.
And that's just where they like to be. In five of the last seven years, Hamilton has upset a higher seed in the quarterfinals of the NESCAC Tournament, with their biggest victory coming last year when they upset No. 2 Williams from the seventh seed on the road.
"I really like the underdog role for us," said coach Phil Grady, who returns for his 23rd year behind the Continentals' bench. "We don't have to worry about who's No. 5 or who's No. 1. I like that our team can just rely on its quickness and work hard without the distractions or pressures of being the favorite."
This year, Hamilton has worked some of the underdog magic it typically reserves for the NESCAC Tournament in the regular season, jumping out to a 3-0-1 start that has included quality road wins and surprising home victories. The team's season opener was a tough road game at Trinity, which was christening its brand-new Community Sports Complex. The Continentals breezed past the hoopla of the 1,950 Trinity fans who turned out for the opening, cruising to a 5-2 win.
Besides displaying an ability to manage a tough road environment, Hamilton has also shown a penchant for late-game heroics. The Continentals' second game of the season was another road NESCAC contest, this time at Wesleyan, where senior captain Casey Deak scored a game-tying goal with less than two minutes remaining to salvage a point for his team. During Saturday's game against Norwich, then ranked second in the USCHO.com Div. III poll, senior assistant captain John Gordon scored a go-ahead power-play goal at the 14:12 mark in the final period, giving Hamilton its biggest victory of the young season.
"Going into the season with such a young team, you don't really know what to expect," Deak said. "You have to mature quickly in this league, and beating Trinity in their home opener, tying the game late at Wesleyan, and beating Norwich on a late goal really proved a lot."
The Continentals have proved something to the critics who didn't put much stock on the young squad. Having risen to a tie for first place in a competitive NESCAC with Amherst, the squad for the first time this season earned votes in the USCHO.com poll, though it remained unranked.
Much of the credit for this surprising early-season success is the quick development of the team's younger players. When the Continentals opened their home schedule against St. Michael's before a sellout crowd of 1,121 on Friday night, freshmen forwards Chris Lorenc and Jerome Wallace each scored the first two goals of their collegiate careers to lead Hamilton to the 6-3 victory.
Sophomore goalie Matt Crowson has also made remarkable strides during his first full season as the Continentals' net-minder. Stopping 44 shots in the game at Trinity, Crowson helped seal Hamilton's win when he defended the net from a barrage of Bantam shots in a 58-second stretch during a three-attacker advantage. Still, Crowson defers credit for his success to Gordon, the veteran defenseman who plays in front of him.
"John and I communicate well on the ice, and it makes the game a whole lot easier when we can play off each other," Crowson said. "John, having as much experience as he does, consistently takes care of business in our end and definitely makes my job a whole lot easier."
Indeed, while the freshmen and sophomores have helped Hamilton get off to its unbeaten start, seniors Deak and Gordon has been instrumental. Deak, who earned NESCAC Player of the Week honors on Nov. 4, scored three of his NESCAC-leading seven goals with a natural hat trick in a span of 2:09 against Norwich. Gordon, meanwhile, is second on the team with eight points.
If Hamilton can continue its winning ways, it will benefit not only from its rise in the NESCAC standings but its coach's place in the record books. With five more wins, Grady will become only the 16th coach in the history of Div. III hockey to win 300 games.
"When he gets that win, I think it will be a relief for him because he cares so much about the guys on the team that I think he will be happy to get back to thinking about this season and what we can do to be successful," Gordon said. "To be able to play in such an important game will be nice because there is no better way to reward such a competitive man than to help him win."
