Coming off a pair of non-conference losses last weekend (the women fell 4-0 to RIT at home, while the men dropped a 3-2 overtime decision at Stonehill), we’re ready for a return to ever-critical ECAC games for Brown hockey. The men play host to Colgate and Cornell and the women travel to the Albany area to face Union and RPI.

Before we get into the preview, let’s take a moment to acknowledge the news from Wednesday: Brendan Whittet will be stepping down as head coach of the Brown men’s hockey team, effective February 20, to take family medical leave. We’ll keep the Whittet family in our thoughts and hope for the best as they tackle what is sure to be a difficult time. Presumably his last game behind the bench will come at home against Dartmouth on Valentine’s Day — a poetic ending for a coach who cut his teeth in Hanover as an assistant on Bob Gaudet’s staff for many years. Gaudet coached Whittet at Brown and took him under his wing as a burgeoning coach.

Cheers, Coach!

We’ll have a more extensive retrospective on the Whittet era in the days and weeks to come, but for now, we’d like to thank Coach for his 17 years of tireless dedication to the program and the University. No one cares more about Brown, and certainly Brown hockey, than Brendan Whittet. It’s good to see he’ll be sticking around in an administrative role after he returns from leave.

In the meantime, we’ve got some games to play!

WIH: A chance to rack up some points

The Pandas struggled against RIT last Saturday at home, falling 4-0 to the Tigers. They'll take on the bottom two teams in the ECAC this weekend as they look to solidify their standing in the top half of the conference. They enter the weekend in sixth place, and the middle of the conference is congested — the gap between eighth (St. Lawrence) and fifth (Cornell) is just five points.

The Pandas look to bounce back from a tough loss to RIT last weekend. Photo credit to Ben King.

The last time Brown faced off with these two teams, they almost fumbled the bag against RPI, spotting the Engineers a 3-0 lead before a furious rally spearheaded by Jade Iginla led them to a 4-3 overtime win. The next night, they ruthlessly dominated Union all over the ice but had to settle for just a 3-1 margin of victory as the Chargers got great goaltending and collapsed in front of the net to tirelessly block shots.

Since then, the Bears have found themselves in a 1-3-1 rut. Two loser points and a regulation win have earned them five points to keep them in the thick of the home ice race in the standings, and they also have an outside shot at a first round bye, sitting just four points behind fourth-place Yale. These two games come at a great time as a clean sweep could vault Brown up the standings — or at the very least, keep them abreast of the middle of the pack.

For more on how these teams match up on the ice, check out our preview from a few weeks ago (sorry, it’s been a busy week and I haven’t had much time to write about the specific matchups!).

MIH: Turning the page

While we’d like to say the focus will be on the games this weekend, it will be impossible to overshadow the impact of Brendan Whittet’s imminent departure from the program. Throw in the fact that Brown, now sitting seven points behind ninth-place Clarkson, is likely destined for a bottom-three finish and a playoff road trip, and the coming games almost feel like a farewell tour than anything else.

Perhaps fittingly, Whittet will get one last crack at his greatest foil: Cornell, against whom he has a 5-27-3 career record, with four of those wins coming at least 13 years ago. To go out with a victory over a very good Big Red team under the tutelage of first-year coach Casey Jones would be a terrific achievement.

But first, the Bears will welcome Colgate to Meehan Auditorium on Friday. Brown has fared much better against the Raiders under Whittet, though they still have a losing record of 12-18-6. The Bears have gone 2-0-2 against the Raiders in the last four meetings at Meehan, which bodes well for a team that is 4-4-0 on home ice this year and 0-12-0 on the road. However, Colgate is famously unpredictable both game-by-game and in terms of their ultimate finish in the conference standings — we call it the Colgate Zone — which means any range of outcomes could be in play tonight.

We wrote a more extensive matchup analysis back in the fall when Brown traveled to central New York to face these teams at their home arenas, and most of it still holds up, so I recommend checking that out.

Make sure to get out to Meehan this weekend to support your Bears. Go Bruno!

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