The Minutemen are two seasons removed from a national championship during the 2020-2021 season. The team has changed dramatically since then, except for their one constant: head coach Greg Carvel. This will be Carvel’s eighth season as the head coach of the Minutemen. UMass has its eyes on returning to the top of Hockey East this season and possibly even making it to the national tournament again.
The Minutemen’s non-conference schedule begins this Saturday, Oct. 7, at the Mullins Center against AIC. The first major test of this season begins with back-to-back games against Michigan the following weekend.
The non-conference schedule also sees them go on the road to face Minnesota State and Harvard along with a home series against Alaska Anchorage. At the end of December, UMass will play in the Adirondack Winter Invitational against Cornell and Clarkson or Arizona State. The Minutemen will also face off against all other members of the Hockey East Conference.
New Faces, New Places
The Massachusetts roster has changed completely from last season with nine players leaving the program. However, Carvel and his staff brought in ten freshmen and four graduate transfers.
The graduate transfers begin with Princeton transfer Liam Gorman, a native of Arlington, Massachusetts who played in 91 games for Princeton. The newcomer was a 2018 NHL draft pick and posted 36 points in his Princeton career, including 22 last season.
The next graduate transfer is Finnish defenseman Samuli Niinisaari. The Brown transfer recorded only eight points last year but totaled 67 blocked shots on the season. Niinisaari was also an assistant captain during the 2022 season.
UMass also picked up Christian Sanda as a late transfer addition from Union College. Sanda only played in 12 games last season due to a lingering injury from 2021. Sanda finished his career with 14 points over the course of 68 games.
The final graduate transfer is Lucas Vanroboys, a forward who originally began his career at Bentley. Vanroboys is an excellent distributor of the puck and recorded 16 assists last season. The Ontario native is elite at the faceoff dot and won 56% of his faceoffs last season.
As for some notable freshmen, Czechian goalie Michael Hrabal is a 2023 second-round draft pick of the Arizona Coyotes. Hrabal is a 6’7” goalie who played for the Omaha Lancers of the USHL. The second-round draft pick was voted to the USHL All-Rookie Team and posted a .908 save percentage.
Hrabal is expected to battle with New Jersey Devils prospect Cole Brady for starting minutes. Brady started in 10 games last season and posted a 4-5-0 record to pair with a .907 save percentage in net.
Aydar Suniev projects to provide scoring right away for the UMass offensive attack. The Russian forward was drafted 80th overall in this year’s NHL draft to Calgary. He spent his last two seasons in the British Columbia Hockey League. Over those two seasons, he posted 123 points over 83 games and earned First Team All-BCHL Honors in 2022.
Finally, Dans Locmelis, a native of Latvia, joins the Minutemen as a left shot forward. Lochmelis was a fourth-round draft pick for the Boston Bruins in 2022. The freshman forward spent his last four seasons in the Swedish Hockey League. He spent 2022 on Lulea HF’s U20 team where he posted 59 points in 44 regular season games. Also, the Latvian native was a staple in the Latvian IIHF World Championship team earlier this year. Locmelis scored three points in nine games and earned a bronze medal as a member of the team.
Who Returns?
In September, defensemen Ryan Ufko and Aaron Bohlinger were named co-captains for the upcoming season. Ufko played in 32 games last season for the Minutemen, and Bohlinger played in 25. Bohlinger has only recorded five goals in his career, but they have come at pivotal points including the game-winner of the 2021 National Championship game, and the 2022 Hockey East Championship game.
Ufko on the other hand, recorded eight goals alone last season. Expectations are high for the co-captains, “They’re real leaders in every way.. and so far they’ve proven to be extremely good leaders,” said Head Coach Greg Carvel.
Other returning skaters include Taylor Makar, Kenny Connors, and Cole O’Hara. Makar, brother of UMass legend Cale, is set to see an increased role this year in the offensive zone. Makar only posted 12 points last season but buried the puck in the back of the net ten times.
Connors was a freshman last year and finished with 26 points, good for second on the team. Through his 32 appearances last season, eight of them were multi-point performances.
O’Hara is a Nashville Predators prospect and posted 17 points last season. He only scored four goals, but his 13 assists show he can be one of the better distributors on the team.
Massachusetts was voted ninth in the preseason Hockey East coaches poll. Only Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont were voted below the Minutemen. There is a lot that remains to be seen with this team and with a wide variety of new talent incoming so the ceiling is high, but the floor is very low. UMass will face a tough start to the season with six of their first seven games against teams currently ranked in the top 16 national hockey preseason rankings. If the Minutemen can break above .500 through their first eight games they will be in great shape.
