If a newly-released book, ‘Burn the Boats,’ a slew of commemorative DVDs, championship T-shirts, and a general buzz all around campus haven’t been enough of an indication, let this writer be the first to tell you: last year’s BU men’s hockey team was pretty good.
While calling it the best collection of players in the history of Terrier hockey may be a bit of a stretch, what cannot be ignored is that the team was something truly remarkable. It was a group of athletes that not only had talent, but also an unflappable composure and a sense of unity that allowed them to persevere in even the most dire of situations (cue the film from the Miami game).
This illustrious year came to something of an official end last Saturday with a carefully-orchestrated banner raising before the start of BU’s exhibition game against the U.S. National Under-18 Team.
Regardless of whether or not you felt that the BU administration picked the right date for the ceremony, any fan would be hard pressed to admit that it wasn’t an emotionally overwhelming event to see the various trophies displayed and the banners raised high into the rafters of Agganis Arena.
The ceremony included all of the pomp and circumstance you would expect, but it had a symbolic meaning to it as well: this ceremony marked the culmination of a historic year for Terrier hockey, one that has now come to a close.
The team that took to the ice after everything cleared featured some familiar faces, but by all means, it was something very different. Hold your, ‘Yip, Yip,’ squeals because that’s freshman Wade Megan wearing the No. 18 jersey. To channel Rick Pitino circa 2000 with the Celtics, ‘Matt Gilroy is not walking through that door. Colin Wilson is not walking through that door’hellip;’.
The point that I’m making here-that this year’s team is different from last year’s squad-is one that may seem pretty obvious considering the roster has changed quite a bit, but it is something that needs to be stressed considerably here: this team is very different and one of the key things that Saturday’s banner raising did was that it officially cut all ties from the 2009 NCAA championship team to the current one.
In a similar fashion to the phoenix rising from its own ashes, a golden era of BU hockey has now officially been closed in order for a new one to begin.
By saying the 2009-10 hockey team won’t be nearly as good as last year may be discounting this year’s installment a little too much, but as Terrier fans (especially the freshmen for this point), we shouldn’t expect a repeat.
Again, this is not a slap-in-the-face to the current team; it’s just that if the bar for success for this team is a 2010 national champions banner, then they are being set up to fail, something that is not only unfair to BU fans for being duped into thinking that, but also to the team itself for having to live up to unwarranted expectations. After all, before last year’s championship, the last time BU men’s hockey won it all was when ‘Gangsta’s Paradise’ was a No. 1 hit.
There’s no question of whether this team has the talent to win; the BU hockey program is in the fortunate position of hardly ever having to totally start anew because each season brings a crop of players who are among the most highly-touted in the nation ‘-‘- they don’t rebuild, they reload (in short).
While this year isn’t going to be a rebuilding year per se, I still have my concerns. Starting off the year in the top five of the polls is always a great thing, but so many question marks remain with this team that I find it hard for that ranking to be completely justified.
People always love to talk about who’s coming back to a championship team, but it’s very important to look at whom BU lost. For example, how are they going to replace a guy like Wilson, whose ability to make plays and orchestrate that offense made him look like a man among boys at certain points last year.
What about Gilroy, a defensive juggernaut and Hobey Baker recipient who was a leader and mentor in every sense of those words? How is he going to be replaced?
How is a team that lost five of its top-six scorers from last season going to manage?
The answers to these questions will depend largely upon the leadership and the examples set by many of the upperclassmen, as well as continued improvement from some of the younger players.
To reiterate, this column isn’t meant to be some source of panic, because although I do have concerns, I believe that this team should be fine. Enough experienced players are returning that I don’t think that the grind of the season will be too overbearing, and of course, a team led by Jack Parker should never be counted out.
But what the Terrier men’s hockey team needs to do this year is to keep the memory of last year’s team firmly engrained in its minds, but to not let it define the team and its performance. As fond as those memories of last-second goals and Duck Boat parades may be, you will always fall short of success if you let your history impede your progress into the future.
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