These guys ran the gauntlet: 10 of 11 Division I weekends on the road, constantly on the road, including six weekends straight. They didn’t know if the team would ever get in a Division I conference again, and there was a lot of uncertainty as to what that might be a program.

What was certain was that these guys didn’t quit.  What’s certain now is that UAH Hockey lives to fight another year.  The boys are in their first stable Division I home after 20 years of life as an independent and in the ill-fated College Hockey America.  Now UAH has made it.  These guys are a big reason why.

So here’s to Steve, Chad, Jack, Anderson, Jeff, Steve, Lasse, and Graeme; to Mike, Frank, Jamie, Ben, Alex, and Mat; to CJ, Craig, Justin, Brice, Johnny, Doug, Curtis, Gregg, and Sebastian; to Kyle, who’s doing work in Atlanta; to Coach Kleinendorst, Coach Garber, Coach Morgan, and Tim Flynn.

Here’s to success not always being measured in wins, and here’s to those successes garnering more wins next year like you know the boys want to see.

Here’s to Charger Hockey.

I am woefully overdue in getting you this information.  Here’s the details on the 2013 UAH Hockey Banquet from Tim Flynn, Director of Hockey Operations:

Our staff wanted to make sure all of our alumni, boosters and loyal fans were included in our invitations to this year’s banquet. It’s an exciting time as we conclude the independent era of the UAH Hockey program and look forward to a new begining in the WCHA next season. We’d love to have everyone come out and see some familiar faces and support the program as we begin to rebuild the great hockey tradition you all helped build at UAH. I have attached this years registration form please fill it out and send back at your earliest convienence. The event details are below.

What: 2013 UAH Hockey Banquet and Award Ceremony
Where: Holiday Inn – Downtown Huntsville
When: Friday April 5, 7 PM.
There will be both a live and silent auction along with dinner followed by an awards ceremony.

We are also looking for alumni who would be able to present an award, if you are coming and would like to participate please send me an e-mail.

We have set a date for our Annual Golf Tournament, it will be June 8 at 8 AM over at Hampton Cove. We will have more details available at the banquet.

The banquet is always a lot of fun, and I really suggest that you attend, even if all you do is buy dinner and watch.  This is a great way to send off our seniors and celebrate a program that we all believe is on the rise.

If you want to attend, here’s the banquet invitation and banquet flyer that Tim sent the boosters.

I hope to see you there!

Anyone who’s ever studied calculus — which is most UAH alumni — knows the concept of the inflection point.  It’s the point on a curve where the sign changes.  Tonight’s game against Duluth probably wasn’t an inflection point, but winter 2013 has been.

Anyone who’s looked at the records of this university’s varsity hockey program over the last decade has seen a trend: After a peak in mid-decade, it’s been a steady downward trend ever since, two NCAA postseason trips notwithstanding.  We all know the story by now: league disbands, league denies, independent life, Portera ends it, Altenkirch saves it, league accepts.  It’s easy to see that this should be an inflection point: When we’ve played against a stable conference, we’ve been a good Division I hockey program.  There’s no reason to believe that this shouldn’t be one again.

I think that these last four games are a part of that.  Consider what they are: four final games for the last members of the second tournament team; a chance to play Penn State and measure ourselves against a team that has a one-year lead on building for the future; and a chance to finish strong against Duluth, an opponent of the quality that we’ll likely see in the WCHA next season (although UMD will be in the NCHC).

What did we see?  A tough 4-0 loss in State College powered by a David Glen hat trick followed by a tight 4-3 loss the next night to lose the one and only #IndependentLeagueMegabowl.  Last night we had a 4-2 loss to the Dogs, and tonight it was 4-0.  All of these were well-fought efforts, and the important thing here is that the boys finished strong and didn’t just play out the string.  It would’ve been easy to let up knowing that the clean slate was coming, but they didn’t.  The values they showed, the commitment to the program no matter the pain: maintaining that is the steel that makes that inflection point happen.

Tonight’s in-game inflection point was a major penalty and game misconduct to Graeme Strukoff in the 2nd period.  Duluth would end up scoring twice, taking what was a tight 1-0 game to a wide lead.  Losing the sophomore defenseman also put the Chargers down to five blueliners, and the Bulldogs pressed the advantage with speedy breakouts and tight forechecking.  The boys kept battling and showed flashes, but the puck was never consistently in the UMD end after the major power play.

Senior John Griggs picks up 42 saves in his final UAH start.  The senior is joined by Justin Cseter, Curtis deBruyn, and Sebastian Geoffrion in a class that has worked hard to maintain the traditions of the program through the stormy waters of being an independent program.  Gentlemen, we are in your debt.

Coach Kurt Kleinendorst addressed a number of us boosters at lunch today and said, “Our guys will have their hands full this weekend.”  He was right: Oklahoma’s club team is a cut above the SECHC teams.  While the Sooners competed hard, I never felt that this game was in doubt, even with the score knotted at 1-1 midway through the first period.  Indeed, it was a 3-1 UAH victory. [BOX]

Sebastian Geoffrion had quite the night.  The senior from Brentwood scored the opening and closing goals on the night while assisting on the middle one, which was scored by Frank Misuraca on the power play.

The Sooners out-shot the Chargers in the second frame, but their six minor penalties really kept them from making a move in the game.  UAH had a 5-on-3 for :57 with consecutive minors for embellishment—haven’t seen that called in a while; Doug Martinson might have given that one out—and interference late in the second, but the boys in blue couldn’t light the red lamp.

Saturday’s contest will return us to the familiar environs of the VBC at the unfamiliar time of 3:00 p.m.  Hope to see you there for the last home hockey that we’ll see until … October.

Well, we did what we were supposed to do: we put up double digits in a shutout of a club team while holding back some of our roster.  We dressed just 14 players today: CJ Groh and Gregg Gruehl in goaltender’s gear; Jamie Kendra, Chad Brears, & Kyle Lysaght and Jack Prince, Doug Reid, & Craig Pierce at forward; and Stephen Hickey & Anderson White, Ben Reinhardt & Frank Misuraca, and Steven Koshey & Mat Hagen on defense.  In case you’re curious, most of the defensemen got a turn at play on a wing.

There’s not too much that you can say about a game like this.  What was great?  Jack Prince getting three goals was very nice.  The puck movement was good: nine of the eleven goals had secondary assists, and all of those goals had a point go to a defenseman.  Best of all, the team allowed just seven shots on goal—just one in the third, even with a power play.  You respect your opponent—we’re still thrilled that they came to play!—but taking care of business is key.

The box score is available if you want all the gory details, but in short: 3-3–6 for Prince, 2-3–5 for Koshey, 2-2–4 for Brears (who logged a lot of those centering-defensemen minutes), and 1-2-3 for Hagen.

We’ll see everyone next week, and it’s a bit different given that we’re opposite the Havoc with this unplanned weekend against Oklahoma’s club team:

• Friday is a 7:30 p.m. start at the Iceplex (3185 Leeman Ferry Road Southwest  Huntsville, AL 35801 if you’ve never been).  Tickets are free on a first-come, first-served basis.  There is not much room at the Iceplex, so make the drive early.
• Saturday is a 3:00 p.m. start at the VBC.  All tickets are free at any seating level on a first-come, first-served basis.  Sorry, season ticket holders, there’s no way to reserve those seats for you outside of you going to the box office and specifically requesting your seat, which shouldn’t be hard to do day-of.

We look forward to seeing everyone at our last home hockey of the 2012-13 season, and we’ll have big news on our conference search at mid-month.

What for the hell, y’all.

The Bulldogs and Chargers traded goals in the second period between 9:19 and 13:44, with each Charger marker—first Sebastian Geoffrion, then Chad Brears—unassisted.  But too many penalties made for two Bulldog power-play markers, including the one by Lukas Ciotti at 18:29 of the second that put the Bulldogs up for good.

This was a terrible night for the Chargers.  An early contact-to-the-head minor and misconduct put the visitors down a defenseman, and another one would leave in the third due to injury.  The home team that slept in their own beds the night before should have pressed through and used that fatigue to Adrian’s disadvantage.  We didn’t see that.  Instead, the visitors seemed to pick up energy as the game wore on.

The answer is simple, of course: Adrian is a D-III power looking to answer the question, “So, how far apart are Division I and Division III, anyway?”  Back when we played Finlandia in December, the answer was, “There’s definitely a gap,” but tonight, we got some of the best athletes that D-III has to offer.

They won.

See everyone at the rink tomorrow for some therapeutic baby-seal-clubbing.