Harvard coach Ted Donato had to attend a Crimson golf tournament fundraiser Monday, and couldn’t be at ECAC Hockey media day.
It may have been just as well that Donato wasn’t here, because reporters would have been asking the same question: Why aren’t
junior goalie Kyle Richter and
senior defenseman Jack Christian playing for the Crimson this season?
The Crimson announced last week that Richter and Christian will be sitting out the season for undisclosed reasons. Numerous sources have suggested that Richter is out because of academic reasons, while the 6-foot-2, 225-pound Christian may have health issues. Christian suffered a concussion last season, and he could still be feeling the effects of that.
But it’s the loss of Richter that deeply affects the Crimson, who reached the ECACH tournament championship game last year.
Richter won the Ken Dryden Award as the league’s top goalie last season after posting a 12-7-3 record with a 1.82 goals-against average, a .935 save percentage and three shutouts. His overall
record was 17-13-4 with a 2.19 GAA, a .923 save percentage and three shutouts.
The Crimson return two goalies — junior John Riley and sophomore Ryan Carroll — who played in a combined three games last season. They played a total of 30 minutes, 28 seconds, in those three games.
Harvard added goalie Matt Hoyle, who played for the U.S. Hockey League’s Indiana Ice last year.
“Obviously, it’s a difficult position,” Donato said in a telephone interview. “We were fortunate enough that we did recruit what we felt was a high-end prospect in Matt Hoyle. But there’s no denying that the inexperience in our net is the big question mark for us to start the season.”
Christian had three goals and two assists in 27 games last season.
Donato will be interested to see how his players will handle the situation.
“Things come up, guys get hurt and issues arise,” Donato said. “We preach, from day one, that one of our mantras for our team is, ‘No excuses,’ and ‘Finding a way to get things done.’ It’s a situation where everybody realizes that we’re going to need everybody else to be better to allow our young goaltenders to gain experience.”
PRINCETON NO. 1
For the first time in team history, Princeton is the favorite to win the ECACH regular-season title.
The Tigers won their second ECACH tournament title, and first since 1998, by beating Harvard in last March’s final.
The Tigers received nine of 12 first-place votes in the coaches poll and earned 118 points. They got 15 of 23 first-place votes in the media poll for 278 points.
It’s the highest finish for the
Tigers in both polls. The previous best finish in the coaches’ poll, which started in 1984-85, was second in 1998-99. The highest finish in the media poll, which began in 1999-00, was seventh in 2001-02.
RPI NAMES SIEGL
Shivaun Siegl has been named assistant women’s hockey coach at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Siegl is a 2007 graduate of Vermont, and served as an assistant coach at Rochester Institute of Technology last season. She helped in game preparation and game analysis, as well as serving as goaltending coach.
The Tigers finished 19-7, including 13-3-0 in the ECAC Division III West standings.
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