Hockey notes: UMass gives former Union assistant a shot

PHOTOGRAPHER: Ken Schott

Vermont associate head coach and one-time Union assistant coach John Micheletto was one of several people who applied for the Massachusetts head coaching job after Don “Toot” Cahoon resigned June 19 after 12 years on the job.

Micheletto bided his time and remained patient while the UMass search committee talked with Quinnipiac head coach Rand Pecknold, Yale associate head coach and former UMass assistant coach Red Gendron and Holy Cross head coach Paul Pearl. Pecknold was even offered the job and seemed ready to accept it before changing his mind and staying with Quinnipiac.

In the end, Micheletto’s patience paid off. On July 16, Micheletto got his first head coaching when UMass hired him.

“I thought it was a great job,” Micheletto said. “Looking at it as an outsider, it had everything a lot of programs should have. I was aspiring to be a head coach, and I thought it would be a great opportunity, so I applied right away.”

While UMass interviewed other candidates, Micheletto continued his duties with Vermont.

“I’ve always been a proponent of the philosophy that you’re working your tail for the job that you’re at, not the potential job you’re trying to get somewhere,” Micheletto said. “And I always tried to do it that way, because I kept in the

moment and doing the right things for the program you were at.”

Micheletto had applied for other openings, but never got much of an opportunity. As the years went by, some doubt started to creep in his mind that maybe a that a head coaching job wouldn’t come his way.

“When you would apply for jobs that would open up and they didn’t fall your way and they would go to guys that weren’t current college assistants,” Micheletto said, “certainly, there were times when to start to think, ‘Well, when would the right time come along?’

“My parents are always the ones that would say that there’s something out there for you. Obviously, with the way it’s worked out now, my parents turned out to be smartest people I know.”

While his hiring came in mid-July, which is a bit late considering that 2012-13 season was less than three months away, it would appear that Micheletto had a lot of work to do in a short period of time. But, for the most part, that wasn’t the case.

“The hockey part of it is never a scramble,” Micheletto said. “You know what you want to do. You want to develop relationships with players. When you’re moving into a new job and becoming a head coach, there are administrative things you need to do that, probably, is more impacted by getting there late in the summer than the hockey stuff.”

Micheletto was the head coach at The Hill School in Pottstown, Pa., from 1991-96. He joined the Union staff in 1996 under first-year head coach Stan Moore. Micheletto stayed on as assistant coach when fellow assistant coach Kevin Sneddon was promoted to head coach in 1998 after Moore suddenly resigned in August of that year.

After the 1998-99 season, Micheletto left Union to become an assistant at Notre Dame. He stayed there until 2003 when he went to Vermont as an assistant coach when Sneddon was hired by the Catamounts.

Micheletto has great memories of his time at Union.

“I loved it,” Micheletto said. “It was a great entry for me into college coaching, coming from the prep school ranks prior to that, and working with ‘Sneddy’ and Stan Moore initially. I loved my time in the Capital District. I look back at it fondly, not only from a professional standpoint from where I learned a lot about the game and about college hockey in general, but personally. I really liked the area. Kevin and I forged a friendship there that served me well over the years.”

UNION BUS TRIP

Union will have a bus trip to its game next Friday at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

The price for the bus and game ticket is $22 per person, and $10 for just the bus. Fans have until Wednesday at 5 p.m. to sign up.

To sign up, call Union hockey administrative assistant Chelsea Soules at 388-6288, or email her at [email protected]

INCH SHUTS DOWN

Inside College Hockey, one of the top college hockey websites in the country, announced that it was shutting down after 10 years.

INCH, which it was commonly called, was co-founded by Nate Ewell and Mike Eidelbes. It became a second place for college hockey fans to turn to for information on the Internet, and giving some competition to the granddaddy of college hockey coverage on the World Wide Web, U.S. College Hockey Online.

In a letter to its readers posted late Sunday night, INCH said, “Essentially, real life has caught up with us. Family, jobs, and other responsibilities have encroached — not on our affinity for college hockey — but on our ability to consistently, generate Power Rankings, First Shifts, conference notebooks, INCH Podcasts, Napkins, Hobey Trackers and all the other elements that we’ve consistently produced. It’s not fair to our loyal readers, and all of those participants that make college hockey great, to give them anything less than our best efforts.

“When we launched this site, we felt like there was room for more college hockey coverage, and we still believe that — our game, most college hockey fans will agree, hardly gets the attention it deserves. We were proud to provide innovative ways to present stories and ideas that changed the way college hockey is covered by many traditional and new media outlets.”

INCH has launched inchwriters.com, a site where the writers will contribute their thoughts on the sport.

ALBER DELIVERS

Boston College senior defenseman and Clifton Park native Patch Alber had two assists in the Eagles’ 5-4 overtime win at Massachusetts last Friday.

Trailing by two, Alber assisted on Pat Mullane’s goal with 3:16 left in the third period. Just over a minute later, helped set up Mullane’s second goal of the game to tie it.

The assists were Alber’s first two points of the season.

LOCAL CONNECTIONS

Alber won’t be the only Capital Region player we’ll be keeping up on this season.

There are three freshmen women’s players with ties to the Capital Region. Latham’s Jordan Juron is a forward with Boston University. She has a goal in six games. The goal came in BU’s first game of the season, a 4-2 win over Boston College on Oct. 5.

Albany’s Courtney Burke is a defenseman at Wisconsin. She has a goal and four assists in eight games. Burke scored her goal in Sunday’s 3-3 tie against Bemidji State.

Clifton Park’s Huner Davis is a defenseman at Brown. The Bears open their season tonight at second-ranked Cornell.

WOMEN START

The Brown-Cornell matchup is one of six games that will be played as the ECACH women open league play.

There are four afternoon games. Union visits fourth-ranked Clarkson at 3, while Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute faces St. Lawrence at 4. The other afternoon contests are Brown at Cornell and Yale at Colgate. Both games start at 3.

The other games are No. 9 Harvard at Quinnipiac, and Dartmouth at Princeton. Both matchups are 7 p.m. starts.