Overlooked NESCAC, overlooked players?

“By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community.” Oscar Wilde

For the Bantam’s sake let us hope that Trinity Men’s Ice Hockey Coach Matt Greason is not relying on the online paper-of-record for college hockey, USCHO, to scout the Amherst College Lord Jeff’s in advance of this weekend’s NESCAC marquee match-up.

Greason will recall that in Trinity’s goal-fueled run to the NESCAC first place finish last season his charges lost just three games to conference opponents, two of them nail-biters to the stingy Jeffs. While Trinity was first in the conference in goals per game with 4.65, Amherst allowed just 2.15 per game, good enough for second in the conference. Each time Trinity faced Amherst the mighty Bantam offense was stymied, getting just one goal in the November game at Amherst, and two in early February in Hartford.

The metronomic calm with which Amherst killed 87.2% of all power plays last season led the conference. At the opposite extreme Trinity led in power play efficiency scoring nearly a third of the time they went man-up (30.6%). Forty-four of Trinity’s 121 goals last season came on the power play (36.6%).

Overlooked in USCHO's profile of the NESCAC, Amherst's Aaron Deutsch won't be overlooked by Trinity this weekend. A Concannon Award semi-finalist for 2013-14, Deutsch was 5th in the conference among defenders scoring at 5-11-16.

But Jack Arena’s Amherst team proved the old saw that “the best offense is a good defense” frustrating the vaunted Bantam power play while holding it to just 10.5% over two games. This included a vexing 0 for 10 November 23, 2013 in Amherst. Making matters worse, two of the Jeff’s three goals in that game came short-handed. Later in the season in Hartford, Trinity did manage two power play goals but even then they were shut down seven times in a 3-2 loss.

Greason knows all this; he likely also remembers that Amherst defender Aaron Deutsch, then a junior, was a Concannon Award semi-finalist last season. The Concannon Award, claimed at the end of the season by Trinity's Jackson Brewer, is given every year to the best American born player in a New England DII/III. But this fact escaped USCHO’s attention in their NESCAC season preview; Deutsch is not even mentioned among the returning players.

OK, OK, opening with a quotation from a 19^th Century Anglo-Irish playwright is an annoyingly pedantic way to make a point, perhaps particular to NESCAC in the world of college hockey. And USCHO is not wrong to conclude Trinity makes sense as a preseason favorite, but as another renowned scholar once said: that’s why we play the games.