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MHOC Coach Mike Cavanaugh on Selection Sunday · Coaches Corner

0:00
Speaker 1: So I gotta play the state championship le over again.
0:02
Speaker 2: Huh yeah, yep.
0:06
Speaker 3: If I imagine, it makes it easier to prepare for
0:08
Speaker 3: familiar opponent like you can play every year.
0:11
Speaker 4: Uh yeah, no question, We're familiar with their team. So
0:16
Speaker 4: from that standpoint, Yeah, it's not like we're, you know,
0:19
Speaker 4: looking at a team we haven't seen all year long,
0:21
Speaker 4: so uh and we've played them year in, year out.
0:24
Speaker 4: So yeah, from that standpoint, it's nice to have some
0:29
Speaker 4: familiarity with the opponent.
0:31
Speaker 5: It's a little I don't know if ironic's the right word,
0:34
Speaker 5: but the NCAA tournament's all about you play different teams,
0:37
Speaker 5: teams you haven't seen before, and then it's Quinnipiac in
0:42
Speaker 5: there instead of just some.
0:44
Speaker 1: Out West team that maybe you don't see as often.
0:46
Speaker 4: If you had told me in the beginning of the
0:48
Speaker 4: year you're going to make the NCAA tournament, you have
0:50
Speaker 4: to play Quinnipiac in the first round, I would have
0:52
Speaker 4: said done.
0:52
Speaker 2: It's like it doesn't matter who we play.
0:55
Speaker 4: Like, we're in the tournament, right and Quinnipiac's in the tournament,
0:59
Speaker 4: So you know, you have to prepare at any point
1:03
Speaker 4: you're gonna have to you're playing great teams that when
1:06
Speaker 4: you have sixteen teams, they're all really good and anybody
1:12
Speaker 4: can beat anybody.
1:12
Speaker 2: And you've seen it over the years, and.
1:16
Speaker 4: You know, I've coached some really good teams in that
1:19
Speaker 4: tournament and we've lost games as a top seed to
1:23
Speaker 4: an opponent who on paper might not be as good,
1:26
Speaker 4: but in a one game, you know, win or take all,
1:30
Speaker 4: anything can happen.
1:31
Speaker 1: How about half the field being from New.
1:32
Speaker 4: England, Yeah, I mean that's well, just our league was
1:38
Speaker 4: so strong this year, you know, of the basically all
1:43
Speaker 4: six teams were in the tournament before the Hockeyas tournament
1:46
Speaker 4: even started. So that's how strong the league was this year.
1:51
Speaker 4: I've never seen it before.
1:53
Speaker 3: Does the weekend in Boston help prepare you for the
1:55
Speaker 3: NCAA's just the atmosphere.
1:57
Speaker 4: No question that that game Friday night against Maine was
2:01
Speaker 4: that was a frozen four type atmosphere. That game, you know,
2:04
Speaker 4: seventeen thousand people, It was loud and there was so
2:07
Speaker 4: much energy in that building.
2:09
Speaker 2: That's exactly what a frozen four is like.
2:11
Speaker 3: Did your younger guys send did you send any nerves
2:14
Speaker 3: for your younger guys in that game Friday night? Or
2:16
Speaker 3: does Maine get all the credit for playing really well.
2:19
Speaker 2: I think Maine played really well.
2:22
Speaker 4: I have to give them a lot of credit. I
2:23
Speaker 4: thought they've played well and they deserve to win. But
2:27
Speaker 4: it was a game that I think we can learn
2:29
Speaker 4: from as well.
2:30
Speaker 5: You knew you were going to be in the field,
2:32
Speaker 5: But what's the feeling when you finally see your name
2:35
Speaker 5: come up for the first time in the twelve years
2:38
Speaker 5: that you've been here, but even just for the first
2:41
Speaker 5: time ever.
2:41
Speaker 2: For the school.
2:44
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a good question because you're so excited. I
2:49
Speaker 4: don't know if relieve there's a type of the word
2:52
Speaker 4: I want, but it's something that we've been striving for
2:55
Speaker 4: for a while, and we were pretty close that COVID year,
2:58
Speaker 4: you know, and then a couple of years we were sixteen,
3:01
Speaker 4: and you're just outside of it. To finally get over
3:03
Speaker 4: the hump, that's great, and it's a feeling of accomplishment maybe,
3:11
Speaker 4: and then you switch to you know right away and
3:13
Speaker 4: be like, we got to prepare for a game here,
3:15
Speaker 4: like this is going to.
3:16
Speaker 2: Be a battle.
3:17
Speaker 4: So that feeling of excitement immediately shifts and goes to
3:23
Speaker 4: we have.
3:23
Speaker 2: Some work to do here.
3:25
Speaker 4: So but overall, I'm really happy, especially for Hudson and
3:31
Speaker 4: John who came back for a fifty year and you know,
3:35
Speaker 4: no matter what happens, they'll go down as two of
3:40
Speaker 4: the great Huskies for sure.
3:42
Speaker 1: Speaking of Buddy, you expect them to play.
3:44
Speaker 2: You think? I hope? So, yeah, I hope. So we'll
3:47
Speaker 2: see as the week goes.
3:50
Speaker 4: But he's doing everything in his power to try to
3:52
Speaker 4: play on Friday night.
3:54
Speaker 3: If the scenario were different where you would had to
3:56
Speaker 3: win to get in, could he have played last weekend?
4:01
Speaker 2: I don't know.
4:02
Speaker 4: Maybe maybe the players are just built that way.
4:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe it might have been different.
4:10
Speaker 5: Is there ever a moment that you think back to
4:16
Speaker 5: since you've been here that kind of reminds you of
4:18
Speaker 5: how far you've come since those early days?
4:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was funny this today. I was just looking at.
4:27
Speaker 4: Different teams that have won the National Tournament, like Providence,
4:32
Speaker 4: you know, when they got in, and I think they
4:34
Speaker 4: were they were definitely a four seed because they played Miami,
4:36
Speaker 4: who was number one at the time, and Yale.
4:41
Speaker 2: But as I was.
4:42
Speaker 4: Looking at the Providence I was going through their schedule
4:45
Speaker 4: that year and I looked when they played US and
4:48
Speaker 4: it was ten to one, and I remember that game
4:51
Speaker 4: distinctly at Providence and we lost ten to one. And
4:56
Speaker 4: to think now, like how far we've come as a
4:59
Speaker 4: pro yeah, kind of, you know, it was it was
5:06
Speaker 4: this morning that kind of I don't know if triggered
5:08
Speaker 4: is the right word, but it made me realize how
5:11
Speaker 4: far we've come as.
5:12
Speaker 5: A program because you didn't have scholarships your first year
5:15
Speaker 5: here that Atlantic Hockey aer right, it was once you
5:17
Speaker 5: got into Hockey East.
5:18
Speaker 4: Those game they we weren't fully funded until Derek Pratt
5:22
Speaker 4: and that class was we're seniors and we lost to
5:26
Speaker 4: bu one game in overtime. Those the best of three,
5:29
Speaker 4: one game in overtime, and I think the second one
5:31
Speaker 4: was two to one, and we played great yeah games,
5:37
Speaker 4: but that was the first year we were fully funded
5:39
Speaker 4: where we had eighteen scholarships in the league.
5:43
Speaker 1: Yeah.
5:43
Speaker 2: B Carpenter killed you guys, Sink.
5:48
Speaker 5: You have talked about you being an important leader for
5:52
Speaker 5: this team because he's been to the NCAA tournament. How
5:56
Speaker 5: does that now manifest itself now that you guys are
5:58
Speaker 5: in it.
5:59
Speaker 4: Well, I think I think you know, he can definitely
6:03
Speaker 4: talk about his experiences, you know, and I've been him
6:08
Speaker 4: a lot too, so I kind of understand how it works.
6:11
Speaker 2: Now.
6:11
Speaker 4: The one interesting thing where I haven't been involved is
6:15
Speaker 4: the regionals where you have a day off in between. Now,
6:17
Speaker 4: we never used to have the day off in between,
6:20
Speaker 4: and that'll be something different. I mean the Frozen four
6:24
Speaker 4: was always a day off in between, so be able
6:26
Speaker 4: to manage it. But it's certainly something different than in
6:29
Speaker 4: year's past with the regionals.
6:30
Speaker 2: But other than that, I just know that.
6:35
Speaker 4: Like every game, you know, I tried to tell the team,
6:38
Speaker 4: every game is going to be like Friday night versus Maine,
6:41
Speaker 4: Like that's the type of intensity you have to prepare
6:44
Speaker 4: for when you're playing in a national tournament game.
6:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, did you notice the level of play go open nottch.
6:50
Speaker 3: I mean even the Providence game, like to me, out
6:52
Speaker 3: of the regular season, like every weekend was a grind,
6:54
Speaker 3: you know, you know we talked about that, but then
6:56
Speaker 3: it goes up a notch for every round.
7:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean when.
7:02
Speaker 4: You know the thing about this tournament is, you know,
7:05
Speaker 4: the hardest thing I think to do in hockey is
7:08
Speaker 4: take another team sticks away. And these games someone sticks
7:12
Speaker 4: are going away, and you know when that's on the line,
7:17
Speaker 4: that the intensity just.
7:20
Speaker 2: You know, ratchets up to a level that you have
7:23
Speaker 2: to be ready for. And I think.
7:26
Speaker 4: Fortunately for us, you know, we've played Providence be all
7:30
Speaker 4: the games we played in the Hockey East Tournament were
7:33
Speaker 4: really intense battles, and I think that's can only help
7:40
Speaker 4: your team as you go into.
7:41
Speaker 2: A national tournament.
7:43
Speaker 5: Quinnipix been there plenty of times, especially recently. Do you
7:47
Speaker 5: think it could be a almost benefit for you guys
7:51
Speaker 5: that you haven't been there and maybe you don't know
7:55
Speaker 5: what you don't know?
7:56
Speaker 2: I don't know. I think.
7:59
Speaker 4: I think really what it comes down to is who
8:02
Speaker 4: executes and who plays the best on game night. I
8:06
Speaker 4: don't think you know all the experience in the world.
8:11
Speaker 4: Like the year Providence won it, I don't think they
8:13
Speaker 4: had been there in a long time.
8:16
Speaker 2: I'm not sure they got there in fourteen.
8:18
Speaker 4: I'd have to look at that, but I think that
8:19
Speaker 4: was their first time there in a long time in fifteen.
8:23
Speaker 4: And is that the Garden, Yeah, they might have been
8:26
Speaker 4: in the year before. I'm not sure, but you know,
8:30
Speaker 4: Yale had never gone for a long time, and you
8:32
Speaker 4: know they performed really well. So I just think it's
8:38
Speaker 4: it really comes down to It's not so much experience.
8:41
Speaker 4: It's not what's happened in the past. That's like our
8:45
Speaker 4: game with Quinnipiac back in January is gonna have zero.
8:50
Speaker 2: Influence on the game we play Friday night. It's not
8:54
Speaker 2: gonna have any It's not gonna have any factor in
8:57
Speaker 2: the game.
8:58
Speaker 4: It's just gonna be which team plays the best and
9:01
Speaker 4: executes that'll be successful.
9:05
Speaker 1: Had you heard from some of your alums alum.
9:07
Speaker 2: Oh a lot of them, Yeah, a lot of them.
9:09
Speaker 4: There were a lot of them were in Boston for
9:12
Speaker 4: the games, and I heard from Maxiltunov and Russia and
9:15
Speaker 4: card Turnbull wherever he is in Europe, reached out, like
9:19
Speaker 4: Spencer Naz who's in Europe. So there's a lot of
9:22
Speaker 4: guys that you know, follow the program intently and still
9:28
Speaker 4: bleed blue.
9:29
Speaker 5: You kind of mentioned it earlier, but the COVID year,
9:32
Speaker 5: the twenty twenty one, you guys were practicing after you
9:35
Speaker 5: lost to Providence, hoping that you could get in. Just
9:40
Speaker 5: what do you remember from that preparation and then the
9:45
Speaker 5: disappointment of not being in the field.
9:47
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was disappointing that day. It was over in
9:49
Speaker 4: the freights. I remember watching it. I really thought we
9:51
Speaker 4: had a chance to be in it because it was
9:54
Speaker 4: a crazy year. But our strength of schedule I think
9:57
Speaker 4: was we played I think that year we played BC
10:00
Speaker 4: four or five times.
10:02
Speaker 2: Four times.
10:03
Speaker 4: Yeah, like the teams that you mess won it. So
10:05
Speaker 4: two of the top teams in our league we played
10:07
Speaker 4: eight times or nine times, I can't remember what it was.
10:11
Speaker 4: And I thought that that was going to factor into
10:13
Speaker 4: it because that year wasn't so much on the numbers
10:16
Speaker 4: as it was. There was some subjective I think to it.
10:23
Speaker 4: So it was disappointing we didn't get in that year.
10:28
Speaker 4: But I think Hudson and John were a freshman that year.
10:32
Speaker 4: So to see them sit here today and know that
10:34
Speaker 4: they were in it and not have to sweat it out,
10:36
Speaker 4: that was pretty good.
10:38
Speaker 1: Speaking of Honey, I think it was after the guest
10:40
Speaker 1: U mess that summer you had lunch with them, I
10:42
Speaker 1: guess out in Vancouver. Yeah, and the want to do
10:45
Speaker 1: it again, the hunger to do it again, and you.
10:46
Speaker 4: Are yeah, it is well, it tells you a lot
10:49
Speaker 4: about him as a kid.
10:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know. And I don't know if I can
10:54
Speaker 2: say it enough, but.
10:57
Speaker 4: Loyalty were just talking about it earlier in today's college
11:03
Speaker 4: athletics loyalties a hard thing to find, and the fact
11:09
Speaker 4: that those two stayed loyal when it wasn't the most
11:13
Speaker 4: opportune time to stay loyal. It's one thing. If your
11:16
Speaker 4: team's going to frozen fours year in and year out,
11:21
Speaker 4: you know, am I going to transfer from that program?
11:23
Speaker 2: Probably not.
11:24
Speaker 4: But when your team had a season like we did
11:26
Speaker 4: last year, where we felt we underachieved and everybody's flying
11:31
Speaker 4: the coop, you know, it's very easy to leave. But
11:35
Speaker 4: that loyalty, you know, I'll never forget it and I'll
11:39
Speaker 4: always remember it, and I just I think it's really
11:43
Speaker 4: special when you have players like that that believe.
11:47
Speaker 2: In a place so much and then they see them
11:50
Speaker 2: get rewarded like they have.
11:53
Speaker 3: I think a last game that I did the first
11:56
Speaker 3: half was the first Merrimac game that was a tough weekend,
11:58
Speaker 3: and then the comeback and rally and beat BC the
12:01
Speaker 3: next weekend. Yeah, you had, you saw the pieces there,
12:04
Speaker 3: but could you could sort of a big turning point
12:07
Speaker 3: for this team when they beat BC, got some confidence
12:10
Speaker 3: after a tough weekend the weekend before, and then you know,
12:13
Speaker 3: you get to the Christmas break and it's like you're
12:16
Speaker 3: wondering because I hadn't been around it. I think I
12:17
Speaker 3: saw eighteenth in the pairwise and everything was sitting in
12:20
Speaker 3: front of him.
12:22
Speaker 2: If you want to see it January first, it's right there.
12:25
Speaker 3: But I remember Christmas, I mean, getting getting ramped up
12:28
Speaker 3: again thinking for hockey. For you guys going to Wisconsin,
12:30
Speaker 3: it's like you look at the skuns like okay, everything
12:33
Speaker 3: in front of you, and then you just ripped it off.
12:35
Speaker 4: In January, well, at Merrimack weekend, we came off you know,
12:38
Speaker 4: a weekend against Vermont where we lost one in overtime
12:42
Speaker 4: and uh won one in overtime.
12:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then uh.
12:47
Speaker 4: That you know, we played without and then Jake Richard
12:49
Speaker 4: got hurt in that game at home, so he we
12:52
Speaker 4: didn't have him for the Merrimack series.
12:55
Speaker 2: And yeah, we didn't.
12:57
Speaker 4: We didn't play well that weekend, you know. Right that
13:01
Speaker 4: being said, I think it did somewhat motivate us to.
13:10
Speaker 2: Was.
13:11
Speaker 4: I don't know if i'd say it was a turning point,
13:13
Speaker 4: but we had a great week of practice before BC
13:16
Speaker 4: and then we played BC here and while the game
13:19
Speaker 4: was five to four, it really wasn't that type of game.
13:21
Speaker 4: I thought that we might have been one of our
13:23
Speaker 4: best games of the year. It was a game we
13:24
Speaker 4: should have deserved to win against BC. It wasn't a
13:29
Speaker 4: fluke win where a goaltender had to make a million saves.
13:32
Speaker 4: We played really well on that game, and then we
13:35
Speaker 4: came back and Lowell was tenth or eleventh in the
13:39
Speaker 4: country at the time, maybe.
13:39
Speaker 1: Even higher, and that's what Callum started playing.
13:42
Speaker 4: And musically got hurt in that VC game in Callum
13:45
Speaker 4: came back and we played great that weekend at Lowell
13:49
Speaker 4: and beat him the first night and then lost one
13:51
Speaker 4: nothing just you know, Halas played dynamite that night and
13:55
Speaker 4: it came back and played a great game against BC
13:57
Speaker 4: and lose it in overtime, where a game we could
14:00
Speaker 4: have won that game too. So I think that was
14:03
Speaker 4: the point where the team realized we have a really
14:08
Speaker 4: good team. And when we came back from break, I
14:12
Speaker 4: thought we played dynamite. I do you know, even that
14:16
Speaker 4: tournament in Wisconsin, we played a really strong game, you know,
14:20
Speaker 4: being down to nothing coming back tigh in that game,
14:23
Speaker 4: and I thought we played really well in against Wisconsin
14:27
Speaker 4: and from that point on, you know, New Hampshire was
14:32
Speaker 4: highly ranked when we played them, had to go to
14:35
Speaker 4: Maine for two then the Connecticut Ice Tournament and then Providence,
14:39
Speaker 4: like it was a murderer's role that we had to play,
14:42
Speaker 4: and we got through it and played really well, and
14:45
Speaker 4: I think our team started to believe then that we
14:49
Speaker 4: have a chance to be an NCAA tournament team.
14:54
Speaker 5: Kind of to that point when you stepped on the
14:56
Speaker 5: ice the first time with this team back in September,
14:58
Speaker 5: You've always talked about getting to the New National Tournament
15:00
Speaker 5: as a goal. Did you think this was actually a
15:03
Speaker 5: legitimate goal for the season, that it was realistic?
15:07
Speaker 2: Yes, I did. I did.
15:10
Speaker 4: The only question mark I had, well, I shouldn't say
15:13
Speaker 4: the only question mark, but we had two goaltenders coming
15:16
Speaker 4: in that I wasn't very familiar with. I liked them both,
15:20
Speaker 4: but you're not familiar with them. It wasn't like we
15:23
Speaker 4: had Jacob Fowler coming back, or you know, we had
15:26
Speaker 4: two new goaltenders coming in.
15:27
Speaker 2: So that was an area where.
15:32
Speaker 4: You know, I didn't know, I didn't really have a
15:35
Speaker 4: strong feeling one way or the other where we were
15:40
Speaker 4: going to be there. We certainly had a lot of
15:45
Speaker 4: new defensemen coming in. You know, John and Thomas Sinio
15:50
Speaker 4: were the only ones coming back that had played substantial.
15:52
Speaker 2: Amount of minutes for us SO that was an area.
15:55
Speaker 4: But I really liked the kids coming back, and I
15:59
Speaker 4: knew we were going to be pretty good upfront because
16:02
Speaker 4: I saw the step Joey Muldowney took last year at
16:05
Speaker 4: the end of the year. I saw the step Ryan
16:07
Speaker 4: Taddle had taken at the end of last year. Percival
16:10
Speaker 4: and Frasier and he Slip were just ultimate warriors, and
16:14
Speaker 4: I knew that that kid line was going to be
16:18
Speaker 4: a talented group. So I felt like we were going
16:21
Speaker 4: to be pretty good upfront. I just didn't know I was.
16:25
Speaker 4: I knew our goaltenders were good, I didn't know they
16:28
Speaker 4: hadn't played a lot of college hockey. And on defense,
16:33
Speaker 4: you know, guys really came in and like Trey Scott
16:37
Speaker 4: was a kid I wasn't counting on and it's turned
16:40
Speaker 4: in where he's running our power play and kai Jan Veraia.
16:43
Speaker 2: I knew he was going to be a good player.
16:44
Speaker 4: I didn't know he was going to have as much
16:46
Speaker 4: impact on our team Viking.
16:48
Speaker 2: We got really late. You know, he's turned into a.
16:55
Speaker 4: Excellent defenseman for us SO and then Nick Carabin I
16:58
Speaker 4: felt like he was going to be a solid piece.
17:01
Speaker 4: I didn't realize how good he was going to be
17:03
Speaker 4: for us. So and from that standpoint, you know, you
17:07
Speaker 4: have expectations and you have you hope that these guys
17:10
Speaker 4: are going to pan out, but when you haven't coached him,
17:13
Speaker 4: you know, I wasn't as sure about them as I
17:15
Speaker 4: was about Tattle and Muldowney and Rashard. I knew they
17:18
Speaker 4: were going to be great players for us.
17:20
Speaker 1: How could you jump speed wise? Did you take from
17:23
Speaker 1: last year this year? I mean you see it on
17:25
Speaker 1: the end.
17:25
Speaker 4: A big jump, A big jump, yes, yeah, pretty much.
17:29
Speaker 4: All the guys we brought in are really high end skaters.
17:35
Speaker 4: So that that's probably the biggest difference between our ten
17:40
Speaker 4: from last year to this year is I think we're much.
17:42
Speaker 2: Quicker up front.
17:43
Speaker 1: You can see in the vord check for sure.
17:44
Speaker 2: Yeah.
17:45
Speaker 3: I liked it in the BU game where A they
17:49
Speaker 3: won the puck battles.
17:50
Speaker 1: On the half boards.
17:50
Speaker 3: But I like it when your defenseman picked their spots
17:53
Speaker 3: to go and keep it in but take those battles
17:55
Speaker 3: on the half.
17:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.
17:56
Speaker 4: I think all good teams, I mean, Maine does that
17:58
Speaker 4: really well, Quinnipiac will do that.
18:00
Speaker 2: Uh, you know, I think a lot of teams that
18:05
Speaker 2: are successful in college apply a lot of pressure to you.
18:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, and it's when you're you have to win those
18:14
Speaker 4: wall battles, when you're coming out of your defensive zone exits.
18:18
Speaker 2: We know we're gonna have to win some wall battles.
18:20
Speaker 4: You know that puck's got to get out that five
18:22
Speaker 4: foot battle between the blue lines at both ends. You
18:26
Speaker 4: got to keep them in you like you just alluded to,
18:29
Speaker 4: and then you got to get them out when you're
18:32
Speaker 4: in your own zone.
18:33
Speaker 2: Yeah.
18:33
Speaker 1: I thought, mean did a good job of that. I
18:34
Speaker 1: guess what, like about ten.
18:36
Speaker 3: Minutes into the second you had you got to throw
18:37
Speaker 3: a good start in the second and then they took
18:40
Speaker 3: a lot of space away, especially in their D zone.
18:43
Speaker 1: They didn't really give you a lot of good looks. Yeah,
18:46
Speaker 1: but you guys kept grinding. That's what we love about
18:48
Speaker 1: these guys. I say, see your foot soldiers getting some payoff.
18:51
Speaker 2: For Yeah, it was good, all right, you got it,
18:58
Speaker 2: guys of them. Thank you