Tigers take ECAC, Ivy titles

Five months and 21 wins later, the Tigers’ season ended in front of 9,816, in a 5-1 NCAA tournament loss to No. 3 North Dakota.

It will go down as the best hockey season in Princeton history, but perhaps more impressive than the 9-1 Ivy League season or the program’s second-ever NCAA tournament bid was the road the Tigers travelled to the Kohl Center in Madison, Wis., to face off with the Fighting Sioux.

Princeton (21-14 overall, 14-8 ECAC Hockey) opened its season 5-8 in its first 13 games, a record that included a tough 6-2 loss to ECAC-rival Clarkson and a lackluster 7-0 loss to No. 6 Notre Dame.

“That Notre Dame game really woke us up,” senior forward Kyle Hagel said. “There was a little blow up in the dressing room, and we realized that if we wanted to be a good team, we had to start playing like one. The attitude was there all season — we worked hard from the very first practice — but we just needed that spark.”

Following that spark, the Tigers found their stride, winning 12 of their next 14 games and vaulting themselves to a No. 12 national ranking. Over the course of the season, the Tigers built a name for themselves as a fast, physical team on both sides of the puck. The team backchecked with intensity and played the kind of offense that grinds down opponents. Cycling the puck deep, Princeton set up bodies in front of the net and generated opportunities by outworking opponents.

“Winning the Ivy League title was one of the goals we set out at the beginning of the season,” Hagel said. “We won our first three Ivy games, including an unbelievable game on the road at Cornell and a come-from-behind victory at home against Harvard, and we realized the Ivy title was well within our grasp.”

The Tigers even had a shot at the regular-season ECAC title, something no Princeton team has ever been close to, but were forced to settle for second place after dropping a one-goal decision to No. 9 Clarkson during the season’s last weekend.

In that game, the Tigers held a one-goal lead in the third period, and though the game did not go their way, the statement had been made: This was not the same Princeton team that lost 6-2 to the Golden Knights earlier in the year. This Princeton team could play with anyone in the country.

As a reward for the Tigers’ 14-8 ECAC season, Princeton earned a first-round bye in the ECAC tournament, a break that the Tigers used to rest some injuries and prepare for the upcoming playoffs.

The Tigers dispatched Yale in a three-game quarterfinals series to punch their ticket to Albany, N.Y., for the ECAC championship weekend, and their stellar play did not stop there.

In the semifinals against Colgate, Princeton received outstanding goaltending from sophomore Zane Kalemba, who kept the game scoreless until the Tigers, who were outplayed for most of the first two periods, could squeeze out a 3-0 victory.

The following night, in the finals against No. 16 Harvard, Princeton played one of the most complete games of its season. Kalemba was excellent, and senior defender and captain Mike Moore added a goal and an assist, as the Tigers rolled over the Crimson, 4-1.

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“Winning the ECAC title was unbelievable,” Hagel said. “If you don’t win a championship, there are always doubts the following spring … I can’t think of a better way to end my career.”

The tournament win earned Princeton its second all-time berth in the NCAA tournament, where it faced North Dakota in the Midwest Regional. The 5-1 score in the loss is misleading. Given very little chance before the game began, the Tigers earned the respect of the Fighting Sioux players and anyone else who watched the game. Princeton outshot North Dakota 39-18, but a few penalties — UND failed to score at even strength — proved too costly to overcome.

“We outplayed them; we had them on their heels,” Hagel said of the 5-1 loss. “The fact that we played with a big [Western Collegiate Hockey Association] team like North Dakota shows just how far our program has come. We proved that we could play with the best in the nation.”

The list of accolades accumulated by the Tigers is almost too long to count. Junior forward Lee Jubinville, who led the ECAC in scoring, was an All-Ivy, All-ECAC and All-America selection, and was named ECAC Player of the Year and a finalist for the Hobey Baker award, given to the nation’s top player. Moore, also an All-Ivy, All-ECAC and All-America selection, was named ECAC Defenseman of the Year and recently signed with the NHL’s San Jose Sharks.

Senior forward Landis Stankievech, one of three Princeton students this year to earn the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship, was named ECAC Student-Athlete of the Year and recently won the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award, given to college hockey’s most outstanding student-athlete.

Head coach Guy Gadowsky earned ECAC Coach of the Year, Kalemba was ECAC Tournament MVP, and the entire squad earned the ECAC’s Turfer Athletic Award for team sportsmanship.

Individual accomplishments aside, what the Tigers will take most from this season was the memories of celebrating their ECAC title.

“Winning the ECAC title meant everything to me,” Hagel said. “Just being out there, holding the trophy, guys hugging each other. It put an exclamation point on what a wonderful place Princeton can be.”