Culture restored, Quinnipiac hockey is back

HAMDEN — Rand Pecknold got up from behind his desk, walked toward a wall in his office to a vertical row of modest plaques marking his milestone victories.

“I know they’re over here, but I never look at them,” the Quinnipiac hockey coach said Wednesday. ‘Let’s see, 400 was UMass, 300 was Dartmouth, 200 we don’t have the opponent down and 100 we don’t have down.

“Lori Onofrio (administrative assistant) put them up there when we moved into the rink. I didn’t even know where they were. She found them in a box or something.”

UMass comes to Perrotti Arena on Friday night to start a home-and-home weekend series and, with Pecknold two wins shy of 500, the opponent is fitting. No, not because the Minutemen were Pecknold’s 400th, but because heading into semester break the games will showcase the surprising progress of both teams.

When the schedule went out, New England hockey fans didn’t look at Dec. 7-8 and go, hey, that’s going to be something special. Neither were ranked in Top 20. Both were considered middle-of-the road teams. Quinnipiac was coming off its first losing season in two decades. UMass hadn’t been over .500 since 2007. Yawn. Right? Nope.

UMass, on a nine-game winning streak, is ranked No. 1 in the nation in the USCHO poll. Quinnipiac is No. 8 and second among Eastern schools.

“There is an ebb flow to all this and I try not to get caught up in it,” Pecknold said.

Although the coach may demur from talk of 500, his players want it badly for him.

“He has built this program from the bottom up,” sophomore center Odeen Tufto said. “He has done it all. To be that close to 500 is special. He’s such a great coach.”

“For Rand to bring this program from practicing at midnight to the kind of powerhouse it is today is unbelievable,” senior captain Chase Priskie said. “It’s such a great milestone in his career. The players are really excited for him. We’d love to get it this weekend.”

The 500 milestone speaks to the considerable commitment a young coach and a school would make to collegiate hockey. Quinnipiac was a Division II Independent when Pecknold was hired in 1994 for $6,700 a year. He taught at Griswold High. He

had midnight practice at Hamden High. Until they found a janitor’s closet for him, his office was a campus telephone.

“I was 1-12-1 my first 14 games,” Pecknold said. “I’m thinking, what am I doing? I didn’t know I’d get to 20 wins at that point.”

Men like former Quinnipiac president John Lahey and former athletic director Jack McDonald would commit to the program and to some of the best athletic facilities around. The arena opened in 2007. Quinnipiac would advance to the Frozen Four in 2013 and 2016. When the Bobcats finished 16-18-4 last season, it marked the first losing campaign since 199596 — when they were in Division II.

First losing season in 21 years? Did it feel like the end of the world for you?

“It did for our fans,” Pecknold said. “I like to say we created our own monster. But it wasn’t like we were 4-29.”

Still, there was much work to do. Twelve freshmen were brought in, among them Ethan de Jong and Wyatt Bongiovanni, who now flank the Tufto line.

“I’ve really enjoy coaching this team,” Pecknold said. “I’m not going to lie. It has been a lot of work with 12 freshmen, but even more so I felt we really needed to do more to restore our culture and identity.

“We strayed from it a little bit and that’s why we struggled last year. We need talent and character and, honestly, character is more important. We lost our culture a little bit. We had kids, not a lot, a few, that were selfish, not selfish.”

So you got it back?

“Absolutely,” Pecknold said. “With college athletes, generally, you’ve got high character kids, low character kids and the majority are fence-sitters. They’ve got to make a decision. Who am I going to follow? When you fill your locker room with high character kids that’s the only way they can go. If you’ve got a lot of bad character kids, it’s, ‘I’ll stay out until 4 in the morning.’ Where we struggled last year was our fence sitters were put in situation where they were allowed to make bad decisions.”

And now? “They’re not,” Pecknold said.

The vibe is great. Not perfect, Pecknold said, but it’s a family. A family that’s 13-2.

“We were embarrassed as a team last season,” said Priskie, Quinnipiac’s all-time defense goal scorer. “First losing seasons in 20 years, we knew we had to change it around and tweak the culture.

“It feels a lot more like that 2015-2016 team now.”

Tufto wanted to get faster and stronger. He wanted to improve his shot. For as many points he amassed as a freshman, he wasn’t happy with nine goals. Most of all he wanted to improve his 200-foot game, something Pecknold says he has. Tufto already has 10 goals and is third in the nation with 24 points.

“Odeen thinks the game at a whole ’nother level,” Priskie said.

Priskie is first in the nation among defensemen and third overall with 11 goals. Yet it is the other end of the ice, where he has put in so much work.

“The biggest thing is not to be known just for my offensive ability,” Priskie said. “That’s always come

natural to me, but really become a great 200-foot player, not cheating defense for offense.”

“Chase has been our best player,” Pecknold said.

Drafted in 2016 by the Washington Capitals, Priskie had a choice last spring to turn pro.

“It was huge for Chase to stay,” Tufto said. “It meant a lot to our team and program. He is a great leader on and off the ice.”

“I didn’t want to leave on that losing season,” Priskie said. “There have been a lot of great players here. Sam Anas, Devon Toews, Connor Clifton, Travis St. Denis. I want to leave my mark. I want to have players talk about me. That’s the biggest thing for me, leaving a legacy and playing with such a great group of guys.”

Pecknold looks down from the plaques in his office. There is one game, he says, he won’t forget. Maine won the NCAA championship in April 1999 and there was Quinnipiac in December of that year on the bus to Orono.

“Our first big game,” Pecknold said. “We went in the MAAC, which became Atlantic Hockey, so we had Division I games. Maine was so much better, it was scary, but we had a 4-3 lead going into the third. The ice was all downhill from there and they won 7-4. But when the puck was dropped that night, I remember thinking, ‘Wow! This is it. This is Division I hockey.’ ”

This run to 500 wins is satisfying yet not maudlin. It’s not the end for Pecknold, 51, or Quinnipiac. The Bobcats are back in a significant way, playing in a surprising weekend that has caught the eye of college hockey.