Yale is enthusiastic but inexperienced

Even where the Yale men’s hockey roster features a familiar name, there are not always a lot of NCAA games behind it.

With help, or rather with no help, from the Ivy League’s skipping athletics last school year after the COVID-19 pandemic ended the 2019-20 season in the playoffs, only nine Bulldogs have played a college hockey game.

That includes transfer Ryan Carmichael of Greenwich, who played eight games for Notre Dame two seasons ago. The other eight have a combined 225 games in blue and white. And while coach Keith Allain is excited for a new start, he knows he and his staff will have to be patient.

“The one side of that is our guys had a year of hockey taken away from them, so the the energy and the excitement, you can feel it in the air every time they come on the ice,” Allain said Monday on the ECAC’s preseason media conference call.

“They saw two senior classes here at Yale not have an opportunity to finish their season, one not have one at all and the other one have it taken away from them. I think there’s a renewed appreciation for

Richard T Gagnon / Getty Images Yale coach Keith Allain stands behind the bench during a game against Boston University during a game in 2016 in Boston