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September 19, 2025 • 35 mins
Conference season previews continue on this episode of the PodKaz. Hosts Nicole Haase and Todd Milewski take a glance at the stories ahead in the 2025-26 season for Hockey East and Atlantic Hockey.

UConn is looking to return to the top of the Hockey East standings a year after beating Boston University by one point.

Penn State ran away with the Atlantic Hockey title in 2024-25 and the Nittany Lions are in position to repeat behind forward Tessa Janecke.

For a look at all of the offseason player and coach movement, click here.

Previews of the WCHA and the NEWHA are coming on a future episode.

The PodKaz is a production of USCHO.com. Have a question for us? Reach out to Nicole (@NicoleHaase) or Todd (@ToddMilewski) on social media or email todd.milewski@uscho.com.
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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Usccho dot com. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Todd Maleski here when Nical Hosey from uscho dot com.
And in today's episode, we're going to take a look
at two more of the NCAA women's hockey conferences, Hockey
East and Atlantic Hockey for the twenty twenty five to

(00:26):
twenty sixth season. And let's start in Hockey East, where
last season was the It was the closest race of
any of the five conferences at the end of the season,
Yukon beating out B You on the final day of
the season by one point. Of course, BU got some revenge,
well not necessarily directly, but b You got the playoff

(00:48):
championship to become the only Hockey East team to make
the NCAA tournament last season. The coaches have predicted Yukon
to be be You again this season in the coach's poll,
So Nicole has start there is that a looking like

(01:08):
it's gonna be a repeat race for what we saw
last year between Yukon and BU.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
Well, the most intriguing thing to me in this conference
is that be You managed to pull Michelle Paseechnik back
out of retirement. I guess and back into the college
net for one more season, and so presuming that she
is still the top tier goalie that she was when
she finished four years at Clerk said, not this past season,
but the season before. That gives them a huge edge

(01:36):
because I feel like what had Connecticut had going for
them was a great goaltending duo and now obviously still
one graduated, but they still have a great goalie in net,
and so that's an interesting equalizer, right, So I think
that's what's gonna make that race the most interesting. And
I think if we assume that Passeechnik is still the

(01:57):
top tier goalie, then like I said, I think that
puts b ahead. They just, you know, I think they
took a lot of momentum, even after, you know, getting
knocked out of the UNCA tournament. I think they just
took a lot of momentum out of that and really
like wanting their program to be where it maybe had
been in the past. And so I think there might

(02:17):
not be a team hungrier than be you. And then
they just added this really important piece.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
It's a I would really love to know the backstory
of how that came about, and maybe Tyra Washhorn will
let us in on it at some point over this
season or some of the players. But that, I mean
just feels like it could be a game changer in
terms of how you're I feel.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
Like every coach is that if I known she was available.

Speaker 1 (02:50):
Right, if they're players like this that are just out
there that you're like, oh, yeah, I've got a season left,
bring it in, right.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
I mean, it was fascinating that she chose, you know,
sort of to retire and not continue her college career,
knowing that she could have gone pro or she had
a year of eligibility left and she chose to walk away.
And so you know, she had her reasons and maybe
she'll share them and maybe she won't, and that's on her.
She gets to she gets to make those decisions. But
it is super interesting that she's back and the game

(03:20):
is better for it. She's just she's really good, you guys.

Speaker 1 (03:25):
And adds to a really decorated list of goalies in
Hockey East this season. Players coming back from last season
you mentioned at Yukontia Chan had a great season again,
Lisa Johnson at Northeastern. These are players that have shown
they can, over the course of a season, be dependable

(03:49):
for their teams and win some big games. And it
felt like Hockey East was a defensive league last season.
And I looked back at the stats and there was
only one twenty goal scorer of all of the Hockey
East teams and that was Julia Pellerin from Boston College,
who has transferred this season down the road to Yukon.

(04:10):
So staying within the league, but a different look there.
So do you think we're looking at a league that
could be more more offensive this season or are we
still looking at a Hockey East that's rooted in defense.

Speaker 2 (04:27):
That's a really good question. I think I want it
to be more rooted in offense. I think I don't
know if that. This league can frustrate me at times
because games you think a team should just handle and win,
they often lose. And I love how competitive that is
and I love that there is like sort of never

(04:49):
a given game for them, but I also feel like
when you're the top one or two teams in your conference,
you shouldn't be losing those kinds of games. And part
of that is because it's not an overly offensive might league.
You're just not seeing five so there aren't The games
are all close, right, not seeing that many goals and
so for me, I hope that we're seeing a bit
more offense. But again, as you mentioned, like three of

(05:10):
the best goalies you know in the country right off
the top of the bat, without even sort of talking
about anybody that's not in the conversation for Goalie of
the year. So yeah, it's it's gonna be interesting. But
you know, Johnson could miss time for the Olympics, and
so thats again another could she and that would make
a big difference, you know. So Northeastern is bringing in,

(05:31):
you know, a very good goalie who off the top
of my head, I'm not remembering, but they're just you know,
there's gonna be there. There's gonna be a lot of
difficult defenses this season, right.

Speaker 1 (05:44):
It seems like it's going to be the way. And
maybe it's just the the style that these coaches, this
group of hockey's coaches prefers, and that's the way it
turns out, or maybe this is just a blip in
these few years of hockey that we're seeing teams that
are built from the the goal out first and primarily

(06:06):
playing to make sure they keep their goals against low.
I I don't know that Hockey East necessarily makes a
big jump in the national picture, however, without having a
little bit more when you go into some non conference games,
being able to get the three or four goals in

(06:27):
some of those and having some more you know, elite
forwards carrying the load there. And so that is where
I do wonder whether Hockey East stays a one bid
team in the NCAA tournament because of that that I

(06:47):
don't know if reliance is the right word, but that
that style that we see of it being defense heavy.

Speaker 2 (06:56):
Yeah, I mean, and I think too just like you
look at you know, Conference why Yukon was what nineteen
and six, and they pull out all of their overtime wins,
but like they had a win percentage of seven sixteen,
like that is fairly low for a conference topping team,
and sore as you mentioned, they're not getting sort of

(07:17):
the boost from those non conference wins. And then they're also,
you know, as a conference, taking a lot of losses
within themselves. And so when you're seeing that happen, it's
it's really hard to make make up ground, particularly when
the strength of schedule within other conferences it's just higher.

Speaker 1 (07:37):
Let's take a look around league we had mentioned Yukon
and BU and b You I not to stay on
the Terriers for too long, but look at their route
through the playoffs last season. Had to beat Vermont in overtime,
had to beat BC and double overtime, had to beat
Northeastern in overtime to win the champions chapar.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
Yeah, they were had all the horseshoes, lucky clovers.

Speaker 1 (08:01):
Yeah, very well said. But Boston College and Providence also
in the top four, and then you had Northeastern at fifth,
which was a surprising finish just historically for Northeastern, a
team that's used to being in the NCAA tournaments and
being you know, getting to frozen fours and championship games.
Do you feel like Northeastern has a bounce back in

(08:23):
the cards this season.

Speaker 2 (08:25):
Oh, that's a good question. Well, part of the problem
is Northeastern is one of those rosters that has quite
a few European players that may or may not spend
time away. They have a decent number of those, some
of their you know, Tuva Candle and some of their
interesting incoming roster as well. So I don't know. I mean,

(08:46):
I think it's hard to ever want to count them out.
You know, they're also bringing in a couple of U
eight team players that have been that showed themselves off
really well. And so I don't know, but I think
they're They've got I think a good four or five
players that could be playing, you know, in the Olympics,

(09:06):
and that that's just going to make it hard for
them to sort of regroup and come back together this season.

Speaker 1 (09:12):
Yeah, And if you didn't hear our first episode talking
about some of the bigger picture items and the ECAC preview,
we talked about the the Olympics and the impact that
that's going to have on rosters this season, and you
know the fact that there's gonna be players coming coming
and going from their college teams for and or for

(09:33):
Olympic international duties. And so yeah, this, uh, if that
you know, impacts Northeastern that I don't know that you know,
they're necessarily moving up a ton because coaches picked them
for third, which I feel like is a leaning on
a little bit of history and leaning on a little

(09:54):
bit of Lisa Johnson and goal and and leaning on
the fact that you know, Dave Flint teams don't generally
stay in fifth place for long and so I would
I guess I'd like to give them the benefit of
the doubt that there's there may be more coming there.

(10:15):
I just don't know that. Like what you're saying with
the Olympics, Eh, it feels like there's there's that uncertainty
is really really powerful there.

Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah, and I would like to say too. The one
of the reasons I like we're being particularly vague, and
we did bring this up a bit in the last episode,
is that we don't have rosters. I believe they're allowed
to start with thirty in the international teams and have
to be down to twenty three by the Olympics. Does
that sound correct? And so we have players that have
been in camps and have played on national teams at

(10:48):
various tournaments, but we don't know whether or not they
will make either that group of thirty or the group
of twenty three until like on Northeastern, for example, Lisa
Johnson may or may not make that group. I expect
Eloise Kron will be with France who got moved into
the Olympics because of Russia not being allowed and to Macindele,

(11:09):
I believe is someone that will regularly be with her
Swedish team as well. But so it's not even what
the unknown of whether or not of what the non
centralization looks like, but also the unknown of whether these
players would like make a thirty person roster but then
maybe come back and not make a twenty three person roster.
Will they get named to the thirty person roster at all?

(11:30):
Even those numbers, like we're just we're in this state
of like we think they're gonna play with their national team,
but we don't know, And so that that leaves a
lot of Like I mean, for Northeastern who graduated Skyler Irving,
Eloise is their number one returning scorer, so whether or
not she's gonna be around a lot is a big difference.

(11:50):
And as we keep talking about Lisa right like is
she gonna make that larger group we don't know.

Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, there's I didn't mean the gloss over Boston College
in Providence as the third and fourth place teams last season,
but they're picked behind Northeastern this season. So that's why
I kind of moved past them first. But those those
two teams have some some scoring coming back, and I
think that's a potential positive for them. Reckon kirk Mayor

(12:22):
at Providence, the leading returning scorer in Hockey East is
from Providence. Audrey Napp also right up there. She had
thirty five points. Sammy Tabor for Boston College back after
scoring thirty six points. And there's some there's some players
there that can be top line drivers of offense. It's

(12:42):
just is there enough, I guess to sustain the rest
of the lineup.

Speaker 2 (12:47):
Yeah, in Boston College, as you mentioned, Julia Pellerin going
to Yukon and Molly Jordan transferred out to Minnesota, and
so they do have some really great returning talent, but
they also have to do some retooling and some shuffling,
and so just how how that comes together and then
see it. We were talking about bu but Alex log
leaving to Quinnipayak, but they are bringing in Greta Henderson

(13:09):
from Saint Claude State. So it'd be interesting to see
that wch in to Hockey East. That's not a transfer
we see a ton of or haven't seen a ton of,
So it could be fun to see how she, you know,
handles just the different way the game is called, in
the different way the game is played, So that could
be fun too.

Speaker 1 (13:28):
I should mention here that Nicole has a really good
piece up on us echo dot com taking a look
at the comings and goings of players through the transfer
portal and through graduation or as well as coaching changes
of both head coaches and assistant coaches. So make sure
you check that out. We'll get that link in the
show notes here as well. Then we're down to the

(13:53):
bottom half of hockey switches. I mean, I gotta admit
there's a lot of question marks I have there about
who can make a jump, who can get into the
top half of Hockey's We're talking about Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont,
holy Cross, Merrimac. It it feels like, well, the coaches

(14:14):
have picked those teams in some order to be the
bottom five again. And I don't know that I have
a way of disagreeing with that from what I see
on paper.

Speaker 2 (14:27):
Yeah, I mean, I think there's sent kind of some
very clear tiers. If you look at the votes in
the Coach's preseason poll, which is that Yukon MPU were
both got eighty points, Northeastern got eighty some Northeastern got
seventy six BC and Providence we're in the sixties. And
then we go down at six to New Hampshire, at
forty four, Maine and Vermont with forty one points apiece.
So it's like there's these bands and it's the jump

(14:49):
the point difference between, Like there appears to be a
very clear sort of thought process on like where where
these teams fall in the pecking order. But to me
that means that like New Hampshire Main and for have
a ton to prove. I think there's you know, space
for them as we've talked about some of the things
that like like BC has a lot to figure out,
So I think there's a chance for both Providence to

(15:09):
move up and then these three as well. And again
it's what it comes down to for me in Hockey
East is there is always opportunity, there are always open doors,
and there just doesn't always seem to be a team
willing to take those opportunities or having the hunger to
grasp those opportunities. And that's what I think makes the difference.
So which one of those teams is gonna you know,

(15:31):
see that there's there's big changes this season, and there's
there's games that are winnable and points that can be
picked up and make those moves. I guess.

Speaker 1 (15:41):
I don't know if we were last season at this
point talking about bu as a NCAA tournament team. So right, there's.

Speaker 2 (15:49):
Remember they had that spectacular first weekend or early weekend
series at Minnesota, and you went, oh, that's what happened
last year, Like nobody was really talking about them, and
then yeah, it was sort of like hey, there, uh so.

Speaker 1 (16:04):
That's the that's the part that's out there. Yeah, that's
that's what's out there. Is like, well, okay, that's maybe
it's not one of those teams in the bottom half
of the league, but there's there's always that chance that
there you get the right mix of players together, you
get a good goalie, you find some success early, and
see where it goes. That's that's to me is what

(16:27):
always is entertaining about the start of a season is
that you could get someone that gets hot and all
of a sudden goes from a Well I wasn't expecting
to have them in the discussion of you know, bracketology
at the end of the season, but we're going to
have them there.

Speaker 2 (16:44):
And let's be honest, the coaches pulls the USHO poll
and the USA Hockey Pole like everybody's just guessing we're
using last year's results we any given season, we're doing that.
This year, there's so many more question marks, Like some
of this can be guidelines, but also every team could
blow this out of the water and be like you
were wrong. So like we talk about it, you know,

(17:08):
and I do think it is a good place to
start from. But I also think that any of these
teams just have this opportunity to take that personally, to show,
you know, the growth that they've had, to show the
work they did in the off season, to really buy
into what their coaches are trying to do. And you know,
I don't. I can't make a lot of noise on
my computer. You're all gonna hear it. So I didn't
go looking up. But a BU was not ranked at

(17:30):
the they were not picked to do well at the
beginning of less season. Let's put it that way in
their coach's paul. So you know, proof I'm wrong is
kind of like I feel like that was a blueprint
for like it doesn't have to be, Like just because
that's what everybody thinks it's going to be, doesn't mean
that's what it has to be.

Speaker 1 (17:46):
Have that here somewhere in one of my Notebooks's see
if I can find it last season, Hockey East bus
picked for fifth. So there you have it.

Speaker 2 (17:57):
The inside baseball on this is that we got some
new equipment and we're testing out this time. But it
turns out it records every little noise and so I
will not be typing up in questions into Google while
we're recording it at the moment, and so apologies for
not having that.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
I will just reach over a bunch of things and
grab something off of my bookshelf because yeah, for some
reason I had that within arms distance. All right, So
one last question for Hockey East, same question that we
ended with with ECAC in our last episode last season.
One NCAA tournament bid can't be less? Is he gonna

(18:35):
be the same or is it gonna be more?

Speaker 2 (18:38):
I can't imagine it's going to be more, both on
its own and because if I'm picking five for ECAC,
that doesn't leave room. But right, I just think, like
what we saw at the end of last season with
this right where they were nobody the top team couldn't
pull out the win at the end, no one team

(18:58):
was taking control, and so dropping those points just is
always going to mean that they're not going to be
at play in the National Conversation. I think even a
number two team in Hockey East that is that like
has a very good season, if there's like a clear
one in two and they're winning like a good majority
of the points available to them, I still think that's

(19:20):
a team that is going to struggle to really crack
that NPI conversation just because they don't have as many
ring teams, They're not getting that same strength of schedule.
So if you're going to be a team that's going
to make that kind of run, then you also have
to be doing those non conference games against ring opponents
and pulling points there. So I just think the nature

(19:40):
of that league right now makes it really hard to
talk about a second team. Do you see it differently?

Speaker 1 (19:46):
I don't, because I if I'm thinking about it, I'm
looking at it the same way that it shook out
last year. I'm thinking for or let's say the and
WHA split eight teams and then you've got the three
auto bids from the other conferences. Now the Olympics could

(20:11):
change that. That the the roster juggling or however you
want to call it, that's gonna have to go on.
There is I will guarantee you gonna cost some teams
some games, but sure enough, probably not.

Speaker 2 (20:26):
Yeah, I mean, I don't think we're gonna see a
runaway team at all, right, Like we're not going to
see a team with only one or two losses all season.
It's just not gonna happen in any conference.

Speaker 1 (20:37):
Yep. But we've been surprised before and I'm sure we'll
be surprised again, maybe even this year, and maybe even
by Hockey East. That is our look at Hockey East.
When we come back, we will take a look at
Atlantic Hockey America. Stay with us on the podcast. Welcome

(20:59):
back to the podcast. Todd Lawski here with Nicole Hasey.
Let's look at Atlantic Hockey America. Nicole, the former CHA
as it was once known, and I believe this is
the second year. Correct. Yes, the naming of Atlantic Hockey
and the name changed, but the dominant team did not.

(21:21):
Penn State ran away with the title last season regular season,
won the playoffs and made it to the NCAA Tournament.
Is there any reason to suspect that twenty five twenty
six will be any different at the top of Atlantic Hockey.

Speaker 2 (21:43):
The reason the no I was trying to I mean, uh,
Tessa Janiki going to the Olympics changes the dynamic quite
a bit, but I still think I mean, they lost
one game last year and it was like the second
to the last weekend of the seas of the season,
and it was to Mercy Hurst, the only the number
two team. So I don't think that boades well for

(22:07):
the rest of the season for anyone else in ah.

Speaker 1 (22:10):
Right, Yeah, And we over the last few seasons have
really seen the the emergence of Testa Janicky as a
a high international level player. What we saw her do
at the World Championships, you know, scoring an overtime goal
to win a gold medal is going to live on

(22:30):
forever for her. Now it's it's a matter of can
can she get a little bit more exposure for herself
and for Penn State when she's playing at Penn State.
Obviously she's gonna have fewer chances for that this year
with Tyle off to be with the international side of things.
But I do wonder whether there's there's more that Penn

(22:55):
State can do in terms of you know, scratching out
a few more non conference wins or or you know,
finding more of a even a higher level to get
to in terms of dominating Atlantic hockey.

Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, I mean, I don't know at this point. You know,
one of the things Penn State did really well as
they were building up the program was those non conference
games and just really building up their their resumes so
that if they did not get the conference autobed, they
were still in conversations at the national level. I don't
think that's as much of a concern. I still think,
you know, the auto bid is sort of theirs to lose.

(23:35):
I think sort of the secondary storyline here for me,
for them is I mean, getting Tessagianniky to go there
to commit to them was a huge get.

Speaker 1 (23:47):
And so.

Speaker 2 (23:49):
I want to say, like this is literally like fully
with no offense to the rest of her teammates, but
like Tessa's obviously just at another level she was as
an incoming freshman, and she has improved significantly sent then,
and so I don't think, I hope nobody is offended
when I say, like she she's an elite level player
and the rest of the roster is not at that level,

(24:09):
and so can they leverage her having come there and
become the player she is over her time there into
getting other big name recruits because while her team has
been very good around her, and she's not the only
reason that they have been a very good team the
past few seasons. A she's gonna graduate, but be like,

(24:29):
you can't build a program on a single player. And
so for them, I think it's not that winning isn't
the goal or the but I think it can't be
the only goal anymore, especially when it sort of has
been coming so easy to them, And so like, what
can they do to keep building the program's prominence to
make sure that they're at that level sort of forever, yeah,

(24:53):
at infinite right, Like just to make sure that like
when Tessa jan and he graduates, that's not sort of
the end of state as a program. We talk about
sort of at that national level, it means something to
have a player of her caliber with their university name
beside it, when she's on a roster, when she's introduced,
when she's talking about at the Olympics, at World Championships,

(25:15):
things like that, And so I think it maybe is
like mercenary to talk about it like that, but they,
you know, I think they need to leverage that, like
this is a player we brought here. Look how good
she's been, how much she's grown through her time here.
We were a part of that. That's that can happen
for you at our program. I mean, she was setting
program scoring records like her junior year, right like midway

(25:36):
through her junior year. So I think that they're beyond
just what they're going to accomplish wins and losses, you know,
national tournament first, things like that. This season, I think
one of the things that they have to do is
really be leveraging the fact that they're going to have
one of the best players in the world at the Olympics.

(25:57):
You know that there's got to be a big push
and using that to their advantage.

Speaker 1 (26:02):
It's a great point, and it's also reminds me too
that they have other things that they can use. It's
as leverage that they've got an incredible facility that will
host this year the Frozen Four for the second time
and get a little bit of exposure that way. I
do wonder So that was trying to think of which

(26:24):
year it was as a twenty twenty two, the first
year that it hosted the Frozen four after the last
State one.

Speaker 2 (26:34):
Yeah, that was the year after the.

Speaker 1 (26:37):
After the COVID one, Right, so that twenty twenty two,
so basically it's four years later. I would say Penn
State is in a much different position as a program
that it was then. I don't know if I'm willing
to go yet to they have a chance to be

(26:58):
one of the four teams playing in the Frozen Four.
I would. I know they're in the conversation because they're
in you know, last season, they were in the top
eight for a lot of the year, right in terms
of pair wise, and I think when you're there, you've
given yourself a chance. How it turns out, you don't know.

(27:23):
But when you get into that game one game to
get to the Frozen Four, anything can happen. I just
don't know if I necessarily see it happening yet this year.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
No, But again, I think that's just more sort of
the leverage, right, like you want you can bring in
recruits as you start putting up you know, NCAA promotion materials.
I think that there's just a lot there that they
can do. I mean, I do think they do a
very good job with their schedule, but I think there's
probably just some limitations of being an AHA team and
like what how much of a boost that can give

(27:56):
them in terms of like be a team prepared for
that national tournament, right, Like they've made it, but they
also haven't really advanced, and so can they be a
frozen four team? It would take a lot. And I
think in this funky year where they're going to be
missing their top tier talent, I think the door is open.
But I also think that their hill is steeper than

(28:19):
it has been in other years.

Speaker 1 (28:20):
Right, that's a good point. Yeah, pen Sate beat Mercy
Hears by ten points in the race for the championship
last season, and they postseason went chalk in Atlantic Hockey,
with pen Sate being Mercieres for the championship to go
on to the NCAA tournament. Well, that Pensate, I believe,

(28:43):
if I'm rowing right, would have been in regardless. It
was just a matter of, yeah, was Mercy Here's going
to get an upset and get Atlantic cocky two bids,
which is one of those things that keeps teams on
edge for that final weekend of the season. One of
the bigger pieces of news happening in Atlantic hockey is

(29:06):
the expansion to seventh team, with the University of Delaware
coming on board this season. Alison Kumi, the former Penn
State assistant as head coach, So there's some familiarity there.
There's I'm sure gonna be interesting homecoming for that. But

(29:29):
we shouldn't be blinded by the fact that this is
a first year team with a lot of club players
and a team that's you know, going to be focused
on getting the building blocks in place this season, not
necessarily focused on the number of wins.

Speaker 2 (29:48):
No, but I do think that there are wins available
to them, which maybe in a different conference wouldn't be
the case. But I do think that they have a
chance to really you know, get key wins, get some
conference wins, and sort of build momentum and give them
something to keep, you know, working on leading into future seasons.

(30:10):
Like I don't see them going on only one win
or not winning any of this season, and so I
think that just automatically helps because because it's rough, that's
rough in the locker room when you when you're not
winning many games, and so I think just for them,
it will be be helpful that they're in a position
in this league to be competitive from the start.

Speaker 1 (30:31):
Robert Morris finished last last season, as they kind of
are still building out of the the hole that I
were in from losing the program for a couple of seasons.
Do you feel like that that may be accelerating a
little bit. They maybe have some momentum for this season.

Speaker 2 (30:50):
Yeah, the coaches had them fifth in the preseason Poland
I feel like that is really not a fair assessment
of where I think they're going to be. You know,
they did have slightly rough season last year, right, but
they're bringing back some some key returners. Ellie Markowski, who
went and played at Princeton when the team shuttered, is
now coming back. So getting that high level experience and

(31:13):
a lot of quality minutes in the ECAC and coming
back I think that's really cool. Shell, you know, the
leadership and sort of just the passion that like this
is a school she went to and the program shuddered,
and she's still coming back after having gone to Princeton.
I just think that says a lot about what she
thinks of the program and what she wants, like what
the last lasting impression she wants to have on that program.

(31:35):
I just really think there's a lot of potential there
and it's yet to be seen if they can convert that. Right,
But I think that the ceiling for them is quite high.

Speaker 1 (31:46):
I'm intrigued by whether there's upward movement potential at SYRACU,
said A Ri T. Lynnon Wood. We've been waiting to
see some something happen up in there for a few years.
I'm not tremendously optimistic. I guess about about just whether

(32:12):
there's that, uh, the opportunity for them to take a
step those teams specifically, I kind of.

Speaker 2 (32:21):
I didn't love that there wasn't a lot of movement
for them with the portal. I mean, however, fewable about
the portal. It does offer opportunities to shake things up
and to bring in players. And r I T had
a player, you know, go out and go to two
D three and Syracuse had no changes through the portal.
And so yeah, I mean we've seen how teams have

(32:45):
used the portal to you know, maybe booie spots and
the roster that ended up weaker than they would have thought,
or just like changed the dynamics of like maybe underclassmen,
heavy roster things like that, and so yeah, I part
of me feels like, why was there no movement? Why
was there nothing done there? So I, you know, until

(33:07):
you can actually ask them one to talk about it,
I don't want to like say that's the only reason,
but like to me, those we're just sort of like, huh,
there work to be done, and that would have been
a way to do some of that. So I don't know.
I yeah, it's real hard to look at what's happening
in either place and really get a grasp for like
sort of like what the vision is, what the long

(33:29):
term you know, sort of goals and next steps will be.
I think.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
The UH Atlantic Hockey America has been a one bid
team for the NCAA tournament. I don't think either one
of us is seeing that change this year. Keeping our
our closing thought here consistent, that's been what we've been
asking about other leagues. The only way that can happen

(33:54):
really is that if there's a team like Penn State
that loses in the championship game. And I guess I
don't see that happening.

Speaker 2 (34:02):
I don't either, No, no, But I do think that
Mercy Hurst. I mean, we didn't really talk about them
because I feel like Mercyhurst is just this like sort
of reliable, and Penn State took that top spot, and
I think Mercy Hearst's gonna take the second spot and
like that's like done and dusted. That's what I think
about the A j A. Right, they're just the really
I think they're a team that kind of always has

(34:24):
an opportunity to make a splash. And they're a team
that I think can can beat Penn State and can
you know pull you know what would be I guess
at upset and maybe get that autobid. But it's really
it's rough going for everybody else. And again, kind of
like we said with Hockey East, there's just like there's
not an opportunity to build up your your strength of

(34:44):
schedule and earn you know, some sort of the additional
boosts from that sort of thing.

Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yep, all right, that is our look at Atlantic Hockey.
Thanks for following along with us. We've got three of
the leagues down. We still will be talking about the
WCHA and the new HA in our next episode, so
we hope you'll come back for that. Until then, we
hope you enjoyed the first week of games, the limited

(35:11):
schedule that there is, and we will be back with
you next week for Nicle Hassey. I'm Todd Leuski. Thanks
for listening to the podcast.
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