M. Hockey's Seniors Can't Solve NCAAs

AMHERST, Mass.—All week long, the question circulated. Towards the players, it was broached carefully. Behind their backs, behind the scenes, and around the water-coolers, it was more pointed.

Could Harvard finally do it, finally advance beyond the first round of the NCAA tournament?

The Crimson is one of just five programs that has made The Dance in four consecutive years, after all. But entering last night’s matchup with New Hampshire, not one member of its senior class remembered anything but three seasons of disastrous, first-round losses.

Would this one, last chance prove any different?

“It seemed to be the question of the week earlier, before this game, about our last three years,” said captain Noah Welch Saturday night, after the game at UMass-Amherst’s Mullins Center.

The answer? No.

For the fourth straight year, Harvard failed to advance past the first round., The culprit this time around: a 3-2, overtime defeat that marked the end of seven Harvard careers—those of seniors Brendan Bernakevitch, Tom Cavanagh, Rob Flynn, Dov Grumet-Morris, Andrew Lederman, Ryan Lannon, and Noah Welch—and which marked, at the same time, the continuation of an ugly tournament streak.

The Crimson may be one of only five teams to make the tournament four straight seasons, but it is the only squad not to win any of those contests.

“To me,” Welch said, “I think each game, you could take differently. As far as tonight goes, we left it out there.”

For three periods, Harvard and the Wildcats had traded momentum and goals. But then New Hampshire’s Daniel Winnik redirected the game-winner through the crease 15:06 into the extra frame, and it was over. Just like that.

Ryan Lannon hunched over his knees near the goal, his arms stiff, his head down. Welch traced slow, defeated rings around the left faceoff circle. Grumet-Morris stood frozen in the crease, motionless as Wildcats celebrated behind him, until one by one, the Harvard skaters surrounded the goaltender.

“To be perfectly honest with you,” said Harvard coach Ted Donato ’91, “I'm probably still a little shocked right now. It's tough to separate myself.”

“I think there'll be a little delayed sadness,” he added. “This group, this senior group, has meant the world to me. It's my first year coaching, so it's a group of great character, and it's a group that will always be very special to me.”

It was a group that spearheaded a 21-win campaign and a second-place league finish—feats that were, before the season began, anything but expected of a team boasting nine freshmen and a coach with zero practical job experience.

And, of course, it was a group that had reached The Dance four years in a row.

This past Tuesday, when he was asked to pinpoint why, exactly, the Crimson floundered in its last three NCAA tournament-appearances, Welch said, “Our first couple of years, I think we were just happy to be there. We weren’t that confident, to be honest with you.

“And this year, we’re a lot more confident.”

It was a different, meeker Welch who fielded media questions last night, still in his skates more than 10 minutes after the game had ended, still sporting his ‘C’-adorned jersey.

“I’m upset because my college career is over, not that we lost this game,” he said with tears in his eyes. “When you go out and you know that you left everything on the ice, and you know that your team did, you’re a proud captain.”

—Staff writer Rebecca A. Seesel can be reached at seesel@fas.harvard.edu.