AMHERST — UMass has fought its way back atop the college hockey world for another week.
After comfortably sweeping Vermont over the weekend, the Minutemen (17-3-0, 9-1-0 Hockey East) ascended to the No. 1 ranking in the U.S. College Hockey Online poll Monday for the second time this season with 35 first-place votes. In addition, UMass earned the top ranking from the USA Hockey poll for the first time in program history with 31 of the 34 first-place votes. It marks the first time in program history the Minutemen have held the top spot in both polls simultaneously.
Once again, UMass will have a top-10 matchup to defend its No. 1 rank as it plays a home-and-home series with No. 8 Northeastern (14-4-1, 8-2-1 HEA) on Friday and Saturday. The weekend series is the start of the most difficult stretch of the Minutemen’s conference schedule with six of their next nine games coming against the teams in second, third and fourth place in the Hockey East standings. After facing off with the second-place Huskies, UMass plays two in Maine next week before playing home-and-homes with Boston University and Boston College – which are tied for third place – sandwiched around a game at UMass-Lowell.
CHAU TIME: Oliver Chau missed the first four games of the season due to illness, and the effects of that lingered deep into December.
Chau scored nine goals and recorded 24 points last season as a freshman, but the first half of his sophomore campaign wasn’t as consistent as he would have hoped. He scored the overtime winner against Princeton on Nov. 24 and then tallied again against Yale on Dec. 11, the Minutemen’s final game before winter break.
But this past weekend seemed like the first glimpse of the Chau who dazzled fans as a freshman. He scored a power-play goal in both wins over Vermont on incredible individual efforts. On Friday, he dragged the puck past a sliding defenseman before ripping his shot past Stefanos Lekkas. The next day, he calmly skated to between the faceoff circles from the blue line before beating Lekkas cleanly to the glove side with a wrist shot.
“You could see it with Oliver, you could see his game coming,” coach Greg Carvel said after Saturday’s win. “He was outstanding tonight, that game was the result of the rest of his game. He was really moving his feet on the backcheck, all of those things that we demand of our players without the puck. … You can just see Oliver’s confidence, his energy, his strength, he’s becoming that magician, that really elusive skilled guy that in the first half of the year we really didn’t have because he was working his way back from illness.”
Chau’s offensive breakthrough has coincided with linemate Jake Gaudet’s payoff on the scoresheet. The sophomore center has points in four of his last five games after recording just four in UMass’ first 15 contests of the season. The two of them combine with Mitchell Chaffee, the Minutemen’s leader with 14 goals and 24 points, to form UMass’ most dangerous offensive line.
MARVELOUS MURRAY: For two years, Carvel would “start to itch and shake” when he stared down at the UMass goal, what Carvel deems the worst feeling in coaching. This year, though, the coach only becomes more confident when he peeks down at Matt Murray protecting the Minutemen’s goal.
After stopping 41 of the 43 shots he faced from the Catamounts, Murray has taken over the Hockey East lead in goals against average (1.74) and save percentage (.933). Those numbers rank fourth nationally in both statistics despite playing at least 200 more minutes than any of the goalies ahead of him. Murray’s 14 wins are tied for fifth-most in a single season while his GAA and save percentage would both be program records for a single season.
He said Murray has taken his play to another level this season and looks to be in a groove right now, especially after backstopping UMass for all four games since the team returned from the winter break.
“As a goalie, you find this confidence level where you’re just in the flow, in the play,” Carvel said. “You just react instead of (being hesitant), he just knows ‘I’m going’ and that’s the way he’s playing in the net. Everything is natural to him, that’s how it looks.”
MAKAR HONORED: Sophomore defenseman Cale Makar was named the Hockey East Defensive Player of the Week. Makar registered four points – two goals and two assists – in the Minutemen’s 5-1 win over the Catamounts on Saturday to improve his point total on the season to 24, most among defensemen in Hockey East.
Josh Walfish can be reached at jwalfish@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @JoshWalfishDHG. Get UMass coverage delivered in your Facebook news feed at www.facebook.com/GazetteUMassCoverage.