By now they were used to it. It was a cool dark evening and the snow-capped mountains smirked at them as their squeaky bus carried them from Colorado Springs to Denver. The 3-1 defeat that the Notre Dame hockey team had just suffered at the hands of Colorado College at World Arena was just another winless outcome. Yeah it was No. 20 in a row, so a date with University of Denver’s Championship hockey team, was their present for big No. 20. Those 20 winless outcomes weren’t exactly pretty, a 10-1 loss to Michigan and 6-2 loss to Michigan Tech were just some of the blemishes.
“I remember coming out here the last time we played in Denver and just wanting to give them a game, maybe try to steal one,” said senior captain Mark Van Guilder.
That 3-1 defeat would turn out to not be just another loss; it was start of the Jeff Jackson coaching era. An era that would quickly bring Notre Dame back to Denver for the 2008 Frozen Four tourney.
That was two years ago and this is now.
“I think it started when coach Jackson came to South Bend. The past three years he has been trying to change the culture of the team. It has been put into our minds how hard we have to work. We want to turn this program around and we know we have the talent and be a part of something special,” said Colorado native Christiaan Minella.
This time Notre Dame was not getting laughed or pointed at, instead praised and cheered by thousands. This time they were the Cinderella story. The Irish were the No. 4 seed in the West Regional that was supposed to lose to No. 1 seed New Hampshire in the first round. Instead, Notre Dame pushed its critics away and punched a ticket to Denver.
This time in Denver the Irish were coming off a season 27-15-4 and the year before had advanced to the second round of the NCAA tournament after a 32-7-3 season. There was no attitude of just wanting to play the game close, but an attitude of winning.
“It has been a crazy ride. You got to give a lot of credit to coach Jackson for what he has done changing the attitude, confidence and culture of this program,” said Van Guilder.
“We didn’t just come here to have a good time and to skate in front of a lot of people, we came here to win. It’s disappointing. It’s just how it goes sometimes,” said VanGuilder after the 4-1 loss to Boston College in the championship game.
Sure, second place is no fun, but for this team it was more than just second place. It was a statement that “we are here on the college hockey map and we are not going anywhere,” said senior Brock Sheehan.
“With the players we got here and the coaching staff, I see no reason that Notre Dame doesn’t become one of the best program’s in the country. I think over the last few years we have proved that we are one of the better teams in the country.”
If there is anyone the Notre Dame football team, fresh off a disappointing and embarrassing 3-9 season should talk to it is their hockey team.
The hockey team knows what it is like to be in the dumps and think there are no answers. To suffer loss after loss.
The Notre Dame hockey team showed this weekend at the Pepsi Center that it was much more than a Cinderella story. The Irish are a team that changed that smirk to a smile on the Rocky Mountains. It’s a team that saw the seniors start their career with a losing program and leave a championship-caliber one.
