Men’s hockey (3-3-0) split its pair of games last weekend, defeating the Babson Beavers (4-5-1) 2-1 in overtime on Saturday and falling 0-4 to the No. 4 SUNY Geneseo Knights (9-0-0) on the road on Sunday. The loss ended a three-game winning streak for the Ephs, who had rebounded from a disappointing start to the season.
The Ephs began to prepare for the season with early off-campus practices in the fall. “The ice here isn’t down until the middle of October, so when we get to campus, we’re practicing in North Adams twice a week,” said goalie and co-captain Cal Sandquist ’25, who noted that on some days the team would start as early as 6 a.m.
This preparation was especially crucial for integrating a new group of first-years into the team, which lost 10 graduating players at the end of last season. “When you have a lot of first-years, there’s a lot of variance,” said assistant captain David Vieten ’26. “You don’t know which way it’s going to go. Fortunately, we’ve seen a lot of freshmen who are super eager and hungry.”
The year began with two consecutive home losses to the Colby Mules (4-1-1) and the Bowdoin Bears (3-3-0) — which forward Jack Sabre ’25 attributed to nerves and early season pressure.
The team then steadied the ship with back-to-back decisive away victories over Tufts (4-2-1) and Connecticut College (4-1-1), with a combined six-goal margin of victory. “It was actually good for us to get on the road,” Sabre said. “We were able to forget those expectations.”
Last weekend, the Ephs maintained their momentum with an overtime win against the Beavers, aided in part by a strategy that attacked their opponent’s strengths, Sabre noted. “Babson plays really fast, up and down the ice,” he said. “Our game plan was to slow down the game [and] prevent a high-scoring game.”
The Ephs were successful, blocking the Beavers from scoring in the first two periods. Sandquist made a number of key saves, letting only one of Babson’s 29 shots find the back of the net — though by then, the Ephs had scored a goal of their own.
Sabre scored in the third period with an assist from Leo Schneeberg ’28, who tallied his first collegiate point with the pass. The play also marked Sabre’s third consecutive game with a goal, a streak that he attributed to good positional awareness. “Something that we’ve focused on is positioning, getting into the dirty areas of the ice, in front of the net,” he said. “A lot of my goals have been nothing fancy.”
After the Beavers tied the score just over a minute later, the game went into overtime, during which Sabre passed to Connor Fitzpatrick ’26, who scored the game-winning goal in front of a boisterous home crowd.
Vieten said that the game boosted the team’s confidence — especially that of its defensive players. “[It was about] getting back what our identity is and what we know,” he said. “Being strong defensively in that game helped us a lot.”
On Sunday, the team traveled to Geneseo for a difficult matchup against one of the top 10 teams in the country. The undefeated Knights stifled the Ephs, scoring goals in each period and allowing none. “Geneseo is obviously an incredibly skilled team who’s deserving of their ranking nationally,” Sandquist said.
Sandquist said that he believes there is room for improvement as well as reason for optimism. “We know that they haven’t seen our best yet,” he said. “It also gives us a view of what the standard is for our long-term goals and what we have to do to get there, so we have a good roadmap and we’re really excited.”
The Ephs’ opportunities for growth begin this weekend: They play on the road against Hamilton (4-2-0) on Friday and Amherst (2-3-1) on Saturday.
