Our salute to the standouts of the past hockey season continues today as we celebrate the standout achievers before we head toward the fall.
Here are our New England Hockey Journal Awards for the 2021-22 season.
Today we examine college hockey.
Last week we honored the top juniors from New England and later this week we'll have high school/prep school awards.
Bobby Trivigno, UMass: Hockey East Player of the Year
Trivigno’s 49 points on a career-high 20 goals and 29 assists helped him become the first-ever UMass skater to earn multiple All-America honors at the Division 1 level.
The Setauket, N.Y., native ranked third nationally in point scoring and fifth in points per game (1.32) for a Minutemen team that won its second consecutive Hockey East championship. His memorable senior campaign also included repeat Hockey East All-Star and tournament MVP honors.
Jerry Keefe, Northeastern: Hockey East Coach of the Year
Keefe (Billerica, Mass.) became just the second first-year head coach to win Hockey East Coach of the Year honors as he guided the Huskies to a 25-win season, the second-best total in program history.
Led by three New England All-Stars in Mike Richter Award-winning goaltender Devon Levi, forward Aidan McDonough (Milton, Mass.) and defenseman Jordan Harris (Haverhill, Mass.), his Northeastern club returned to the NCAA tournament after winning its first-ever Hockey East regular-season championship.
Matthew Coronato, Harvard: ECAC Player of the Year
A year after finishing as the USHL goal-scoring champion, Coronato led the Crimson in scoring as a first-year forward. The Huntington, N.Y., native scored 18 goals and 18 assists in 34 games for the Crimson’s ECAC Hockey title-winning squad.
Coronato was on a rapid offensive pace at season’s end, logging 22 points in the last 17 contests including the game-winning goals in both ECAC championship weekend contests. Entering the tournament, he ranked second only to teammate Sean Farrell (Hopkinton, Mass.) among all NCAA freshmen in points per game.
Rand Pecknold, Quinnipiac: ECAC Coach of the Year
It was another season full of milestones under Pecknold (Bedford, N.H.) as Quinnipiac accomplished a 30-win season for the third time in 10 years, won its second straight Cleary Cup as the ECAC Hockey regular-season champion, and was the lone New England team to earn a national tournament win this season.
The Bobcats tied a program record with their 32 wins, including a new NCAA-best 16 in shutout fashion.
Blake Bennett, American International: AHA Player of the Year
With Bennett’s 20 goals and 14 assists leading the way, AIC was the lone team in the conference to produce multiple 30-point scorers this season. Bennett was at his best during the postseason as he scored or assisted on 12 of the team’s 26 playoff goals en route to Atlantic Hockey Player of the Month honors.
For the season, his goal total led the league and was the highest for a Yellow Jacket since Springfield, Mass., native Austin Orszulak scored 22 in 2014-15.
Eric Lang, American International: AHA Coach of the Year
Lang has led the Yellow Jackets through an unprecedented stretch of success in Atlantic Hockey history as the team captured its fourth consecutive regular-season and third consecutive tournament crowns in 2022. The run of four straight pennants is a first in league history.
AIC, which topped the standings by 11 points, scored the most goals in the conference (3.57 per game) and allowed the fewest. Lang was a Spencer Penrose National Coach of the Year finalist for the third time in four years.
Ryan Black, Babson: D3 Player of the Year
Black (Pomfret, Conn.) became Babson’s 10th-ever first-team All-American after scoring a career-high 19 goals and 20 assists — the highest totals by a Beaver since 2004-05 — in 27 games this season. Next season, he's making the jump to Division 1 at New Hampshire.
Black had a flair for the dramatic as he scored a nation-leading nine game-winning goals, tying the NCAA Division 3 record. The two-time All-NEHC forward and Winchendon School product is just the second Babson player since 2000 to record multiple 30-point seasons.
Jamie Rice, Babson: D3 Coach of the Year
Rice (Newton, Mass.) led his alma mater to a sixth NCAA appearance in 18 years as head coach, but this berth came via the New England Hockey Conference championship. The Beavers hadn’t won a conference title since going back-to-back in 2013-14.
In the end, the Beavers advanced to the national quarterfinals for the fourth time under Rice and went 20-6-1 while finishing as the top team in a league that had six of 10 teams ranked or receiving votes in the national polls entering the tournament.
Skylar Fontaine, Northeastern: D1 Women’s Player of the Year
The senior defender from East Greenwich, R.I., made her presence felt on a loaded Northeastern roster, tallying seven goals and a career-high 41 assists in 38 games. Her 41 helpers were tops nationally and one shy of matching a single-season program record.
While helping the Huskies to another Frozen Four berth, Fontaine was named a Patty Kazmaier Award finalist for the second straight year and became the first player in Hockey East history to earn three consecutive Defenseman of the Year honors.
Mark Bolding, Yale: D1 Women’s Coach of the Year
After his second season guiding the Bulldogs ended with first-ever NCAA tournament and Frozen Four berths, Bolding was named Division 1 National Coach of the Year. He had earned the same honor at Division 3 Norwich — his alma mater — on four occasions. His Yale club won 26 games (26-9-1) and scored 122 goals, setting program records in both categories. The team included a pair of New England All-Stars in All-American defenseman Emma Seitz and All-ECAC forward Elle Hartje.
