When one door closes, another opens. The same can be said about hockey seasons in New England.
After wrapping up the fall schedule over the weekend with a Massachusetts Hockey 16-U State Championship, Cullen Emery and his Boston Junior Eagles teammates are quickly shifting their focus to the fast-approaching winter campaign.
The Los Angeles, Calif., native, who has been playing in the region since 2018, is entering his first season in the NEPSAC landscape at Dexter Southfield.
Although it's only been three years since he arrived in New England, the 2005 birth-year center has taken a winding path to get to the independent prep school in Brookline, Mass.
After playing his eighth-grade season at Austin Prep and freshman campaign at Reading High, DXSF marks his third team in as many years.
“(My family) moved here in 2018 and that’s when I started playing for the Eagles,” Emery, 16, told New England Hockey Journal. “That summer is when I first visited Dexter and met Coach Donato, and I’ve been wanting to go to prep school ever since.”
With fall hockey in the rearview, things are starting to heat up in prep, as teams get back together and set out on preparing for the 2021-22 season.
“It’s been really fun,” Emery said of his early experiences at Dexter. “It’s a really close community and all of the guys have been really good to me from the start. It’s a great group."
For head coach Dan Donato (Dedham, Mass.), the incoming sophomore is a welcome addition to a lineup that is loaded with talent heading into the 'return to normal' campaign.
“We’ve really liked what we’ve seen so far,” Donato said of Emery, a 5-9, 175-pound forward. “Obviously, we knew he was a really good player coming in but I love his game. He does everything well.”
The various positive attributes that Emery brings to the team remind Donato of a certain No. 37 that plays across town, just a few miles away from Dexter's home base.
“He plays all ends of the ice and he’s always in the right spots defensively. He plays with an edge but he also knows how to make plays at a high pace," the head coach said.
During last year’s Covid-shortened season, Emery split time between the Junior Eagles, who played up a year in the 16-U division, and Reading.
While there weren’t as many games as usual, the California native developed quite a bit during the partial season, especially while playing alongside Will Vote (Arlington, Mass.) and Will Smith (Lexington, Mass.), two of the country's top '05s, who left DXSF and St. Sebastian's, respectively, to join the NTDP.
“He was kind of the third piece on that line last year, so he showed he can really play with high-end guys and be effective,” Donato said.
Emery carried that rising play into the summer and fall, playing a key role on the Junior Eagles team that will be competing for another championship in the spring.
With a 4-1 tournament-clinching victory over the North Suburban Wings on Sunday, the 16-U Eagles -- and their 18-U counterparts -- secured a bid to USA Hockey Nationals, which will be held at the end of the prep season, from March 30-April 4, in Rochester, Mich.
For now, Emery, who describes himself as a ‘fast, straight-playing forward that’s hard and heavy on pucks’, is focusing all of his energy on the upcoming prep campaign.
“I’m excited," he said. "We have a lot of good games on the schedule, we’re going to get closer as a team, work hard, and hopefully, have a really good year."
Donato is equally excited to see what the coming months have in store for the budding '05, who has yet to land an NCAA commitment.
"We were fortunate to land him. He’s quiet, he goes about his business, everyone respects him and he’s great academically," said head coach, entering his 13th season at the helm.
"He’s going to kind of burst on the scene for us a little bit this year. A lot of people are going to enjoy watching his game.”
@LiamFlaherty
liam.flaherty@hockeyjournal.com
