By: Craig Morgan
TEMPE, Ariz. -- Sun Devils men's hockey coach Greg Powers laughed when the question was posed. We're guessing he's been asked before.
Were you temporarily insane when you built this season's schedule?
"No," Powers said, still chuckling. "I stand by it. While we're in our first full year with minimal expectations from anybody to make any sort of a postseason run or anything like that, if you look at the way our schedule plays out, I can definitively tell you if we had played a bunch of unranked teams and had four more wins, we wouldn't be as good as we are right now."
ASU men's hockey is 3-12 in its first full year of a Division I schedule, but that schedule reads like a murderers' row. Already this season, the Sun Devils have played a litany of teams that are, or were at the time, ranked in the nation's top 20.
ASU has faced No. 12 Notre Dame twice on the road; No. 24 Air Force (then No. 18) twice at Gila River Arena in Glendale; No. 8 Harvard twice in Arizona; No. 20 Michigan at Gila River Arena; No. 3 Boston College on the road; and No. 7 Penn State twice on the road.
They also faced then-No. 17 Northeastern twice on the road.
That's 10 games against opponents currently ranked in the top 25 and 12 against teams that were ranked in the top 25 at the time. To put it more plainly, ASU has played exactly two teams this season that were not ranked. The Sun Devils defeated New Hampshire, 5-4 in overtime on Nov. 12 in Durham. The Wildcats were in fourth place the Hockey East standings.
To make matters even more difficult, eight of ASU's 15 games this season have been on the road, adding the challenges of new environments, new beds, bus travel from one game to another on back-to-back days and the need to keep up with their studies. ASU hasn't played a home game since Nov. 4 during a portion of the schedule Powers jokingly refers to as the Devils' "sabbatical."
"It's not easy to commit to doing homework in a hotel when you're tired and out of your normal routine," Sun Devils captain Dylan Hollman said. "It takes a lot of discipline, but we all knew what we were signing up for and for the most part, our teachers are pretty accommodating.
"Don't get me wrong. We're glad to be home now, but any time you're away with the team it's nice because it gives the group a chance to bond. It was actually an unbelievable experience. We got to play in (Northeastern's 106-year-old) Matthews Arena, we got to play at Boston College and see the city, Penn State's student section is unbelievable and Notre Dame has all this history and cool buildings and a really good following so it was a great experience."
While the Devils haven't posted tangible results in the form of wins, Powers and the players insist there is noticeable improvement, both in the team's play and the team's understanding of what it takes to compete at the Division I level.
"To face those kinds of teams is definitely challenging because it forces you to bring your best game every night -- as a team and as an individual," graduate student forward Robbie Baillargeon said. "It forces you to build good habits. That starts in practice. We're building good practice habits and setting that tradition of what it means to be a Sun Devil hockey player by coming to the rink every day, ready to learn and work and give it your all."
Powers said he and his staff have monitored the team closely to make sure its confidence level isn't dipping in the face of losses.
"I don't think it ever did," Baillargeon said. "It was more about getting over the hump. In some of the early games, we'd be down by one or tied and then all of the sudden we'd go through a phase where we'd let up two, three goals at a time and it felt like it took a lot of life out of the team.
"But that weekend when we beat New Hampshire and then were in a one-goal game with a top-five team (an eventual 3-1 loss to No. 4 Boston College), that really let us know we could play with anybody in the country."
Powers said part of the thought process in constructing the schedule was to attract the best players to his program.
"There is some elite young talent here and they wouldn't be here if we played a different type of schedule; they want to play in games like this," he said. "As a staff, he hold ourselves accountable to make sure the kids show up ready every day; to make sure they're staying confident even when they're not seeing results. We keep telling them to stay focused on the process and the ultimate results will come."
With the first four-game homestand in program history ongoing -- ASU split with RPI and is set to face Colgate -- Powers sees opportunity for the Sun Devils to get some payoff for all their hard work.
"We're into the third segment of our season now where we get a string of good hockey teams, but unranked team so the expectation is to take everything we have learned in the previous two segments and apply it for more success.
"The main goal this year for our program was, no matter who we play, when we start the third period we wanted to have a chance to win that game. There have only been a few games where we haven't put ourselves in a position to do that."
TEMPE, Ariz. -- Sun Devils men's hockey coach Greg Powers laughed when the question was posed. We're guessing he's been asked before.
Were you temporarily insane when you built this season's schedule?
"No," Powers said, still chuckling. "I stand by it. While we're in our first full year with minimal expectations from anybody to make any sort of a postseason run or anything like that, if you look at the way our schedule plays out, I can definitively tell you if we had played a bunch of unranked teams and had four more wins, we wouldn't be as good as we are right now."
ASU men's hockey is 3-12 in its first full year of a Division I schedule, but that schedule reads like a murderers' row. Already this season, the Sun Devils have played a litany of teams that are, or were at the time, ranked in the nation's top 20.
ASU has faced No. 12 Notre Dame twice on the road; No. 24 Air Force (then No. 18) twice at Gila River Arena in Glendale; No. 8 Harvard twice in Arizona; No. 20 Michigan at Gila River Arena; No. 3 Boston College on the road; and No. 7 Penn State twice on the road.
They also faced then-No. 17 Northeastern twice on the road.
That's 10 games against opponents currently ranked in the top 25 and 12 against teams that were ranked in the top 25 at the time. To put it more plainly, ASU has played exactly two teams this season that were not ranked. The Sun Devils defeated New Hampshire, 5-4 in overtime on Nov. 12 in Durham. The Wildcats were in fourth place the Hockey East standings.
To make matters even more difficult, eight of ASU's 15 games this season have been on the road, adding the challenges of new environments, new beds, bus travel from one game to another on back-to-back days and the need to keep up with their studies. ASU hasn't played a home game since Nov. 4 during a portion of the schedule Powers jokingly refers to as the Devils' "sabbatical."
"It's not easy to commit to doing homework in a hotel when you're tired and out of your normal routine," Sun Devils captain Dylan Hollman said. "It takes a lot of discipline, but we all knew what we were signing up for and for the most part, our teachers are pretty accommodating.
"Don't get me wrong. We're glad to be home now, but any time you're away with the team it's nice because it gives the group a chance to bond. It was actually an unbelievable experience. We got to play in (Northeastern's 106-year-old) Matthews Arena, we got to play at Boston College and see the city, Penn State's student section is unbelievable and Notre Dame has all this history and cool buildings and a really good following so it was a great experience."
While the Devils haven't posted tangible results in the form of wins, Powers and the players insist there is noticeable improvement, both in the team's play and the team's understanding of what it takes to compete at the Division I level.
"To face those kinds of teams is definitely challenging because it forces you to bring your best game every night -- as a team and as an individual," graduate student forward Robbie Baillargeon said. "It forces you to build good habits. That starts in practice. We're building good practice habits and setting that tradition of what it means to be a Sun Devil hockey player by coming to the rink every day, ready to learn and work and give it your all."
Powers said he and his staff have monitored the team closely to make sure its confidence level isn't dipping in the face of losses.
"I don't think it ever did," Baillargeon said. "It was more about getting over the hump. In some of the early games, we'd be down by one or tied and then all of the sudden we'd go through a phase where we'd let up two, three goals at a time and it felt like it took a lot of life out of the team.
"But that weekend when we beat New Hampshire and then were in a one-goal game with a top-five team (an eventual 3-1 loss to No. 4 Boston College), that really let us know we could play with anybody in the country."
Powers said part of the thought process in constructing the schedule was to attract the best players to his program.
"There is some elite young talent here and they wouldn't be here if we played a different type of schedule; they want to play in games like this," he said. "As a staff, he hold ourselves accountable to make sure the kids show up ready every day; to make sure they're staying confident even when they're not seeing results. We keep telling them to stay focused on the process and the ultimate results will come."
With the first four-game homestand in program history ongoing -- ASU split with RPI and is set to face Colgate -- Powers sees opportunity for the Sun Devils to get some payoff for all their hard work.
"We're into the third segment of our season now where we get a string of good hockey teams, but unranked team so the expectation is to take everything we have learned in the previous two segments and apply it for more success.
"The main goal this year for our program was, no matter who we play, when we start the third period we wanted to have a chance to win that game. There have only been a few games where we haven't put ourselves in a position to do that."