SCHENECTADY, N.Y. – The #20 Union College men's hockey team earned its first national rankings since Nov. 5, 2024 in the latest USCHO and USA Hockey polls, released Monday afternoon.
Union is ranked 20th in both the USCHO and USA Hockey polls. The Garnet Chargers are one of four ECAC Hockey teams to be ranked in both polls, joining #9 Quinnipiac, #13 Dartmouth, and #19/17 Cornell.
Union has won three straight games and is off to its best start to a season since 2016-17, when it also sported an 8-2-1 record. The Garnet Chargers are coming off a 2-0 weekend where they took down UMass Lowell 7-1 on Friday, and then shut out the visiting Wildcats of New Hampshire 6-0.
Union boasts the No. 3 scoring offense in the country at 4.00 goals per game and the No. 7 scoring defense, only allowing 1.91 goals per game. Union's special teams are also enjoying a successful start to the season, ranked second on the penalty kill (95.1%) and 11th on the power play (25%) nationally.
Already with three shutouts to his name, Union's starting goaltender sophomore Cameron Korpi won his second ECAC Hockey MAC Goaltending Goalie of the Week award on Monday to go along with his ECAC Hockey Goalie of the Month Award from October.
Three other Union players have earned weekly accolades from the conference. Junior Tyler Dunbar was the Defender of the Week on Oct. 20, first-year Etienne Lessard claimed Rookie of the Week honors the same day, and senior Brandon Buhr was the Bluebird Hotels Forward of the Week to begin the season.
Buhr has tallied three points in each of his last three games, most recently notching his third career hat trick. He scored three straight goals in the second period against New Hampshire on Saturday and is the only ECAC Hockey player with double-digit goals on the season. Buhr (10-6-16) is one of five players leading NCAA Division I men's hockey in power-play goals with six, and he and senior Parker Lindauer (4-11-15) are the top-two point scorers in ECAC Hockey.
Union gets its first ranked test of the season on Friday, Nov. 21 against #19/17 Cornell at 7 p.m. in Ithaca, N.Y.
