RANKED! The Union College men's hockey team is ranked #20 in the USCHO and USA Hockey polls after a 2-0 weekend with wins over UMass Lowell and New Hampshire. The Garnet Chargers outscored the opposition 13-1 in those games and are ranked in the USA Hockey poll for the first time since Nov. 5, 2024 and in the USCHO poll for the first time since 2019. The newly-ranked Garnet Chargers visit #19/17 Cornell at 7 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 21 and Colgate at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 22. Union's 8-2-1 record marks its best start to a season since 2016-17.
UN-BUHR-LIEVABLE: Brandon Buhr has recorded three points in each of his last three games. He is the only player in college hockey this season to total three points in three straight games, and he is the first Union player to have such a streak since Olivier Bouchard '07 did it with five goals and five assists in a three-game span from Oct. 14 - Oct. 28, 2005.
BIG RED SCOUTING REPORT: Cornell hosts Union riding a two-game winning streak and in a tie with Harvard for second place in the ECAC Hockey standings. Cornell defenseman George Fegaras won the ECAC Hockey's Defender of the Week award after dishing out a total of three assists in wins over Brown and Yale last weekend. First-year goaltender Alexis Cournoyer sports a 1.42 goals-against-average and a .953 save percentage through five starts.
RAIDER SCOUTING REPORT: Union and Colgate played a neutral-site exhibition game during the first week of the regular season, but this one is for real as the Raiders look to break free from a four-way tie with Union, Yale, and RPI for fourth place in the league standings. Simon Labelle is the reigning ECAC Hockey Forward of the Week after a pair of three-goal performances. He is on a four-game point streak, averaging 2.25 points during that span.
GAME-WINNING BUHR
Brandon Buhr leads the team with three game-winning goals and notched his third of the season during the 7-1 win over UMass Lowell on Friday. It was his second game-winner in a row and the first time he's posted back-to-back game-winning goals in his career. Buhr is one of seven players in college hockey with more than two game-winning goals on the season. Michigan's Will Horcoff leads the NCAA with four. Union is also 8-0-0 when Buhr records at least one point this season and 0-2-1 when he is held pointless.
AN APPLE A DAY...
Parker Lindauer is tied for sixth in the NCAA with his one assist-per-game average. His 11 assists are tied for the 10th-most in the country, and he is on a three-game multi-point streak. He notched the team's first playmaker of the season with three assists against St. Lawrence on Nov. 8 and has already matched his career-high in assists. His four goals this season are also a career-high. Lindauer has assisted on half of
Brandon Buhr's 10 goals this season as well.
WHAT'S YOUR SUPER POWER?
Brandon Buhr is in a five-way tie for the national lead with six power-play goals this season and leads ECAC Hockey.
Alex Laurenza and
Parker Lindauer are both in the top-50 nationally with two power play goals each.
SHORT-HANDED? NO PROBLEM!
Union scored short-handed goals in back-to-back games for the first time since December 2016.
Lucas Buzziol scored the first goal of the weekend against UMass Lowell while the Garnet Chargers were a man down, and
Parker Lindauer bookended the weekend with a shorty in the third period against New Hampshire, scoring Union's sixth and final goal of the game.
POINT SURGE
Entering the weekend series with UMass Lowell and New Hampshire,
Brandon Buhr and
Parker Lindauer were both averaging 1.11 points per game. After both forwards posted back-to-back multi-point games, Buhr increased his points-per-game average to 1.45, and Lindauer's jumped to 1.36. Buhr's average is the sixth-best in college hockey, and Lindauer's is the 13th-best.
ALL GOOD THINGS MUST COME TO AN END
Despite beating UMass Lowell by six on Friday, Union's season-long streak of never being outshot in a period came to an end in the second period. Union was outshot 11-10 during the middle stanza. The two sides finished the game with 33 shots each, marking the first time Union did not outshoot its opponent through 60 minutes all season.
HOCKEY'S MENDOZA LINE
Union posted a shot percentage over .200 for the first time this season, doing so in both games over the weekend (.212 vs UMass Lowell; .207 vs New Hampshire). The last time Union had a shot percentage over .200 in back-to-back games was Jan. 28, 2023 and Feb. 3, 2023, in wins against RPI and Colgate, respectively.
POWER PLAY STREAKING
The Garnet Chargers scored multiple power-plays goals in both games last weekend. It is the first time Union has had consecutive games with multiple power-play goals since Oct. 19, 2024 (2 vs Mercyhurst) and Oct. 25, 2024 (4 @ RPI). The Garnet Chargers haven't had multiple power-play goals in three straight games since February 2017, when they had eight in three games against Dartmouth (4), Quinnipiac (2), and Princeton (2).
PLUSES AND MINUSES
Riley Brueck,
Ethan Benz,
Ollie Chessler, and
Luke Buss are the four players on the team without a negative on-ice rating in any game this season. Brueck leads that contingent with a +8 rating in 11 games.
Tyler Dunbar leads the team at +11 and is +7 over his last three games.
MAKING A BETTER DOOR THAN A WINDOW
Carter Rose has blocked a shot in five straight games, and
Colby MacArthur's three-game streak with a blocked shot just came to an end.
Jacob Jeannette is currently on a three-game blocked-shot streak, and he's averaging three blocked shots per game over that span.
THAT'S THE GOAL
Union is averaging six goals per game during its three-game winning streak. The last time they scored five or more goals in three straight games was January 2024. Union is outscoring opponents by five goals per game during the streak and have the fourth-best scoring margin overall in the country at 2.09.
PACING THE LEAGUE
The Garnet Chargers lead ECAC Hockey with 44 goals and 449 shots, and they are tied with Quinnipiac with 13 power-play goals.
Brandon Buhr leads ECAC Hockey with 10 goals,
Parker Lindauer is in a tie for first with 11 assists, and Buhr and Lindauer lead with 16 and 15 points, respectively. Buhr and
Ben Muthersbaugh lead the league with 46 shots each, and Buhr leads ECAC Hockey with three game-winning goals and six power-play goals.
SENIOR STREAKS
Brandon Buhr,
Parker Lindauer, and
Nate Hanley all have active three-game point streaks. Buhr's longest point streak is eight during the 2023-24 season, Lindauer's is four from 2023-24, and Hanley's is seven in 2023-24.
KILLING IT ON THE KILL
Union has gone 17 straight opportunities on the penalty kill without allowing a power-play goal.
Cameron Korpi made 21 saves while Union was a man-down on the ice last weekend, and Union's longest streak of penalty-kill chances without allowing a goal was 20, spanning from the Army game on Oct. 4 to the Clarkson contest on Nov. 7.
ON THIN ICE
There was a 62-minute delay between second and third periods during Cornell's game against Yale due to issues with the ice at Lynah Rink on Saturday. After the delay, Yale scored to cut its deficit to two goals, but Cornell scored eight minutes later to renew its three-goal lead and salt away the victory.
SOME GOOD WINS
Colgate is coming off a weekend sweep of Yale and Brown, and the Raiders have a 1-2-1 record against ranked teams already this season. They tied #3 Boston University on Oct. 11 and took down #10 Maine on Oct. 24. They also went to overtime with the Black Bears the next night but fell 3-2. Colgate was swept by RIT on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1. The Tigers were on a nine-game winning streak until losing to Niagara 2-1 (OT) on Tuesday. RIT is one of the four teams headed to Belfast, Northern Ireland for the Friendship Four.
THERE'S A FIRST FOR EVERYTHING
Etienne Lessard became the first Union rookie to score this season when he netted a power-play goal against RPI on Friday, Oct. 31. The next night,
Alex Laurenza also scored his first collegiate goal, also on the power play.
Brandon Buhr and
Drew Sutton are the only other current Garnet Chargers to record career-goal No. 1 on the man advantage.
DJ Hart scored his first collegiate goal while Union was short-handed.
M&T BANK CENTER
This season, the men's and women's Union hockey teams will call the state-of-the-art M&T Bank Center its home, becoming the primary tenant of the 100,000-square-foot multi-purpose venue. The arena holds a capacity of 2,200 for hockey games and expands to 3,600 for other sporting events, trade shows, special events, and conventions. Highlights include seven luxury suites, a spacious hospitality suite, two full-service concession stands, and an elegant bar overlooking the Mohawk River. M&T Bank Center is the 16th hockey venue in the NCAA to open in the last 10 years.
DON'T COUNT THESE GUYS OUT
Union stormed back from a 3-0 deficit and scored five unanswered goals in a 5-3 win over Mercyhurst on Oct. 11. It marked the Garnet Chargers' first victory after trailing by three goals since Dec. 1, 2013, when they erased a 4-1 deficit to beat Penn State. Daniel Ciampini scored the game-winner in that comeback with three seconds left in regulation, breaking the hearts of 5,177 Penn State fans in University Park, Pa.
BUHR WATCHING
College Hockey News released its "Players to Watch" in ECAC Hockey and recognized
Brandon Buhr with some high praise. "Buhr is shifty and has a good shot, which makes him successful. He is also good at getting to the important areas of the ice, which is the way his coach,
Josh Hauge, would like his team to play. Union as a whole is returning a deep group, and [Buhr] could be in the mix for Player of the Year."
NEED A RECHARGE?
The Garnet Chargers lost 12 players from its 2024-25 roster to graduation, the transfer portal, and the pros. Those departures accounted for 101 points last season, but Union still kept its top goal scorer in
Brandon Buhr (19) and point scorer in
Colby MacArthur (29). Not to mention, four of Union's 20-point scorers from last season are still on the squad, and Union's 78 "returning" goals are the seventh-most in Division I.
FRESH FACES
Hauge and his staff brought in two of each positional group to round out their recruiting class.
Alex Laurenza (F),
Troy Pelton (F),
Etienne Lessard (D),
Ollie Chessler (D)
Brayden Gillespie (G), and
Brendan Holahan (G) will all get their first taste of college hockey this season.
Will Felicio (D, Michigan),
Carter Rose (D, Clarkson),
Tyler Dunbar (D, Colorado College),
Cameron Korpi (G, Michigan), and
Luke Buss (F, Wisconsin) end up in Schenectady as transfers after earlier stops around the Division I hockey landscape.
WHAT'S UP BROTHER
They say your teammates are like your brothers. For Carter and
Cameron Korpi, one of their teammates actually is their brother. Carter is three years older than Cameron, and this will be the first time they've played hockey on the same team together (other than knee hockey games in the basement of their childhood home).
PROFESSIONAL PROKOP
It's no secret
John Prokop was a massive part of the Union defense last year. In three seasons, Prokop notched 65 assists and registered 85 points. Now, the AHCA East Second Team All-American is skating professionally for the Toronto Marlies in the Toronto Maple Leafs organization. He's looking to join the likes of Nick DeSimone and Shayne Gostisbehere as former Union hockey players in the NHL.
YOU LOVE TO "C" IT
Nick Young earned captain honors in his senior season. He's been along for the ride for all of head coach
Josh Hauge's tenure so far. The alternate captains on the team are
Parker Lindauer and
Brandon Buhr.
HIGH HOPES IN SCHENECTADY
Head coach
Josh Hauge told the media on Tuesday, Sept. 30 that if his team equals its No. 5 preseason ranking, then the season will be a disappointment. Union did finish fourth in the standings last year before an early exit at home to Dartmouth in the ECAC playoffs. That fourth-place finish was Union's best since placing second in 2017-18. The Garnet Chargers' most recent regular-season title came in 2013-14, the same season Union won its first national championship.
ACROSS THE POND
Union will be joined by RIT, Miami (Ohio), and Sacred Heart in Northern Ireland at the end of November for the Friendship Four.
SENIORITY PRIORITY
Union hits the ice with eight seniors, tied with Niagara and St. Thomas for the seventh-largest senior class across Division I. The Garnet Chargers' average age as a team is 22.5, making them tied for the seventh-oldest team in the country.
GO BIG BLUE?
Three Garnet Chargers previously played college hockey at the University of Michigan.
Cameron Korpi and
Will Felicio both played for Michigan last season, and
Brendan Miles transferred to Union after the 2023-24 campaign.
Tyler Dunbar, Miles, and Cameron and
Carter Korpi all hail from Michigan as well. Across Division I men's hockey, there are 91 players from The Wolverine State.
