{"id":85057,"date":"2013-10-23T08:28:45","date_gmt":"2013-10-23T12:28:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=85057"},"modified":"2015-12-14T11:26:46","modified_gmt":"2015-12-14T16:26:46","slug":"ice-hockey-teams-skate-into-new-era-with-cavanaugh-mackenzie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2013\/10\/ice-hockey-teams-skate-into-new-era-with-cavanaugh-mackenzie\/","title":{"rendered":"Ice Hockey Teams Skate into New Era with Cavanaugh, MacKenzie"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"From<\/a>
Men's ice hockey head coach Mike Cavanaugh, left, and women's head coach Chris MacKenzie at the Freitas Ice Forum. (Sean Flynn\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mike Cavanaugh was named the fourth men\u2019s ice hockey coach for the Huskies following 18 seasons as an assistant for Boston College, where he was part of four national championships. Chris MacKenzie was named the second women\u2019s ice hockey coach for the Huskies after serving as an assistant at Ohio State University and as head coach at his alma mater, Niagara. The coaches talked with UConn Today<\/i> about their first season in Storrs.<\/p>\n

What was your first order of business when you met with your teams?<\/i><\/p>\n

Mike Cavanaugh:<\/b> We have one more year in the Atlantic Hockey League. I wanted to be clear with our guys this isn\u2019t going to be a throw-away season. It\u2019s only fair to our seniors. They don\u2019t get to compete in Hockey East, but they have a chance to compete for the Atlantic Hockey League title.<\/p>\n

Chris MacKenzie:<\/b> Our goal is to win the Hockey East championship and make the NCAA tournament. We had a clear set of goals at our first team meeting. Our expectations were laid out right there.<\/p>\n

What changes are you bringing to your respective teams?<\/i><\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> We\u2019re doing some things systematically different than what\u2019s gone on here before. We\u2019ve had some growing pains with that. It\u2019s to be expected. We\u2019re breaking the season down to five game segments. We just had our fifth game. We\u2019ll re-evaluate where we\u2019re at each time.<\/p>\n

MC:<\/b> I think you always build from your goaltender out. We have a goaltender who is a fifth-year senior. The top line that finished the year last year are seniors and they\u2019ve been tremendous leaders. I consider the team is young when your top line, goalie, or top center is a rookie. Those are key positions where you need strong leadership. We might be a little bit young on defense \u2013 we don\u2019t have a senior on defense \u2013 but otherwise I like the makeup of the club. If your kids compete hard and win a lot of puck battles you\u2019re going to win games. That\u2019s kind of our focus through the preseason.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve both been assistant coaches. What were you looking for in finding the right staff to help you build your program?<\/i><\/p>\n

MC:<\/b> When you coach for 20 years you meet a lot of people, like former players I\u2019ve coached. The hardest part was telling some of those people I was going in a different direction. Hiring the two guys I hired [Joe Pereira and Mike Souza] was pretty easy. I felt comfortable that those guys were going to share the same vision I did in bringing the program forward.<\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> I went through this before. I feel fortunate with the set of assistants I have here. Jaclyn Hawkins \u201908 (CLAS) came in to meet with me before I had moved here. She\u2019s the all-time leading scorer in our program. Her passion was evident. I feel I got lucky with getting her back here. Casey Handrahan\u2019s brother and I were college roommates, so I know him. He\u2019s had wonderful experience coaching and playing. He\u2019s a great asset to our program.<\/p>\n

What are you looking at toward the future as the program moves forward? <\/i><\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> We\u2019re always going to look to put together a competitive schedule. You learn the most about yourself through adversity. If you\u2019re playing tough competition, you\u2019re only going to get better from it. You want to have wins and have a great record, but as long as you\u2019re pushing yourself and putting your program in a place to get better, that\u2019s what you\u2019re looking for.<\/p>\n

MC:<\/b> We\u2019re going to have 12 non-league games. I\u2019d always want to play the Connecticut schools \u2013 Quinnipiac, Sacred Heart, and Yale \u2013 if I could. I\u2019d like to keep a couple of the Atlantic Hockey League rivalries that we\u2019ve had. We will also look to play a couple of western teams on the schedule. I agree with Chris that you want to go out to a Michigan or a North Dakota where it\u2019s a hostile environment, because when it comes to the NCAA tournament, you can be placed anywhere. The ultimate goal we all have is to win a national championship. You have to prepare your team to play in the most adverse circumstances. The only way you can do that during the year is to schedule those games.<\/p>\n

What kind of changes in atmosphere will take place as the facilities for ice hockey at UConn improve?<\/i><\/p>\n

MC:<\/b> I love the pageantry of college hockey. I think a lot of that stems from student support. When you look at some of the toughest places or the best venues to play in \u2013 Michigan, Cornell, or the University of Maine – they have a great fan base of students that excite the entire venue. I think it\u2019s important that we do build a beautiful, first-class facility on campus where the students have the access to walk over to the game and really get behind both programs. That\u2019s the most effective way to create a loyal and rabid fan base. However, I\u2019m not opposed to playing some games around the state; this is the state\u2019s university and that\u2019s another way to cultivate your fan base.<\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> I would agree the student support is where it starts. There\u2019s been a loyal following. We were happy with our home opener. There were 500 people here. That\u2019s a pretty good size crowd for a women\u2019s hockey game. But the student support is where it will really take off for us.<\/p>\n

How has your reception been on the road for recruiting?<\/i><\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> It\u2019s been wonderful for us throughout Connecticut, New England, and into Canada. It\u2019s exciting to tell a recruit about UConn, what the vision is, what we want to do, and the excitement around the men\u2019s team getting to Hockey East, and to tell our story of where we\u2019ve been in the past and where we want to go in the future.<\/p>\n

MC: <\/b>Any Massachusetts kid we bring down here is shocked to see how nice the campus is. With the Storrs Center and all the money that the state has appropriated for the school, it\u2019s really eye-opening for people when they come here. It\u2019s been encouraging to see from our standpoint. We\u2019re certainly accepted in the hockey community, until we sign our first recruit. Then they don\u2019t accept you so well, but that\u2019s OK.<\/p>\n

Have you seen an increase in intensity for the college game as you\u2019ve been on the recruiting trail? <\/i><\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> The women\u2019s game has grown exponentially over the last 20 years. What\u2019s exciting is that this is an Olympic year, and we\u2019ll be front and center. It will showcase our national teams to the world. For us it\u2019s a great thing. I\u2019ve seen growth, energy, and investment in women\u2019s hockey just in the four years I\u2019ve been coaching it. I left the men\u2019s game because I was excited about being a part of it.<\/p>\n

MC: <\/b>There\u2019s tremendous talent in this state, and that\u2019s one of the things I was intrigued about most when the job opened. I\u2019ve been fortunate to recruit a lot of [Boston College] players out of this state. Three of them were captains on championship teams. There\u2019s a lot of talent here. At the Select 15 Festival this year, where they pick the top New England kids, 10 of the top 15 were Connecticut kids. It\u2019s certainly a wealth of talent that we hope to capitalize on.<\/p>\n

There was a bit of a shock last year when both Yale and Quinnipiac played for a national championship. What went through your mind when you saw that?<\/i><\/p>\n

CM: <\/b>I think it\u2019s great for Connecticut hockey. We can only benefit from the exposure of it. That type of event happening is great for men\u2019s and women\u2019s hockey.<\/p>\n

MC:<\/b> I wasn\u2019t that far removed from it [laughing]. If we had beaten Union, Quinnipiac was next on the schedule. They\u2019ve both been good programs for a long time. It wasn\u2019t surprising to me. When we won a national title [at BC] in 2010, one of the toughest games getting there was against Yale. Yale\u2019s been knocking on the door for a while. Rand [Pecknold] at Quinnipiac has done a good job there for 20 years. It didn\u2019t surprise me that either of them was playing for a national championship.<\/p>\n

Where is the game of college hockey right now?<\/i><\/p>\n

MC:<\/b> I think the mistake people make is to compare hockey with football and basketball. It\u2019s never going to compare with football and basketball. I don\u2019t think anything can compare with football where you have 100,000 people going to a football game. It\u2019s just a completely different sport. From the men\u2019s side, the Frozen Four has become an event that is sold out year in and year out. I think the state of college hockey and its fan base is growing right now. I like the path college hockey is on.<\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> On the women\u2019s side, we\u2019ve learned the proper place to put the championship. This year the national championship is at Quinnipiac. Where is it trending? It\u2019s growing and getting better every year.<\/p>\n

What haven\u2019t you been asked that you think people should know?<\/i><\/p>\n

MC: <\/b>I don\u2019t think enough has been asked about the kids on the team. I don\u2019t think people understand in this program there weren\u2019t any scholarship players and they had to pay their own way to go to school. I\u2019ve been impressed with their work ethic and dedication to be a student-athlete at UConn. Going forward, I hope more of the questions will be centered around student-athletes like Brant Harris \u201914 (CLAS) and Matt Grogan \u201914 (CLAS). That\u2019s where I\u2019d like to see it go.<\/p>\n

CM:<\/b> One of the questions I\u2019ll always ask myself when I\u2019m recruiting: Is this someone I can trust with my daughter? The whole group is someone I can trust with my daughter. That\u2019s an important thing in my world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Huskies’ two new head coaches talk about the new era in men’s and women’s ice hockey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":84622,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[55],"class_list":["post-85057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-09 07:14:20","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85057"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85057\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":107183,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85057\/revisions\/107183"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/84622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85057"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=85057"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=85057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}