"Whenever I think of Harvard, I think of terrific skating," Union Coach Bruce Delventhal said. "We'll have to work to match up with them."
Delventhal will be counting on seniors Craig Ferrero and Dalton Menhall to penetrate the Crimson defense, but he knows that won't be an easy task.
"We might just pull one forward and put our two goalies in the game," quipped Delventhal. "Work for the 0-0 tie."
Actually, one bright spot in the flying Dutchmen's early season has been their goaltending. Union has platooned two freshmen between the twines with some success.
In fact, Mike Gallant, a freshman from Stoney Creek, Ontario, snagged ECAC Rookie of the Week honors for his performance against Vermont. He stopped 42 our of 45 shots and kept the 'Cats zero-for-six on power plays.
Union is just happy to be in the conference and will worry about dominating it in season to come, said Delventhal.
"The kids have just been thrilled about it. The crowds have been great," said Delventhal.
Neither ECAC hockey nor Harvard are anything new to the Rensselaer hockey program.
But many of its own players are.
The Engineers (2-1-0, 0-0-0) probably have been hurt worse than the Crimson by graduation, and as a result, they are left with a young and inexperiences team.
"We basically have a whole different system this year from the one we've had the past two years," said Rensselaer Coach Buddy Powers, whose team has notched consecutive wins over Boston College and Merrimack after losing to Boston University.
"We're just trying to perfect and execute the basics right now," said Powers.
Just like Harvard, the Engineers are skating five freshmen in their top four lines and a first-year on defense.
"We've made a lot of freshmen mistakes," Powers said. "We've managed to cover some of them up. To be honest, we're very happy to have the two wins we have right now."
Rensselaer's first ECAC test comes tonight when it faces Brown, and tomorrow, it will face the Crimson at the large and noisy confines of Houston Field House in Troy, N.Y.
Last year, the two teams split their playoff series with each winning in the other's rink. But Rensselaer fans are undoubtably still smarting over the Crimson's first-round victory that knocked the Engineers out of ECAC tournament.
"It's really turned into quite a rivalry between the two schools" said Tomassoni, who is a Rensselaer alum.
Powers isn't thinking about winning any rivalries right now.
"For the first four or five games, I think most of the teams will just be feeling each other out," Powers said. "St. Lawrence and Clarkson are far ahead of everyone else."