Sure, it’ll be different. No one’s denying the novelty. But make no mistake: there is more to this weekend than a familiar face on an unfamiliar bench.

Tomorrow night, the Harvard men’s hockey team hosts the Nate Leaman-led Union Dutchmen in Leaman’s first game at Bright Hockey Center since leaving Cambridge after four years on Mark Mazzoleni’s staff.

The subplots are numerous. Every Crimson player either played for or was recruited by Leaman. During his time here, Leaman’s youth—he was 30 years old when he replaced Kevin Sneddon ’92 as Union’s head coach in July—and charisma made him a very popular assistant among Harvard players. And then there’s the intriguing understudy-turned-adversary element about the Leaman-Mazzoleni matchup.

“It will seem weird having him on the other bench,” said Harvard senior captain Kenny Smith. “We all were very close with Coach Leaman, but now that makes us want to beat him all the more. I’m sure he feels the same way toward us.

“He’s a competitive person. He instilled that in us. He wouldn’t have it any other way than to have an extremely competitive game.”

The teams met once earlier this season—the Crimson’s 3-2 win at Union on Jan. 2, in which Harvard staged its largest third-period comeback in over two years—but tomorrow will mark Leaman’s first trip to the visiting side of the rink where he became a prize assistant coach and helped the Crimson to the 2002 ECAC championship.

“It’ll be different being on the opposing bench,” Leaman said earlier this week. “When you coach somewhere, you’re always going to have relationships that are special. I watch those guys on the Internet, see how they’re doing, and talk with Coach Mazz and the assistants every now and then.

“Myself and [former Harvard assistant] Ronnie [Rolston] recruited a lot of those kids, so you’re always interested in how they’re doing. You follow them because you care. But now I have my own thing going on here, and I care a whole heck of a lot about the players here.”

Leaman said he thought most of the “emotional stuff” involving his Harvard ties took place in the January game at Union.

Now, he said, “it’s more about focusing on the game itself.” That’s understandable. This is, after all, the ECAC in mid-February and the horse race that will take place over the next few weeks will make the Belmont Stakes look like a Sunday afternoon canter.

With six regular-season games remaining, two overachieving teams (Brown and Colgate) are in the top spots and three more—Rensselaer, Cornell, and Dartmouth—are tied for third with 19 points. Harvard (9-12-2 overall, 7-8-1 ECAC, 15 points) is in seventh but within earshot of a top-four finish and first round bye. Union (12-12-4 overall, 5-9-2 ECAC, 12 points) is in 10th but only two points away from a home playoff series.

All indications are that this year’s ECAC stretch run could be as tight as the 2001-2002 season, in which Harvard, in third place with 23 points, had only four more points than Union, which ended up in 11th place and out of the playoffs.

“This is no different than any other year in this league,” Leaman said. “It’s all coming down to the last couple weeks. Anybody can end up on top, and no one in this league is untouchable.”

Much like Harvard, Leaman’s Dutchmen have beaten the league’s best at times and struggled mightily at others. Union began the season 7-2-2, then went on a 12-game winless streak—from Nov. 21 until a 4-3 overtime win at Sacred Heart on Jan. 23—but has won four of its last five, including a 7-0 win at Dartmouth.

“Nate’s done a great job there,” Mazzoleni said. “They’re right around .500 overall and they’re making a run right now in conference. They weathered a very difficult time where they went through a period without winning and scoring goals, and they’ve put themselves right back into the possibility of hosting.”

Leaman, meanwhile, is adjusting well to life as a head coach, both on the ice and off the ice.

Since Union does not offer hockey scholarships, Leaman is often at a recruiting disadvantage when compared with Ivy League schools, which use their name recognition as a selling point, and the other non-Ivy ECAC schools, all of which offer scholarships.

The Union program went through a particularly difficult time last month, when College President Roger Hull sided against ECAC members Clarkson, Rensselaer, and St. Lawrence in their struggle to keep scholarships, a stance that was criticized around the league.

“There’s a lot more to deal with outside hockey, which is challenging,” Leaman said. “There are a lot of ups and downs, not only with the season itself but with the program overall. That’s frustrating at times, but I’m very happy being a head coach. When you go to bed, you know you have the final decision. It’s different, exciting, and you can really go with your gut on a lot of things.

“Every day, I learn something new about the kids on the ice, and our relationship gets tighter as a team. You really do care about the kids out there, and that’s very important to have between a coach and his players.”

Weighty Issues

As ECAC teams jockey for playoff positioning, league and school officials have begun work on an issue that goes far beyond hockey games: the league membership itself.

Vermont’s announcement that it will join Hockey East for the 2005-2006 season leaves the ECAC Division I men’s league with 11 teams. In response, preliminary conference calls have been held in recent weeks among the ECAC’s four-member Development and Legislative Committee (DLC), which includes Harvard senior associate athletic director John Wentzell. The ECAC coaches’ committee, chaired by Yale head coach Tim Taylor ’63, spoke via conference call Wednesday.

The league could stay at 11 or expand to 12 teams or more. ECAC officials have yet to speak publicly about potential applicants, but the list of candidates has been widely reported to include Niagara (CHA), Holy Cross (Atlantic Hockey) and Quinnipiac (Atlantic Hockey).

A key element in any expansion will be the wishes of the six Ivy League schools, which wield disproportionately strong influence within the league. The Ivies are limited to 29 regular-season games, and Harvard’s schedule—bound by two Beanpot games and rivalries with Boston College and Boston University—would be affected dramatically by an increase beyond 12 teams.

For example, if the league went to 14 teams and maintained its format of playing each team twice, the league would have 26 league games, leaving the Crimson with only one game to work with outside of the Beanpot. Other Ivy schools would feel a similar crunch.

“That’d never fly through the Ivies,” Mazzoleni said of a 14-team arrangement. “I don’t know if there are three teams out there that fit geographically, that we could bus to instead of fly to, and that would really enhance the ECAC.”

During the ECAC coaches’ conference call, Mazzoleni said many expressed a desire to avoid a “knee-jerk reaction.”

“We’ve got to proceed cautiously, evaluate all inquiries, and have [schools] make their formal presentations,” Mazzoleni said, adding that he expects decisions would be made regarding membership during the league meetings in Naples, Fla., in April.

“My opinion is, why bring someone into the league if they can’t enhance the league?” Mazzoleni asked. “We have to be very smart, and allow people to make their pitch. We have to listen to what they have to say.”

In addition to scheduling concerns, issues to be discussed include academic profile, location, strength of program and ramifications to the current 12-team, three-weekend playoff structure that ECAC commissioner Phil Buttafuoco said has been “received very well” by the league’s member schools.

Any new teams would need to be approved by a two-thirds vote of a committee of the league’s athletic directors, and a two-thirds vote of the ECAC Policy Committee, comprised of non-athletic representatives at each school who typically have close ties with the university or college president.

Both committees currently have 12 members, but it is possible that Vermont will excuse itself from the membership discussions.

Eight schools would need to approve any new members, both at the athletic director and Policy Committee levels. If Vermont does, in fact, abstain from voting, that means it will take only three dissenting votes—half of the Ivy hockey institutions, in other words—to block a school’s entry.

—Staff writer Jon Paul Morosi can be reached at morosi@fas.harvard.edu.