Leaman, who has seen Harvard from both sides of the ice, first as a Crimson assistant and currently as the Union head coach, agrees with much of Smith’s assessment.

“Harvard has a great chance in NCAAs,” Leaman said. “They just won the ECAC Championship...and that builds a lot of confidence within the team and within the players.”

“I think Harvard is going to represent the ECAC well,” he continued. “The sky’s the limit for that group.”

That the sky was the limit for Harvard was certainly the feeling at the beginning of the season, when both the media and coaches picked Harvard to finish atop the ECAC.

The national media agreed, slotting the Crimson at No. 6 in the first pre-season poll.

But nothing transpired the way the team or the pundits anticipated.

At least until the season’s final game, a 3-0 shutout of Dartmouth. Since then Harvard has reeled off seven straight wins, tied with Maine for the longest streak in the nation. And that streak has made the team and its coach confident entering Albany.

“All along we’ve had a quiet confidence in ourselves,” Mazzoleni said. “For a long time we’ve been in this mindset of single-elimination because if we lost we were done. I think it’s helped us focus on the game and the task at hand.

“I can say this,” he continued. “Out of the five years I’ve been here, and this is our third year in a row in the NCAA tournament, this team I feel the best about,” Mazzoleni said.

—Staff writer Timothy M. McDonald can be reached at tmcdonal@fas.harvard.edu.