“He came back,” McCulloch adds, “and I think he stepped in and made a difference right away for our team.”

Reese earned four assists during Harvard’s postseason streak, and in the team’s final game—in the NCAA tournament’s round of 16, against eventual runner-up Maine—Reese knocked home the Crimson’s first goal, a power-play strike 17:01 through the first period.

Not bad for a skater who had missed a sizeable chunk of his first collegiate season.

In fact, when questioned about Reese’s layoff, assistant captain Ryan Lannon says, “The fact that you just said he missed 15 games surprised me, because I don’t ever remember him missing a step.

“That’s a credit to him as a player,” adds Lannon, who has been Reese’s defensive partner for nearly all of this season, “to his work ethic off the ice...but also to the talent level that he has, where he can miss 15 games and come back and not look too rusty—come back at the end of the season, when the pace of the game is at its peak, and still fit in and be an integral part of our success.”

In any case, Reese says he wanted a “fresh start,”—one made possible by the fact that the sophomore has remained healthy this entire season.

And Harvard, meanwhile, is still collecting the dividends.

Reese currently sits atop the Crimson’s list of scoring defenseman with seven goals and 12 assists—Welch is second with six goals and 12 assists—and, like the captain, Reese has become something of a menace on the power play.

“He’s got a great shot,” Welch says, “and he’s been using it a lot more. I think he’s been getting a couple shots on net a game, and a lot of the scoring opportunities and chances.”

Officially, Reese is three inches shorter and seven pounds lighter than Welch—on the ice, though, this disparity appears greater, and it create the most glaring difference between the pair’s game styles.

Reese easily admits that he cannot play the physical game to the extent that Welch can, simply because Welch is “bigger and stronger.”

But while “Welchy has the size that Dylan doesn’t,” Lannon says, “Dylan makes up for it with his speed and just the hockey-sense that he has to keep himself in position. He doesn’t necessarily always have to out-muscle guys, but he still doesn’t get beat off the puck or [in the corner] very often.”

And beneath the flashy numbers and the gritty offensive instincts lies another similarity: the two are, first and foremost, blueliners.

“People look at their offense so much, and the points they put up and their ability to run the power play, that they forget that they’re still defensemen,” Lannon says.

“It’s nice to have that offensive ability,” Lannon adds, “but sometimes, as a defenseman, it’s still nice to be recognized [for being] able to shut guys down, as well. They both have that ability.”