The 2020–21 Canisius Golden Griffins men's ice hockey season was the 41st season of play for the program, the 23rd at the Division I level, and the 18th season in the Atlantic Hockey conference. The Golden Griffins represented Canisius College and were coached by Trevor Large, in his 4th season.

The start of the college hockey season was delayed due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. As a result, Canisius's first scheduled game was in late-November as opposed to early-October, which was the norm.

Season As a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic the entire college ice hockey season was delayed. Because the NCAA had previously announced that all winter sports athletes would retain whatever eligibility they possessed through at least the following year, none of Canisius' players would lose a season of play. However, the NCAA also approved a change in its transfer regulations that would allow players to transfer and play immediately rather than having to sit out a season, as the rules previously required.

Even after being delayed, Canisius had the start of their season disrupted by cancellations and postponements. The Golden Griffins played two games over a 62-day period. In February the team was finally able to put a string of games together and showed themselves to be one of the better teams in the western pod of Atlantic Hockey teams. After a four-game winning streak, Canisius was nearing their first top-20 ranking in years but the team was swept by a down Air Force club. Due to Canisius having so few games on their schedule, the losses to Air Force meant that the team had little chance of making the NCAA Tournament without winning their conference tournament.

After the Golden Griffins dispatched RIT in the quarterfinals, they had to get past a very strong Army team to reach the championship. The two teams battled through a close game, needing overtime to decide the winner, and J. D. Pogue's marker sent the Griffs to the title game. Canisius was unable to overcome American International despite the Yellow Jackets facing their own COVID problems and had to settle for second place. Canisius had a slim chance of being selected as an at-large bid but when the tournament teams were released, Atlantic Hockey was essentially disregarded, with league-leading AIC being given the 16th and final space in the bracket.

The program finished as a runner-up, the second-best performance in team history. Despite playing fewer than half the games of the previous season, Canisius recorded more wins. Sophomore Jacob Barczewski served as the team’s starting goaltender throughout the season.

John Stampohar and MacGregor Sinclair sat out the season.

Departures Matt Hoover Forward Graduation (Signed with Utah Grizzlies) Nick Hutchison Forward Graduation (Signed with Adirondack Thunder) Casey Jerry Forward Graduation Jesse Pereira Forward Graduation Will Scherer Defenseman Graduation Matt Stief Defenseman Graduation (Signed with Macon Mayhem) Daniel Urbani Goaltender Graduation

Recruiting Jackson Decker Defenseman 21 Algonquin, IL Cooper Haar Forward 21 Huntington Beach, CA Max Kouznetsov Forward 19 Voorhees, NJ Jack Lyons Defenseman 21 Mississauga, ON Niclas Puikkonen Forward 21 Stockholm, SWE Jami Virtanen Forward 20 Pori, FIN Connor Zilisch Forward 21 Appleton, WI

Roster

As of September 17, 2020.

Standings

Schedule and results

!colspan=12 style=";" | Regular season

!colspan=12 style=";" |

|- align="center" bgcolor="#e0e0e0" |colspan=12|Canisius Won Series 2–0

Scoring statistics C 17 9 9 18 4 LW 16 6 9 15 21 RW 13 3 8 11 8 C 17 5 5 10 10 C/RW 13 5 4 9 0 F 15 3 6 9 10 F 15 2 7 9 8 LW 13 5 3 8 6 D 17 1 7 8 12 C/LW 17 4 3 7 8 LW/RW 17 4 3 7 4 F 17 3 4 7 6 D 17 2 4 6 12 RW 13 1 4 5 6 LW 16 3 1 4 19 D 14 1 3 4 4 D 15 0 4 4 4 C 17 0 4 4 0 D 17 0 3 3 8 C/W 6 1 1 2 0 D 4 0 2 2 2 G 11 0 2 2 2 D 10 1 0 1 0 G 1 0 0 0 0 D 1 0 0 0 0 F 2 0 0 0 0 C 4 0 0 0 0 G 11 0 0 0 0 Bench 0 0 0 4 Total 17 59 96 155 154

Goaltending statistics 1 1:25 0 0 0 0 1 0 1.000 0.00 11 653 7 3 0 25 315 1 .926 2.30 7 376 4 3 0 18 189 1 .913 2.87 Empty Net - 6 - - - 3 - - - - Total 17 1037 11 6 0 46 505 2 .917 2.66

Rankings

PollWeekPre123456789101112131415161718192021 (Final) USCHO.comNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNR-NR USA TodayNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNR USCHO did not release a poll in week 20.

Awards and honors Jacob Barczewski Atlantic Hockey Regular Season Goaltending Award Jacob Barczewski Atlantic Hockey First Team Keaton Mastrodonato

References