The 2022–23 Bentley Falcons men's ice hockey season was the 46th season of play for the program, the 24th at the Division I level, and the 20th in the Atlantic Hockey conference. The Falcons represented Bentley University and were coached by Ryan Soderquist, in his 21st season.
Season With more than half of the players from the previous season's team departing, coach Soderquist had his work cut out for him. The new lineup displayed some obvious deficiencies early in the year, both on the offense and defense. The result was a rather poor record and a last-place position in the conference standings. Once the team returned from the winter break, they seemed to have built some amount of chemistry and produced a surprising upset over Northeastern.
The Falcons were much better in the second half of the season and nearly posted a .500 record in 2023. Towards the end of the season they were able to produce wins over both American International and RIT, the top two teams in the conference. One of the big keys to this was the emergence of Connor Hasley as the team's starting goaltender. Unfortunately, because of both their bad start and the fact that Atlantic Hockey had altered its playoff format for this season to eliminate the First Round, Bentley's 9th-place finish left them out of the bracket and without a single playoff game.
Departures Drew Bavaro Defenseman Transferred to Notre Dame Matt Clark Defenseman Left program (retired) Evan Debrouwer Goaltender Graduation (retired) Jason Grande Goaltender Transferred to Holy Cross Brendan Hamblet Forward Graduation (retired) Fraser Kirk Goaltender Graduation (retired) Phil Knies Forward Graduation (signed with HK Nitra) Matt Lombardozzi Defenseman Graduation (retired) Luke Orysiuk Defenseman Graduation (signed with Trois-Rivières Lions) Ethan Roswell Defenseman Graduation (signed with Corsaires de Dunkerque) Collin Rutherford Forward Graduation (retired) Kohei Sato Forward Graduation (retired) Will Schlagenhauf Forward Graduation (retired) A. J. Villella Defenseman Graduation (retired) Brendan Walkom Forward Graduation (signed with Bees IHC) Michael Zuffante Forward Graduation (retired)
Recruiting Seth Bernard-Docker Defenseman 20 Canmore, AB Nick Bochen Defenseman 22 North Vancouver, BC; transfer from Quinnipiac Stevie Castagna Forward 21 North Vancouver, BC Connor Hasley Goaltender 21 North Tonawanda, NY Josh Latta Forward 24 West Vancouver, BC; transfer from Massachusetts Lowell Pat Lawn Defenseman 21 Waltham, MA Ethan Leyh Forward 21 Anmore, BC; transfer from Quinnipiac Arlo Merritt Forward 21 Halifax, NS Ryan Nause Defenseman 21 Riverview, NB Nicholas Niemo Forward 21 Middlebury, VT Jordan Schulting Defenseman 23 Penticton, BC; transfer from Massachusetts Lowell Joshua Seeley Goaltender 21 Trenton, MI Matt Thomson Forward 23 Reading, MA; transfer from Northeastern; joined mid-season Ryan Upson Forward 21 West Vancouver, BC
Roster As of January 1, 2023.
Standings
Schedule and results
!colspan=12 style=";" | Regular Season
Scoring statistics F 32 8 14 22 33 D 34 5 15 20 14 F 32 4 16 20 65 LW 34 7 9 16 12 C 33 2 14 16 10 F 32 8 7 15 30 F 33 7 8 15 20 F 33 9 5 14 16 C 28 5 7 12 12 F 27 3 6 9 16 F 22 5 2 7 4 D 24 2 5 7 20 C 30 2 5 7 4 D 20 1 6 7 22 F 20 3 3 6 2 D 26 2 3 5 6 D 29 2 2 4 16 D 24 0 4 4 8 D 15 0 4 4 2 RW 25 1 2 3 6 D 33 1 2 3 35 LW 13 1 1 2 19 D 22 1 1 2 10 F 14 1 1 2 4 F 10 1 0 1 4 G 16 0 0 0 0 G 1 0 0 0 0 G 20 0 0 0 0 Bench - - - - 16 Total 81 142 223 406
Goaltending statistics 20 1100:07 6 10 2 54 544 1 .910 2.95 16 909:33 5 11 0 56 428 0 .884 3.69 1 27:59 0 0 0 4 19 0 .826 8.58 Empty Net - 16:39 - - - 10 - - - - Total 36 2054:18 11 21 2 124 991 1 .889 3.62
Rankings
PollWeekPre12345678910111213141516171819202122232425 26 27 (Final) USCHO.comNR-NRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNR-NRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNR-NR USA TodayNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNRNR Note: USCHO did not release a poll in weeks 1, 13, or 26.
Awards and honors Nicholas Niemo Atlantic Hockey Rookie Team
References