The 2023–24 Colgate Raiders Men's ice hockey season was the 94th season of play for the program and the 63rd in the ECAC Hockey conference. The Raiders represented Colgate University, played their home games at the Class of 1965 Arena and were coached by Mike Harder in his 1st season.
Season.
After 30 seasons behind the bench for the Raiders, Don Vaughan retired following his first conference tournament championship. A few months later, the school decided to bring back former assistant and team captain Mike Harder as the program's 15th head coach. Harder began with a solid foundation as most of the team's roster returned, however, he would have to find a way to replace some missing offense. Three of the Raiders' top four scorers had departed, however, as Colgate was already one of the better offensive teams in the conference, they were well-positioned to handle that loss.
The team encountered difficulty early in the season but, surprisingly, it was the defense that appeared to be the culprit. Carter Gylander had an up-and-down start to his season and was unable to string together a consistent run of solid goaltending. With the offense still a work in progress, the team hovered around .500 for the first half of the season despite playing a relatively easy schedule.
After returning from the winter break, the layoff of more than a month didn't appear to help the Raiders and they went winless in their first four games in January. With the season starting to spiral out of control, Colgate recovered against defending national champions Quinnipiac with a surprising 2–1 win in the middle of the month. That proved to be the turning point of the season as Gylander began looking like the starting goaltender that he was and returned to his 2023 form for the remainder of the season. The offense began to function as a cohesive unit in the second half as well. Though the Raiders didn't have the same top-end scoring they did in '23, the team had greater depth to its offense and ended the year averaging nearly half a goal per game better than it had the year before.
Colgate nearly ran through their conference schedule in the latter half of the year, ending the regular season on a 10–3–1 run. As the wins piled up, the Raiders shot up the conference standings. Though hey barely missed out on a 2nd-place finish, the Raiders not only received a bye into the quarterfinal round, but they would kick of the defense of their conference championship at home. When Colgate got back on the ice, they hit the ground running against St. Lawrence. The Raiders were by far the more aggressive team in the first but the Larries were kept in the game by a stellar performance from their goaltender. SLU took advantage of a lull by Colgate in the second to score 2 goals in quick succession but the Raiders were able to recover in the third. Tommy Bergsland had a hand in 2 markers for Colgate to even the score and force overtime. The offense continued to assault the Saints' net in extra time but they could not find the winning goal. It took until the middle of the second overtime for the game to be decided, however, a seemingly harmless shot from the point was not be picked up by Gylander and found its way into the goal. The rematch saw Colgate's offense provide a consistent barrage on the St. Lawrence cage but the opposing goaltender remained stout. Colgate opened the scoring but were again down when the third period began. Ryan McGuire's power play marker even the score but, less than three minutes later, SLU's surging offense netted the go-ahead goal and the Raiders were unable to respond. The final 10 minutes of the game passed without any further scoring and Colgate's season ended with a disappointing thud.
References.
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