Moving along to the penultimate segment in the Early Top 25. Four of these teams reached the NCAA tournament last year, and the other has played on Memorial Day in the last two seasons it managed to complete.
10. DENVER
2021 record: 12-5 (9-1 Big East)
Last seen: Stuffed on the doorstep in the closing seconds of a one-goal loss to Loyola in the first round of the NCAA tournament.
Initial forecast: Denver’s super-sized roster dips from 67 men to 57 this season, and while the locker room won’t be as crowded, it will also be without attackmen Jackson Morrill (33 goals, 37 assists) and Ethan Walker (39 goals, 21 assists), defenseman Colin Squires and do-everything short stick Danny Logan. Gone are 40 percent of the Pioneers’ starts and 50.9 percent of their points, a logical byproduct of the program’s embrace of fifth-year seniors and graduate transfers last season. But that big roster meant some really good players either played much smaller roles than anticipated in 2021 or simply collected dust. That talent’s still there, and Denver should again contend in the Big East. Alex Simmons (31 goals, 24 assists) and Jack Hannah (37 goals, 10 assists) are an excellent place to start on offense, and Alec Stathakis (.635 faceoff percentage) is more than capable of handling full-time duties at the X after splitting time with TD Ierlan in the second half of last season. It remains to be seen if the Pioneers’ ceiling is as high as in some other years, but they’ll surely be a team no one is thrilled to see in May.
9. YALE
2021 record: 0-0
Last seen: Handling Michigan 17-11 in Costa Mesa, Calif., on March 7, 2020 to improve to 3-1.
Initial forecast: There’s no guarantee of this, but chances are somebody from the Ivy League ends up as a top-10 team at the end of the season. And should that come to pass, is it really wise to bet against Andy Shay and Yale? There is still a strong championship residue throughout the roster, including defenseman Chris Fake, goalie Jack Starr and midfielder Brian Tevlin, and it’s not as if the Bulldogs’ recruiting has dipped at any point in the last decade. Yes, there will be plenty of inexperience with two freshman classes and a group of third-year players who have participated in just four college games so far. Still, Yale has one of the strongest internal cultures in the sport, and a program built on ruggedness and a ferocious work ethic will probably feel like it has a lot to prove in the spring, even by its usual chip-on-the-shoulder standards. If the quarterfinals roll around and the Bulldogs are still playing, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, even if Yale heads into the season with some post-pandemic uncertainty.