After three consecutive losing seasons, can new coach Ben Syer turn the tide for men’s hockey?

As the curtain closed on the 2023–24 season for men’s ice hockey with consecutive losses in half-empty arenas, the need for a change on the ice was brought to a boil. The Tigers have qualified for the NCAA tournament just once since 2009 and haven’t boasted a winning record since the 2017–18 season. While the glory days have been few and far between throughout the program’s 130-year history, new head coach Ben Syer believes he can take the squad to new heights — and he has the track record to prove it.

Syer’s depth of knowledge about the game of hockey comes from his time as assistant coach at his two stops prior to coming to Princeton — Quinnipiac and Cornell. Those two programs, partly with the work of Syer, turned into perennial Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) powerhouses that are in contention for national titles on a yearly basis.

In just his second year on the Quinnipiac staff, Syer — who served as recruitment coordinator for the Bobcats — was tasked with building an entire Division I hockey program from the ground up, as the university entered Division I in the 1998–99 season. 

“We were a Division I program just starting out, like, [playing on] a off-campus rink, people couldn’t say nor pronounce Quinnipiac,” Syer said of his first assistant coaching gig. “I’m sure there were many Division III programs at the time that were better funded than we were.” 

Slowly over time, the Quinnipiac program evolved into one of the more formidable programs in college hockey, with Syer overseeing milestones for the program during his time on head coach Rand Pecknold’s staff. The program moved into the ECAC in 2005, and the program’s meteoric rise led to the opening of the on-campus TD Bank Sports Center in 2007. The program’s ascension culminated in Quinnipiac’s first National Championship in 2023, emblematic of the long process it takes to build a program from scratch. 

“Seeing things grow from the ground level and to be around Rand [Pecknold], where we’re recruiting, was so important in building a program from that level, and how much effort that went in to get the right players,” Syer said.

While with the Bobcats, Syer not only learned how to breed excellence on the ice, but also how to build a winning culture with the right people.

“I got told no a lot of times. But I also realized that we needed to…