Too accustomed to losing

NORTH ANDOVER -- Two years ago, Merrimack College's hockey team had the worst season in its history, which is saying something.

The team hasn't had a winning season since it played in the NCAA's Division 2 during the Reagan administration. But in 2004-05, Merrimack managed only one win in Hockey East play, on Nov. 6. And after a promising 5-3-2 stretch from Thanksgiving to New Year's, the team lost its final 14 games, as well as any sort of connection between the players and sixth-year coach Chris Serino.

"Coach Serino was a very good guy -- he looked out for all of his players," said current senior captain Ryan Sullivan, a sophomore at the time. "Maybe it wasn't even his fault. It was just time for the program to go in a different direction. We needed something new."

On the surface, Merrimack hockey has seemed to need something new for almost 18 years, since the last time there was a big change in the hockey landscape in North Andover.

Before then, the Warriors had been among the dominant teams nationally in Division 2, capturing seven Eastern College Athletic Conference titles and the program's only national championship in 1978. Hockey has been around for almost the school's entire history, and Merrimack officials insist the sport is ingrained in the fabric of the small Catholic school.

"It's our flagship," said second-year athletic director Sean Frazier. "At the end of the day, it is the sport that our alumni have rallied behind."

It was with that excitement before the 1989-90 season that the team determined it was ready to make the jump into Division 1 and Hockey East, which was then a relatively young league but had already established itself as among the elite conferences nationally. Today, most college hockey pundits consider Hockey East to be the second-strongest conference, behind the Western Collegiate Hockey Conference.

Since then, it's been mostly the same story over and over for Merrimack.

There have been blips of success -- like a .500 season in league play in 1996-97 or a first-round upset of Boston University in the conference tournament in 1998. But the league's powerhouses like Boston College, BU, the University of New Hampshire, and the University of Maine simply restock their talent pool every season; Merrimack continually struggles just to get something started.

"Initially there's some excitement, so you join the league and you get a little bit of a bump out of that, and hopefully you're able to attract some players that you might not be able to attract at other times," said current head coach Mark Dennehy. "If you don't have that initial success, that positive vibe that you get . . . wanes. There's definitely an expiration date on that positive feeling. And I think that's what happened with regards to joining the league."

Dennehy is hoping the latest positive feeling -- the one that came when he was hired after Serino's resignation two summers ago -- will have different results. But there's a lot of work to be done.

"You come in and you've got all these visions of grandeur," said Dennehy, a self-proclaimed eternal optimist. "This was a reclamation project," he said, adding that the team's record simply showed that the program needed a lot of work.

In many ways, Merrimack is like a gambler in a casino -- the odds are automatically against them. As Dennehy noted, most New England-area hockey recruits grow up dreaming of playing for BC or BU, meaning that schools like Merrimack begin with a heavy recruiting disadvantage.

"Even when I was [an assistant coach] at UMass[-Amherst], with a $51 million twin rink facility, for a local kid, you're spinning your wheels if you're battling with BC and BU," Dennehy said. "It's almost like when I was selling telecommunications, as soon as you heard the person had AT&T, you hung up the phone because you knew they were brainwashed into thinking that was the best phone service available."

There's also the difference in terms of size of school (many of the Hockey East schools have more than 10,000 students, while Merrimack is closer to 2,000 ), size of rink (Most Hockey East rinks seat at least 6,000 , while Merrimack's Lawler Arena holds about 3,000), and in turn, size of revenue.

But Merrimack hasn't wavered in its commitment to Hockey East, at least in the two years since Frazier and Dennehy have taken control. Dennehy said Merrimack needs Hockey East to keep the Division 1 excitement on campus, and said having Merrimack (a "David") is good for Hockey East (many "Goliaths"), too -- but "it will only benefit Hockey East if Merrimack can hold up its end of the bargain and be a much more competitive product."

Recruiting players who can skate, hit, and score with the Boston teams' NHL draft picks and big guns may be the most important piece of that puzzle, and Dennehy's out to prove that Merrimack has a lot of things that the big schools might not. Frazier referred to it repeatedly as an "academic niche" -- elite hockey players who want a small-college experience blended with big-time hockey might choose Merrimack.

Both men stressed creativity in recruiting, as Dennehy said he's trying to reach out to locales other schools might not, and he may have found one such place in Quebec. Dennehy has also upgraded some of the players' comforts -- from locker room trimmings to travel amenities -- to make the whole experience a little more professional. Dennehy's players also praised the coach's straightforward nature.

Both Frazier and Dennehy have experience in similar situations -- and seem convinced they can accomplish the same results at Merrimack.

When he was an assistant at UMass under coach Don Cahoon, the staff had a four-year plan to make the team competitive, and in the fourth year, the Minutemen took Maine to three overtimes before losing in the league championship game. Frazier, meanwhile, came from Clarkson University, where he hired men's and women's hockey coaches who have brought the teams in or near the top 10 in the current national rankings.

But all the theories in the world won't do anything unless the team performs well on the ice.

Last year, in Dennehy's first season, Merrimack finished last in the league for the second straight year, winning just three conference games. But the team has already matched that total this season, and may have turned a corner, winning two of their last three league games -- all against UMass -- before falling to BC Wednesday. Sophomore goalie Patrick Watson was outstanding in the two recent wins, and could be the most important piece over the next few years.

Still, this year's team has 10 freshmen -- Dennehy's first full class -- and had managed only 16 goals in its first 13 league games. Dennehy knew it would take time, but said that during tough stretches of losing last year and earlier this season, it was his players who kept his head on straight.

The only way to make progress, Dennehy said, is to live in the day-to-day, focus on the task at hand, and make sure you're headed in the right direction.

"It's going to come together," said assistant captain Justin Mills.

"This team and this school will be successful if the people that are here stay and continue to lead in the way that they're leading," he said.

"We're trying to change a culture that didn't believe it could win into a culture that believes it can win every night," said Dennehy.

Mike Lipka can be reached at mlipka@globe.com.