Coaches are generally happy when their charges arrive on campus ahead of the start of the academic year to organize informal workouts and begin team-building exercises. That’s what happened at Rensselaer in the late summer months and it resulted in a great start for the Engineers. The Engineers started with seven wins in their first 11 games following a Nov. 13 5-2 win at Clarkson. The didn’t achieve seven wins last season until Feb. 13, the 29th game of the year.

Chase Polacek

The other side of the story is that it comes with a price. Too much, too soon can take a toll on a team’s mental and physical strength once the season begins and according to head coach Seth Appert, that’s what RPI has faced in back-to-back losses.

“The last two games we’ve probably hit a wall a little bit. All of our guys came back early in the summer to get together and work out and prepare for the season, but you worry about fatigue,” Appert said. “That’s one of the reasons we left this weekend open so that guys can go home if they want, allow them to refresh and recharge. We didn’t have a lot of life or energy the last two games and we were pretty lethargic.”

A relatively young lineup that has also been affected by injuries is still learning about the heavy game workload and travel that ECAC Hockey’s non-Ivy League teams face in the early parts of the season. RPI has missed talented junior forward Tyler Helfrich for the last seven games and had five regulars out of its lineup in Wednesday’s game against Niagara.

The Engineers have nine full days between games, before hosting their annual holiday tournament next weekend. They’ll have time to recharge as their coach wishes, but can also build on some positive indicators from the season’s opening stretch. RPI’s improvement in record has already been mentioned, and one of the reasons for that has been an improved power play. The Engineers have cashed in 13 PPGs in 13 games after scoring a total of just 17 in 39 games last season. Two freshman play on RPI’s top power play (Brandon Pirri and Jerry D’Amigo) and sophomore defenseman Mike Bergin has only 17 total games of collegiate experience (four as a freshman) due to injury. Senior Paul Kerins and junior Chase Polacek round out the unit. Polacek leads the team and is among the nation’s leaders in goals (9) and points (17).

All factors considered, it’s been a great start for RPI. They’re scoring more goals and getting more consistent play from a growing defense corps that experienced some pains in learning the collegiate game at a relatively young age over the last few seasons.

“We’re getting there but we have a long way to go. When we play fast, physical, energetic and in your face we’re a pretty good team,” Appert said. “The majority of the first 11 games we were an aggressive, attacking team. Also, our defense has played more maturely.”

THREE MORE THINGS WORTH KNOWING

• Yale coach Keith Allain played as a goaltender during his playing days with the Bulldogs and earned a reputation as being a goaltending specialist as an assistant coach at the professional level. Therefore, when he turned to freshman Nick Maricic to make his first collegiate start against top-five opponent Cornell last weekend you had to trust that Allain knew what he was doing. Maricic responded with 25 saves in the win over Cornell and stopped 19 shots the following night in a tie against Colgate. He made 32 saves in Thursday night’s loss to Massachusetts.

• Quite a nice little pair of weekend sets on tap as Colgate and Cornell host Quinnipiac and Princeton for a pair of games at Starr Rink and Lynah Rink. All four teams are in the top half of the ECAC Hockey standings and all of them currently reside in the INCH Power Rankings. This weekend could go a long way toward sorting out the contenders and pretenders near the top of ECAC Hockey.

• The Good: It’s not too early to look ahead to intriguing and challenging non-league games during the holiday season, right? Harvard-Minnesota, Cornell vs. Colorado College and North Dakota, Princeton-Lowell, RPI-BU … the list keeps going. The Bad: With 22 goals against in five games, Harvard ranks dead last in the nation in overall defense, allowing 4.4 goals against per game. The Ugly: With Niagara’s win over Rensselaer on Wednesday night, that leaves Brown and Dartmouth as the only winless teams in the country.