The Hobey Baker Memorial Award Foundation has announced that its 2015 Legend of College Hockey recipient is former Yale coach Tim Taylor.
As head coach with the Bulldogs for 28 years, Taylor made a name for himself by coaching more games than anyone in ECAC history, coaching Yale from 1976 to 2006 and going 337-433-55.
While at Yale, the Bulldogs won one ECAC title, six Ivy League championships, 19 ECAC playoff teams, a pair of 20-win seasons and many players that went on to play professionally.
Taylor, the 1997-98 Spencer Penrose Award winner, was a three-time (1986-87, 1991-92, 1997-98) ECAC Coach of the Year and a two-time (1991-92, 1997-98) New England Coach of the Year. He also coached all six of Yale’s Hobey Baker Award finalists.
He was also head coach of the 1994 U.S. Olympic team and was the assistant general manager and assistant coach for the 1984 U.S. Olympic team, head coach of the U.S. National Team at the IIHF World Championships four straight years in the 1990s and a two-time assistant for the U.S. National Team (1981 and 1983). He also led Team USA to its best finish in the 1991 Canada Cup, taking over Team USA after head coach Bob Johnson became ill, and led the Americans to second place.
Taylor, the recipient of USA Hockey’s 2006 Distinguished Achievement Award, was a 1963 Harvard graduate. He spent seven years as an assistant at his alma mater before becoming Yale’s 10th head coach. He captained the 1963 Crimson team that won the Ivy League and the ECAC championships and tallied 46 goals and 33 assists for 79 career points in 68 games.
Sadly, Taylor passed away in April 2013 at the age of 71 after a long battle with cancer. In his honor, the Tim Taylor Cup was established and presented for the first time in 2014 to the Most Outstanding Player when Harvard hosts the annual Harvard-Yale game in Cambridge, Mass.
Taylor will be honored along with this year’s Hobey Baker Award winner at the annual Hobey Baker Award Banquet on Thursday, May 28, 2015 in St. Paul, Minn
