It’s a good bet UMass coach Greg Carvel will be avoiding gluten when his team travels to Northern Ireland for this weekend’s Friendship Four tournament.
The last time the Minutemen participated, six years ago, Carvel’s allergic reaction to an iconic dry stout of the Emerald Isle was a minor irritation of an otherwise memorable trip.
“I drank too much Guinness, and my eyes blew up,” Carvel said with a chuckle. “We don’t eat gluten in my house, except for me, and then I ate and drank too much gluten. I didn’t drink that much — I don’t want anyone to think I was drunk over there, but that’s what I remember.”
UMass will join intra-state rival UMass Lowell for the four-team event Friday and Saturday at SSE Arena in Belfast, along with Dartmouth and Quinnipiac of ECAC Hockey.
Unlike other road trips where the focus is 100 percent on hockey, the Friendship Four will allow all four teams not only showcase the sport to an international audience, but revel in the excitement of taking an overseas trip.
“It’s a tremendous opportunity to showcase what college hockey, and our league in general, can do for people who don’t get to see that every day,” said Lowell grad student forward Jon McDonald. “Traveling overseas as a team is a great way to build camaraderie and make those memories — that’s ultimately why we play college hockey to begin with.”
Lowell won the inaugural event in 2015, beating Brown in a shootout. UMass went the next year and finished third, tying St. Lawrence in the consolation game. The tournament was put on hiatus in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since its inception, the Friendship Four has always featured two teams from Hockey East and two from ECAC Hockey. Other Hockey East teams to win the Friendship Four include Vermont (2016) and Northeastern (2019). Boston College and Merrimack are the only Hockey East schools yet to participate. The tournament is the first and only college hockey tournament to take place outside of the United States.
UMass was scheduled to travel to Belfast on Monday. In addition to the tournament, the trip will include sightseeing opportunities in Belfast and Dublin, according to the team.
“You can’t go over there focused on hockey, you have to take advantage of all the excellent opportunities that are there,” Carvel said. “I think you absorb energy from the trip. When you’re at the rink, you focus on hockey, but when we’re outside the rink, you focus on the experience and the opportunity to bond as a team.”
Make no mistake, the hockey is important, too — the two UMass schools will face each other to open the tournament on Friday and the game will count in the Hockey East standings. Currently Lowell is fifth in the league at 5-3-0 (8-5-0 overall) and ranked No. 14 in the latest DCU/USCHO.com D-I men’s poll, while UMass is 2-5-0 (6-5-1) and ranked 17th.
With a win over New Hampshire last Friday, UMass snapped a five-game losing streak and will be looking to avoid sliding further down in the standings and the national rankings.
“It’ll be a challenge mentally, but we have a hungry group,” said UMass sophomore defenseman Scott Morrow. “We’ve missed out on a lot of Hockey East points here, so we’ll certainly be ready to play.”
